War of the Gods

by Poul Anderson

  In the summer she grew great with child. A while past Yule, on a night when wind wailed and sleet hissed around the hall, she was brought to bed of it.

  Through the long darkness and the glimmer of day and the darkness again she fought. Lamps guttered, torches smoked, shadows wavered thick. The bower stank of their smoke and of the sweat, cold and slick, that drenched every gown the women gave her. Straw ticks, gone sodden with blood, were taken off to be burnt. The midwife hovered helpless. In the corners, three witch-wives whom she had sent for hunched on their three-legged stools, singing their spells.

  Ragnhild gasped. The midwife brought water and held up her head that she might suck of it. She fell back onto the bed. Another wave passed through her belly.

  Again and again.

  Hadding sat in the hall among his housecarles. They drank. By daylight they ate something, without giving it heed, and then drank more. Sleep overwhelmed one after another, until at last they all slumped on the benches or sprawled on rushes, snoring. Hadding sat alone in the high seat. His gaze smoldered ember-red.

  Dawn grayed. The midwife came in to him. “Lord, I bring you sorrow,” she said. “The queen has died, and the birth was cold.”

  Hadding looked at her as a blind man might look. “Was it a boy or a girl?” he croaked.

  “A girl.”

  “I think she would have liked that.”

  He rose and stiffly followed her to the bower. The flames of a few lamps were fading into the dimness that leaked from the sky outside. He was used to blood and reek, he need give them no heed. Instead he walked across the floor, between the awed witches, to the birthbed. A while he stood, looking down. Ragnhild stared back at him. Her face was gray and hollowed out, nothing like the face that once he kissed.

  He bent over to close her eyes. “You were a warrior,” he said. “I could never have fought the fight you did. Wherever you are bound, let them honor you.”

  His hand stroked the wet ruddy hair. He straightened and went out.

  XXVII

  A man hight Tosti. He it was who broke the long peace. In those days the Danes lived mainly on their islands and in Scania. Only the northern fourth of Jutland paid scot to their king. However, more and more of them were moving in, as younger sons overflowed from olden farmsteads. For the most part this happened quietly. The Jutes thereabouts were not many and much land lay open for the taking. The newcomers cleared, built, plowed, and married daughters of the earlier dwellers. Thorps grew, some until they were towns; ships sailed in and out; overland trade waxed; households did well.

  Otherwise the Dane-king held only a pale, some two miles long and wide, on the eastern shore across from Funen. Hadding’s father Gram had taken it with the sword, that he might have a sheriff there to keep watch on the Little Belt that sundered island and mainland.

  Elsewhere the Jutes were in the hands of kings who were hardly more than quarrelsome chieftains. They did not have all the rest of the peninsula. The Anglians owned much of its western half and lands reaching on toward Frisia. The Saxons filled the eastern side of its lower neck though most of their country swept from the valley of the Elbe through the valley of the Ysel. Some of their kingdoms were strong.

  Though Dane, Jute, Anglian, and Saxon thought of themselves as unlike each other, they were closely akin in blood, tongue, and lifeways. Many of them were going west overseas to harry the Franks and carve new homes out of England.

  Tosti hailed from the backbone of mid-Jutland, the son of a poor yeoman who barely grubbed a living from a few gaunt acres. The father died while the boy was small, and Tosti did not get on with the man who took his mother in. Nor was he ever willing for such a lowly life Early on he ran about with other youths of his bent. Their wildness fed on itself. As they got their growth, they started to waylay men, whom they robbed and left beaten half to death.

  Word went around and charges were brought at the Thing. The fathers could not pay weregild. The gang would not even come speak for themselves. Instead, they broke into lonely garths while the owners and carles were at the meeting. They raped, killed, and robbed. Thereafter they were named wolves in the halidom, whom any man could slay without having to answer to the law.

  They took to the heath. First Tosti split the skull of his stepfather.

  A few fights made him their unquestioned leader, while he never owned any man his lord. In the course of the next ten years or so, he gathered more ruffians to him. By their raids they gained skill and weapons, as well as plunder which they could trade for whatever else they wanted. When king’s men came after them, sometimes they threw back the attack on a camp of theirs, sometimes they withdrew to another. Deep woods, misty fens, trackless moors were full of lairs for them.

  Bit by bit Tosti began selling his strength too. Outlaw he was at home. No king anywhere wanted beasts like this in his guard. Yet when the war-arrow went around, the robbers could be useful hirelings—or better than useful, raging ahead to rip the throat out of the foe.

  Afterward they would go back to the stronghold they now had. It stood alone on a high heath, looking widely over ling, gorse, tussocks, scattered thickets, and murky meres. The frame of its stockade was a ring of standing stones left by the giants of old. Tosti gibed at their ghosts. Thralls died hauling the timbers, digging the turf, breaking the rocks that went to build it. When they were done it crouched as a thorp, bulky, filthy, unruly, but his. Kine lowed around it, grazing in summer, fed in winter on hay cut wherever grass grew. This and all other work fell to the thralls, some reaved from their homes, some bought in marts where nobody kenned the buyers. More than half of them were women, who trudged about their tasks, spread their legs when a warrior bade, and seldom lived long. Nor did any children they bore.

  Other needs, such as grain, cloth, and iron, came from outside. Tosti’s gang had won the means to pay for it when paying was easier than snatching. He had, in truth, become a kind of chieftain in his own right. Any one or two of the little Jutish kings could have raised a host too-big for him, and taken the time to hound him down. But he shrewdly furthered wariness among them. Thus he said once to Orm of Donlund, “If ever you go up against me, that will leave your own land open to Svengir of Hrossmark. You know well what grudges he nurses. Would you not both do better to stay on the good side of me? Make me a yearly payment and we brothers will leave you alone. Well, maybe once in a while there’ll be some small raid, but nothing much. Besides, all Jutes should remember that the Anglians are always watchful. Tempt them not.”

  So it was that Tosti waxed in might. Maybe he would have grown greater than he did, were it not that his faithlessness and cruelty shocked too many hardened men. They came to call him Tosti the Wicked. That delighted him.

  He was not tall, but very broad and thick, bandy-legged, strong as a bear. His face was ill to behold, with eyes sunken deep under a narrow forehead, snoutlike nose, buck teeth in a gash of a mouth, unkempt black hair and beard. His garb was greasy, he seldom bathed, and more fleas hopped on him than did on most folk. He liked using his fists and boots on the women he took.

  Withal, he had the somewhat fearful worship of his men. It was not only that they had nowhere else to go. Without him to lead them, they would soon be scattered and slain, and they knew it. He had brought them to what they thought was a better life than a poor yeoman’s or a homeless landlouper’s. He could be merry when he chose, in his rough way, livening drinking bouts that would otherwise have been cheerless. He held dreams up before them.

  The day would come, he said, when they were no longer outlaws, hunting meager prey. No, they would be at the front of a wave that swept over all Jutland, drowned every foe, brought down haughty Hadding, and raised a mighty kingdom.

  It was not all boasting. After years Tosti felt ready to move.

  Besides his own henchmen, he gathered Jutes from the Saxon marches. Warface back and forth had left abiding hatreds, and there was moreover the hope of loot. The host was not very big, but its men were bold and war-wonte
d. They gave no warning as they went swiftly south. Soon the red cock crowed on roofs as far as eye could see.

  The king’s reeve in those parts, Syfrid, mustered what strength he quickly could and met them. That was a bloody affray. The Saxons held their ground, but barely, and behind windrows of their dead. Near sunset, the Jutes drew back and sat down to rest. Tosti sent a man with a white shield to ask if the Saxon leader would like to talk.

  Syfrid would, however bad it tasted. The two of them stalked toward one another across the ling between their men. Ravens flapped heavily up and sought their food farther off. Their croaking was almost the only sound. The west went red.

  “Will you have peace?” Tosti greeted.

  Syfrid folded his arms and glowered. “You should be he who begs for it,” he answered.

  “Why? We drubbed you today. Tomorrow we’ll wipe out the last of you.”

  “That will be as the Father of Victories chooses. But surely your pack will never get home alive. Already the king must be calling up a levy to stamp you flat underfoot.”

  “We can be gone faster than you think, laying waste along our way. Why should your landsmen suffer needlessly/ You can have great gain instead, that may in time bring you higher than your king.”

  Syfrid stood long silent before he asked, “How can that be?”

  “You must join us in making war on Denmark. Hold!” Tosti lifted a hand. “What I mean is to lure King Hadding to his death. Without him, his lands will lie open to those who go in at once, before his jarls or his young son can rally the Danes anew. There’ll be no dearth of chieftains who’ll join us, eager to share the spoils. But first we must be rid of Hadding.”

  “No, you’re mad!”

  Tosti fleered. “If I am, you needn’t share the madness. Only tell me no, and die tomorrow. But if you have any wisdom, you’ll at least hear me out first.”

  They talked long into the night. Stars wheeled, owls hooted, wolf-song wailed. Tosti wheedled, browbeat, uttered terrible threats, made vast promises, and wore the Saxon down. The upshot was that at dawn they swore oaths.

  Folk at Haven knew nothing of this. They were holding a feast that would be long remembered, when Hadding’s son Frodi wedded Viborg, daughter of King Hunding in Svithjod. Whole herds had plodded across Zealand to feed the guests, whole wagon trains brought ale, mead, and outland wine to slake them. Houses bulged with sleepers, tents and booths crowded acres. Fires brawled, racket rang to the sky, skalds chanted their verses, mummers played their pranks, everybody talked, sang, told tales, dickered, seldom quarreled and never too badly, spoke of what was to come, sported, japed, and after dark begot no few children.

  When the torchbearers had led the young man and woman to their bridal bower, while raw good wishes were shouted forth to frighten off evil beings and help bring fruitfulness, the fathers withdrew for a while They strolled out through the fields under stars and a sickle moon. The air rested cool. The noise of merrymaking grew faint behind them.

  “Well,” said Hadding low, “now it’s done. May they find gladness.”

  Hunding chuckled. “From what I’ve heard of Frodi and know of you, my Viborg will never feel slighted.”

  “It’s not easy, being man and wife, and more may hang on this wedlock than on most.”

  “You’re thoughtful. Why now?”

  Hadding smiled wryly. “A man grows older.”

  “But we can only make the best of our lives, no? What our offspring may do with theirs lies beyond us.”

  “Still, I watch them as they grow up, and wonder.”

  “Keeping track of that many must keep you busy.” Suddenly Hunding caught hold of the Dane’s arm. “Fear not, good friend. You’ll stay above ground a long while yet. You may outlive me, and I’m not worrying.”

  Hadding looked at him. “You’re younger.”

  “No man may flee his weird. But while you’re alive, I’ll be happy, and peace will abide between our kingdoms.” Hunding shrugged. “Come, this is getting too grave. Let’s go back and drain some more beakers.”

  As they walked, he saw how Hadding limped more heavily than erstwhile.

  The feast ended, the guests trekked home, quietness fell over the trampled earth. Then out of a rainy day came horsemen galloping.

  Ships had grounded on Lolland, they cried. The crews seemed to be mingled Jutes and Saxons. They were harrying about as no vikings had dared in Denmark for many years. Though they numbered only two or three hundred, they were too much for the neighhorhood’s men. From things overheard it was known that one Tosti was at their head.

  “We have heard of him before,” said Hadding between set teeth. “Soon the world will hear no more.” He sent for his housecarles and by dawn they were riding south.

  Down Zealand they sped, gave themselves and their horses a short sleep in the light night, then ferried across to the island Falster. This they laid behind them in hours, reached another strait, and ferried again. Above the green fields and daisy-studded meadows of Lolland, smoke stained heaven. It pointed the way more surely than did the folk who stumbled past, fleeing with whatever they had been able to take.

  High woodland walled in the last part of the path to that strand. Hoofbeats broke its stillness. The light of late afternoon streamed through leaves and struck spearheads, helmets, byrnies so that it was as if a flickering fire raced through the shadows. With a shout, the Danes beheld seawater at the end.

  They burst into a trap.

  From right and left, warriors swarmed out of the woods. Swords, axes, spears sank into flesh, first of all horseflesh. Before Hadding’s troopers could dismount to fight, they were in a maelstrom of screaming, rearing beasts and hewing men. Horses threw their riders, or fell with broken legs or splitted bellies down upon them. Arrows whined from boughs overhead. No Dane could stand by a shieldmate, even if he got safely to the ground. Each for himself, they hacked about them blindly in the ruck and died.

  Some broke free and got off into the brush. Hadding, at the forefront, leaped from his saddle and cut his way to the strand. As it opened to his sight, he spied ships up and down the length of it. They were many more than he had been told of.

  One sturdy young guardsman had won through beside him. For this scrap of time, nobody was coming at them. The crash and uproar was all from beneath the trees. “Come,” groaned Hadding, and bore off easterly. “Before they find us.”

  The man could not help asking, “Why?” in a harsh breath.

  “My guess is that the firstcomers landed yonder. Now, fast!”

  They hastened on alongside waters shining with eventide. Blood dripped into their footprints, but neither was badly hurt. It was sweat that soaked their underpadding and filled their nostrils with rankness. Their mouths went kiln-dry. After a while Hadding began to drag his bad foot. The other man gave him an arm and they pushed onward.

  The sun trudged lower. A breeze awoke. A flight of rooks passed by.

  The two climbed a ridge that sloped down across the strand. Standing on top, they saw a cove where half a dozen ships lay drawn up. “Yes,” panted Hadding, “these must be the ones we heard about.”

  “What of that?” asked the housecarle.

  Hadding grinned without mirth. “Why, see you, that Tosti fooled us neatly. He came first with no more than some viking skippers might get together. And so they behaved, like plunderers who’d skip off as soon as any real strength showed itself. My main hope was that we could catch them before they got away. But meanwhile his full fleet crossed from Saxland. They set about burning to draw us straight to them, before we could learn the truth. Oh, he’s wilier than I knew, him Tosti.”

  “Then his head will look well on a pole,” growled the warrior.

  “For that, we must first save ourselves.” Hadding limped down the ridge.

  The foe had left merely three men to watch over these craft, against weather and thieves. Weary though they were, the newcomers cut them down in a few strokes. “We can’t go on overland,” sighed
Hadding. “By now we’d be too slow. We’ll take to the water.”

  Some of the ships had towed boats, which lay on the strand beside them. Hadding chose the smallest, most easily rowed. “We’ll not be too handy at the oars, the way we are, if they chase us,” said the guardsman.

  Hadding nodded. “No boat can outrace a ship. But we can see to these.”

  Tools were always aboard a vessel. Hadding and his housecarle took up the planks laid in the bottoms, drilled holes, and put the planks back again. “That should slow them,” laughed the king.

  Taking also a water cask and some dried food they found, they launched the boat and set forth. Once well offshore, they doffed their mail, shipped their oars, and drifted. They ached to their bones.

  Slumped in the stern, Hadding looked at his follower. He saw a big man, fair-haired, blunt-nosed, too young for sorrow to have marked him much. “Forgive me,” said Hadding. “After this day, my head feels blurred. You are Gudorm Thorleifsson, are you not?”

  The warrior nodded. “I joined your housecarles only a month or two, ago, lord, while your thoughts were mostly on the wedding. You don’t know me well yet.”

  “I think I do now, Gudorm. That was the name of my brother. A good sign for us two? Tell me again as you did before—sleep is coming on me—whence you hail.”

  “From Keldorgard west of the Isefjord, lord. It’s among the greatest holdings on Zealand.”

  Hadding nodded. “Yes, I should have remembered. I will remember. But let us rest.”

  He drowsed off. Gudorm sat a while gazing at him through the sunset light. It gave back a little gold to the king’s gray head.

  When the battle was done, Tosti howled, “Who will ken Hadding?” Some of his troop had seen him in the past, and most had heard something about what so famous a man looked like. They grubbed through the fallen. As the search went by without gain, Tosti joined it, tossing bodies aside, grunting and snarling. He too found naught.