The Book of Bera

by Suzie Wilde

  ‘Look out!’ yelled a crewman, as a huge pine trunk swept past them, missing the hull by an oar’s-length.

  Only a strong wind could wrest them out of the Maelstrom’s grip. Bera got the men to raise the sail but it hung limp. In rising panic, they all stared at the Maelstrom, where the giant tree was spun like a splinter of driftwood, upended and then sucked down to the monster beneath. They would be next. Bera grasped her beads.

  Hefnir touched her arm.

  ‘I’m trying to think!’ she cried.

  ‘Help us, I beg you.’ His face was suddenly vulnerable as a child’s.

  The palm of her hand was red from holding her beads so tightly. The B rune was imprinted there, a sign.

  She took her sword from its sheath. ‘ALU,’ she said.

  ‘ALU.’ Hefnir nodded understanding.

  They both held up their swords and the sun appeared, making the metal glint.

  ‘ALU,’ chanted the men. ‘ALU.’

  Egill joined them all. ‘ALU.’

  A small breeze made Bera’s hair shift. She must whistle up what she had started. Bera blew a long, slow note towards the sail. Then, from astern, a woven greyness wrinkled the water.

  ‘It’s coming,’ she said.

  The wind arrived with a slap that made the sail crack and billow. They were off! Hefnir steered the planing boat to the island. They lowered the sail, rowed into the shallows, jumped ashore, rolled it up the beach and doubled over with exhaustion.

  ‘Told you it was slack.’ said Egill.

  Bera ran at Egill and pushed her over. Her look of honest surprise made Bera laugh. Then they were all laughing, crying, shoving each other.

  ‘Listen,’ Bera said.

  In the distance came the mellow, bugling call of hundreds of swans. From off the land came flock after flock, their golden wings translucent against the sun. They were whistling swans on their way to their breeding grounds in the farthest north. There were so many that it sounded like a terrible tearing of the sky. Bera felt the beat in her chest and her eyes streamed with tears. After an age, the sound grew less, until the few remaining birds were past.

  Hefnir pulled her head round to his and kissed her hard and long.

  ‘You did well,’ he said, ‘my little Valla.’

  He respected her powers, at last.

  Bera left the others tending to the boat and went to explore the island. Thousands of tiny pebbles and dead creatures, pounded and milled by the sea over eternities, pricked her feet. She pulled off her loose dress and raced her shadow on the white expanse, her hair flying and eyes streaming.

  She stopped for a moment to see if Hefnir was following. He was at the shoreline, ripping off his clothes to be swifter in the chase. Bera felt fear and desire combine, quickening through her like the first lungful of sea air. She laughed and ran on; feet thrilling to the minute sharpness beneath them and every hair of her body taut with anticipation.

  She shrieked as he grasped her from behind with boat-hardened hands. She turned, smiling, about to speak when Hefnir kissed her. Urgently. It had not been like this before. He knew her for her real self and respected her Valla power. And that burgeoning force brought an equal rush of desire. Her husband responded. They were sudden savages. His wind-chapped lips grazed her throat and he pulled her to him, their hearts pounding out of their chests. He carried her into the water like a new bride. A jolt of iciness made them scream together and laugh. And then the loving completion of flesh joining flesh took her breath away. An ordinary miracle of nature.

  They unclenched and ran back up the beach, holding hands. Hefnir rubbed her briskly to get dry and they lay together, shivering. Bera wanted to stay in this moment. She walked her fingers down his chest to the darker hair below. Hefnir smiled. It was gentle this time, and longer, like the rock of her fishing boat when she lay on its sole.

  Bera woke, frozen. Hefnir was gone, leaving her vulnerable and lonely. She collected her dress from where she had thrown it and instead of finding the others, she sat and sulked.

  Her skern put icy fingers against her cheek. Get a fire going, will you? You can use the thing in your pocket.

  Bera took out a smooth piece of glass, like dried flatfish skin. It was the one she had absently picked up at Egill’s, which had dug into her thigh overnight and hurt her. As lucky as Agnar, with his sea-milled eyes. She held it up to her own. The world turned glaucous and remote.

  Her skern sighed. You are such a baby sometimes. It’s a wonder you haven’t sucked it.

  She glared at him. ‘My Valla instinct made me take it. What is it?’

  He coughed behind his hand. Clearly, it is a remnant of some wealthy object. A jug, or beaker perhaps. Fetch some driftwood.

  ‘This had better have a purpose.’

  He buffed his fingernails.

  Bera went up the beach, found three small branches and a piece of salt-bleached birch. She threw them down crossly.

  He smiled. Now. Hold the glass a small distance from the birch and you’ll see a white light fall on the wood. It’s a sunbeam to play with. Go on, try.

  Bera was fascinated. She found the exact distance to hold it so the white light made a thin brown line on the wood. When it became frail she moved the glass closer to make a strong, if wobbly, line. She laughed with delight and turned to speak but there was the unclasping ache in her ribs and Hefnir was there instead, with a pile of wood.

  ‘You carry on playing and I’ll set the fire,’ he said.

  ‘I’m not playing!’

  Hefnir made a rough fire pit in a circle of stones, set struts of the driftwood in the centre and laid some twigs and driftwood against them, sloping away from the breeze. Then he sat down, took out his knife and cut a notch in the flattest piece of dry wood.

  ‘Women. You always have to decorate things. You’re not practical.’ He carefully placed a thin piece of bark underneath, carved a shallow dip next to the notch and held a long thin branch against it, rolling the spindle fast between his flat hands.

  Bera was not looking at what she was doing. There was a smell of burning where the glass had scorched the wood. It gave her an idea. She held the glass closer and saw a whisper of smoke.

  ‘Hefnir, bring me some dry grass.’

  ‘I’m busy.’

  Bera marched across, put some of his grass on her burned wood and then held the glass close. A curl of smoke rose.

  ‘Quick!’

  Hefnir put some thin bark to it, which caught light. Bera carefully took the fireboard over to the pit and placed it under the stack. She blew softly on the tiny flames and then the wood caught and crackled, leaping into life.

  They looked at each other.

  ‘That’s faster than a fire-steel,’ Hefnir said. ‘Where did you get it?’

  ‘I found it in Egill’s hut.’ Perhaps she had got it away from Egill.

  ‘It’ll work even when it’s wet.’

  ‘Don’t show it to Egill.’

  Bera felt disloyal, but there was danger stirring deep in the glass and, even without her skern’s warning, some instinct about Egill’s eagerness for peril disturbed her.

  After making love again, Bera let Hefnir roughly braid her hair.

  ‘We should get back to the others.’ He was withdrawing inside himself, like the Hefnir she was used to.

  ‘Are you glad I came?’

  His kiss was to avoid answering.

  Bera ought to love him but how could she when he kept changing? Strange company he kept, too: the butcher Thorvald and the Serpent King. What was Hefnir’s true nature?

  ‘Who is that man? The one you do business with?’

  ‘A trader.’ He did not ask which man out of so many.

  Hefnir drank, then passed her the ale flask.

  Bera pushed it away. ‘You treat me like a child. I’m supposed to be your equal partner.’

  ‘What is this?’

  ‘I know he’s called the Serpent King!’

  Her anger was being fed by fear. She
picked up a fur and threw it at him, and then a blanket.

  ‘Look at you standing there, smug. I hate you! I thought we were closer now but you’re cold and not even there when I wake up!’

  ‘Stop it, Bera. You always spoil it for yourself.’

  Truth made it worse. She saw herself seizing a log from the fire and smacking him, hard. Perhaps he saw it in her face because he held her tight in a bear hug. When her breathing slowed he kissed her forehead tenderly.

  She said, ‘At least we can fight without everyone in Seabost hearing it.’

  Hefnir laughed. ‘I think they still might have heard you from here!’

  She cuffed him without rancour and hugged him back.

  ‘I don’t know where to start,’ he said, over the top of her head. ‘You know nothing of the world, Bera. I know you think your father is hard, and Thorvald, but believe me, they are nothing compared to what’s out there.’

  ‘So what is this Serpent King?’

  He moved away from her. ‘It’s better you don’t know.’

  ‘Why?’

  He jabbed the embers with a stick.

  ‘Does Thorvald know?’

  He prodded the fire harder, so that some sparks flew.

  ‘He does know, doesn’t he? Why do you trust him more than me? You think because I’m young and a woman, that I couldn’t...’

  ‘I know you tried to kill him. That’s why he’s at home.’

  Bera was livid. Thorvald must have told Hefnir she was in his billet. She was lucky all Hefnir had done was bring her hunting but couldn’t stop herself.

  ‘So this isn’t my treat! You’re keeping us apart!’

  ‘Thorvald’s important to me.’

  ‘Give me one good reason.’

  ‘Thorvald’s the one who takes the tribute to... the king.’

  Bera was spitting. ‘He’s not a real king! Why pay a tribute to a tattooed monster?’

  ‘You see? I knew you would be angry.’

  They glared at each other, their arms folded across their chests. Bera felt as if she had lost something, like when her skern left her.

  ‘Anyway, Thorvald said the reindeer was a tribute to you!’

  ‘I don’t give anyone tributes.’ Hefnir paused. ‘I was using a word you’d understand. Look. We trade where we can and where we can’t trade we take. Simple as that. Men die. It’s the price we pay for our thralls and furs. But there are others who risk nothing. They are sea-riders, Bera, whose dragonboats lie in wait for our trading vessels to come home and then attack when we are already battle-weary. They take whatever they want.’

  ‘But the Serpent lives in the mountains.’

  ‘He’s not one of them. He keeps the sea-riders off us. You’ve heard about the raid that took our young women and killed my wife? Well, he got them to leave Seabost. I owe him, Bera. It’s simple: every season we pay him to let us get home with our goods. He either pays whoever it is that runs him, or he has to fight, so the price I pay is high.’

  ‘I still don’t understand why you deal with him.’

  ‘The price of safety goes up all the time, Bera, and it’s a price we must pay. With tusks.’

  ‘You should have told me, Hefnir.’ But he was telling her now. Was he starting to care?

  ‘For so many years now I’ve only discussed business with—’

  Bera kissed him before he could say the name, then lingered. There was one last question she wanted answered.

  ‘I saw a vision of the Serpent King. He gave Heggi a wooden horse. A woman came …’

  Hefnir pushed her away. ‘Impossible! He is nothing! Do you understand? Not a king, nothing. He is a non-person, just like my dead wife. I don’t ever want to hear you talk about him again.’

  Hefnir threw together their belongings. Bera was even more confused and they returned to the others in silence, while the sea held a memory of light to show the way. It was the end of their honeymoon.

  Later, Bera stared up at the stars, a buttermilk immensity, while Hefnir lay dozing beside her. His weight was keeping her warm but she gently wriggled away. The Serpent was still on her mind. She thought about the fire-blackened houses in Seabost. It was good that Hefnir had explained some of it to her but why would he not talk about her vision? And did Thorvald have a private deal with the Serpent? Two monsters together.

  She rolled out, threw a fur round her, carried her sword and strode down to the sea. There was no fear of Drorghers in this barren land but there were other predators. The mysteries of being a married woman and a Valla weighed heavily.

  ‘Mama. Please show me you’re here.’

  Valla power increased desire. Bera longed to be purified. Bathing in the moon’s silver sea path would be numbingly cold and full of unseen jaws and coils. So she slipped off her fur, her skern sheathed her and they were soaked in moonlight.

  Pebbles crunched. She grabbed the sword, twisting to see her foe.

  It was Egill.

  She lowered her weapon. ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Lonely.’

  ‘Me too.’

  Egill put the fur round Bera’s shoulders and they hugged to get warm. They sat together on one side of the fire; the sleeping men invisible on the other. There was a distant, lonely howl, then total silence.

  In this secret darkness Bera spoke about all the losses in her life: about seeing her mother die; about Bjorn being like a brother and letting him die too. It brought her to the problem of Thorvald and she stopped.

  Egill took her hand. ‘Tell.’

  She would never see Egill again once the hunt was over. Another loss, but for now it was a relief to talk to someone uninvolved.

  ‘I’m going to make Thorvald pay the blood debt because paying Ottar for a boat is not enough.’

  ‘He sounds like a Viking.’

  ‘He’s evil. He scares me.’ Bera did not like admitting this.

  ‘Bera, you see things so black and white. But things are shades of the same, even life and death. When you’re born you’re fit to die. Can’t die if you’ve never lived. Only a heartbeat between the two.’

  ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

  ‘Good, bad. Boy, girl. Right, wrong. What’s the difference?’

  Everything.

  Bera let go of Egill’s hand, went over to the driftwood heap and placed some on the glowing embers. They popped and crackled.

  ‘As soon as we’ve got walrus we’re going home. I think Hefnir needs to pay someone fast.’ She dropped her voice even lower. ‘He tried to force me, this snake he has to pay. He has black tattoos all over his body.’

  Egill’s eyes widened. ‘Serpents?’

  ‘You know him?’

  ‘In Iraland.’

  The Serpent King must infest the known world. ‘I’m hoping he’s killed Thorvald while we’re away.’

  ‘Seems you ought to scotch the snake, not Thorvald.’

  ‘My skern’s right. I’m no swordswoman.’

  ‘Use other skills then.’ Egill tapped her head.

  ‘I don’t have any. Except healing with plants.’ A log cracked, making Bera jump. ‘I did once, by mistake, mix poison...’

  ‘Then use that.’

  ‘No! It’s dishonourable. There might be consequences. Although ...’

  ‘What?’

  ‘It might be different for a Valla.’ She hoped it was.

  ‘Revenge can destroy anyone, Bera.’

  ‘Why do you care?’

  Egill’s gaze was like a finger, feeling the features. ‘Friends?’

  Bera made a Thor hammer sign. ‘Friends.’

  ‘Show mercy and be saved.’ Egill did a big forehead to chest cross.

  ‘What’s mer-sea?’

  Egill could not explain. ‘Someone said. In Iraland.’

  The men began to stir. Time to hunt.

  They took knives and tackle from the boat, sharpened spears and axes. Bera went off behind a shrub. A white fox turned its pointed face to look at her before it trickled on
between small mounds of snow, keeping low. It had a fine tail. She had not seen a live one before, though these days she wore the skins.

  When she got back, Hefnir had a whale-hook ready, lashed to a long wooden stave with extra rope, which was coiled over his arm. The others mocked Egill’s whittled staff but when she pointed with it to where they would find most walrus they followed.

  Bera was happy. The rising sun striped the ground mauve and yellow and the frosty air twinkled like falling stars. Small creatures popped up and watched as they passed. High above them, birds with wide wings lazily circled and mewled. Bera’s nostrils prickled and she sneezed, causing the men to make the hammer sign on their chests; except for Egill, who made her own version again.

  The yowling, barking, mewling was deafening. Underneath was a deep roar, like an approaching gale. When they reached the next bay the smell hit. The shore was studded with seals of different size and colour; some of them with howling pups. They carefully picked a slippery way through the writhing mass. Pups squealed and mothers barked if a foot landed too close but mostly it was the chatter of seals going about their business.

  The stench of fish and seal droppings made Bera’s eyes stream. Egill nudged her, to show that all the others had covered their faces with neck-cloths. It helped.

  At the far end, on a ledge that jutted into the sea, was a group of fifty or more walruses. They were dozing. Egill showed Bera the different tusk lengths of males and females. The creatures were ranged in colour, from almost pink to a soft brown. Their long whiskers twitched and occasionally a flipper would sleepily wave.

  As they drew close, Hefnir gestured that they should get round behind the nearest group. Bera stayed at the rear as she was new to this, with Egill watching her back. Hefnir crawled towards the biggest male, keeping low. They followed him as closely as they could, to look like one animal to the sentinel walrus. Unlike the seals, this one was properly on guard, so whenever it showed any interest they would freeze until it settled once more. It was like the game of trole-stones they used to play as children. Bjorn used to beg her to stop. She pushed the memory away.