Читать книгу The Whale Road - Robert Low - Страница 6

The voyages of the Northmen are legendary, I know. Even the sailors of the Great City, Constantinople, with their many-banked ships and engines that throw Greek Fire, stand in awe of them. Hardly surprising, since those Greeks never lose sight of land and those impressively huge vessels they have will go keel over mast in anything rougher than a mild chop.

We, on the other hand, travel the whale road, where the sea is black or glass-green and can rear over you like a fighting stallion, all roar and threat and creaming mane, to come crashing down like a cliff. No bird flies here. Land is a memory.

That’s what we boast of, at least. The truth is always different, like a Greek Christ ikon veiled on feast days. But if anyone boasts of spitting in Thor’s eye, standing in the prow, roaring defiance at the waves and laughing the while, you will know him for the liar he is.

A long journey is always being wet to the skin and the wind bites harder as a result and your clothes are heavy as mail and chafe you until you have sores where the cloth rubs on wrist and neck.

It’s huddled in the dark, bundled in a wet cloak, feeling the sodden squash every time you turn. It’s cold, wet mutton if you are lucky, salt stockfish if you are not and, on truly long voyages, drinking water that has to be strained through your linen cloak to get rid of the worst of the floating things and no food at all.

There wasn’t even a storm of any serious intent on this, my first true faring; just a mild pitch of wave and a good wind, so that the company had time to erect deck covers of spare sail, like small tents, to give some shelter, mainly to the animals.

Einar huddled under his own awning, aft. The oars were stacked inboard and the only one with serious work was my father.

And my task? A sheep was mine. I had to care for it, keep it warm, stop it panicking. At night I slept, my fingers entwined in the rough, wet wool while the mirr washed us. In the morning, I woke with spray and rain washing down the deck. If I moved, I squelched.

The first week we never saw land at all, heading south and west from Norway. My sad ewe bawled with hunger.

Then we hit the narrow stretch of water which had Wessex on one side and Valland, the Northmen lands of the Franks on the other. We made landfall a few times – but never on the Wessex side. Not since Alfred’s day.

Even then we kept to the solitary inlets and lit fires only when we were sure there was no one for miles. Nowhere was safe for a boatload of armed men from the Norway viks.

We sailed north then, up past Man, where there was much argument for putting in at Thingvollur and getting properly dry and fed. But Einar argued against it, saying that people would ask too many questions and someone would talk and the news would get to Strathclyde before we did.

Grumbling, the men hauled the Elk further north, into the wind and the white-tressed sea.

Three more days passed, during which no one spoke much more than grunts and even the sheep had no strength left to bleat. For the most part, we huddled in solitary misery, enduring.

I dreamed of Freydis often, and always the same vision: her receiving me on the morning I arrived. She wore a blue linen dress with embroidery round the throat and hem, her brooches had strange animal heads and between them was a string of amber beads. She made no movement save for the rhythmic stroking of the growling cat.

‘From the pack, I take it you have come from Gudleif,’ she said to me. ‘Since he would only miss this journey if he were sick or injured, I presume that to be the case. Who are you?’

‘Orm,’ I replied. ‘Ruriksson. Gudleif fosters me.’

‘Which is it?’

‘Sorry?’

‘Sick or injured.’

‘He has sent for his sons.’

‘Ah.’ She was silent for a moment. Then: ‘So were you his favourite?’

My laugh was bitter enough for her to realise. ‘I doubt that, mistress. Why else would he send me through the snow to the hall of a—’ I stopped before the words were out, but she caught that, too, and chuckled.

‘A what? Witch? Old crone?’

‘I meant nothing by it, mistress. But I was sent away and I think he hoped I would die.’

‘I doubt that,’ she said crisply, rising so that the cat sprang off her lap and then arched in a great, shivering bow of ecstasy before stalking off. ‘Call me Freydis, not mistress,’ she went on, smoothing her front. ‘And ponder this, young man. Ask yourself why in … how old are you?’

I told her and she smiled gently. ‘In fifteen years, you and I have never met, though we are but a day apart and Gudleif came every year. Ask that, Orm Ruriksson. Take your time. The snow will not melt in a hurry.’

‘He sent me to die in the snow,’ I said bitterly and she shrugged.

‘But you did not. Perhaps your wyrd is different.’

Then the hall changed, to the one I had sat in under her bloodsoaked sealskin cloak, with the roof caved in. Yet still she sat on her bench, the cat somehow back on her lap.

‘I am sorry,’ I said and she nodded her head off her shoulders, so that it tumbled into her lap, sending the cat leaping up with a yowl …

I woke to the cold and wet, wondering if she was fetch-haunting me. Wondering, too, what had happened to the cat.

Then Pinleg yelled out from the prow, where he was coiling walrus-hide ropes. When he had our attention, he pointed and we all squinted into the pearl-light of the winter sky.

‘There,’ shouted Illugi Godi, pointing with his staff. A solitary gull wheeled, staggered in the wind, dipped, swooped and then was gone.

My father was already busy, with his tally stick and his peculiar devices. I never mastered them, even after he had explained them to me.

I knew that he had two stones, like grinding wheels, free-mounted. One pointed at the north star and the other was fixed to point at the sun. That way, my father knew the latitude, by seeing the angle of the sun stone. He could calculate longitude by using that and what he called his own time, marked on his tally stick.

I never understood any of it – but at the end of four days I knew why Einar valued Rurik the shipmaster, because we found the land at the point where we were supposed to find it, then my father, leaning over the side, watching the water, announced that a suitable inlet lay no more than a mile away, one where we could get ashore and sort ourselves out.

He read water like a hunter reads tracks. He could see changes in colour where, to anyone else, it was just featureless water.

The mood had changed and everyone was suddenly alert and busy. The sail came down, a great sodden mass of wool which had to be sweatily flaked into a squelching mass and stowed on the spar.

The oars came out, that watch of rowers took their sea-chest benches and Valgard Skafhogg, the shipwright, took a shield and beat time on it with a pine-tarred rope’s end until the rowers had the rhythm and away we went.

Pinleg swayed past me, smiling broadly and clapping a round helmet on his head. He had a boarding axe in one hand and a wild light in his eye. It was hard for me to realise that Pinleg was older than me by ten years, since he was scrawny and no bigger than I was.

I wondered how such a runt – his leg was permanently crippled, from birth I learned, so that he walked with a sailor’s roll even on dry land – had ended up in the Oathsworn. I learned, soon enough, and was glad I had never asked him.

‘I’d leave the sheep, Bear Killer,’ he chuckled. ‘Grab your weapons and get ready.’

‘Are we fighting?’ I asked, suddenly alarmed. It occurred to me that I had no idea where we were, or who the enemy would be. ‘Where are we?’

Pinleg just grinned his mad grin. Nearby, Ulf-Agar, small, dark as a black dwarf and with an expression as sullen, said, ‘Who cares? Just get ready, Bear Killer. Pretend they are lots of bears. That will help.’

I glanced at him, knowing he was taunting me and not knowing why.

Ulf-Agar hefted his two weapons – he scorned a shield – and curled a lip. ‘Stay behind Pinleg if you are worried. Killing men is different from bears, I will grant you. Not everyone is cut out for it.’

I knew I had been insulted; I felt my face flame. I realised, with a sick lurch, that Ulf-Agar was probably deadly with his axe and seax, but a slight is a slight…

A hand clasped my shoulder, gentle but firm. Big-bellied Illugi Godi, with his neat beard and quiet voice, spoke softly: ‘Well said, Ulf-Agar. And not everyone can kill a white bear in a stand-up fight. Perhaps, when you do, you will share your joy with Rurik’s son?’

Ulf-Agar offered him a twisted smile and said nothing, suddenly interested in the notching on his seax. Then: ‘I have a spear, Bear Killer,’ he remarked, with an edge-sharp smile. ‘Since you drove your own up into the head of that beast, you may want to borrow it.’

I turned away without replying. Ulf-Agar wanted the tale to be a lie, for it was a task Baldur would have been hard put to manage, let alone a scrawny man/boy. And the nightmare of it hag-rode me to a shivering, soaked waking most nights, which I am sure Ulf-Agar had not been slow to notice.

The nightmare was always one of those where you are running from some horror and yet you cannot get your legs working fast enough – which is what happened when I spilled out of that doorway, leaving Freydis to her wyrd. I was sobbing and panting and struggling in the snow. I fell, got up and fell again.

My knee hit something, hard enough to make me gasp. The wood sled. The bear lumbered forward, spraying snow like a ship under full sail. I had Bjarni’s sword still, was surprised to find it locked in my hand.

I picked up the sled awkwardly, stumbled a few steps and half fell, half hurled myself on it. It slid a few feet, then stopped. I kicked furiously and it moved. I heard the bear grunting and puffing through the snow close behind me.

I kicked again and the sled slithered forward, picked up a little speed, then a little more. I felt the hissing wind of a swiped paw, a fine mist of blood on my ears and neck from its ruined mouth as it roared … then I was away, hurtling down the hill, the bear galloping clumsily after, bawling rage and frustration.

There was a confusion of snow spray and darkness, a howl from behind me, then the sled tilted, bucked and I flew off, spilling over and over in the snow. I came up spitting and dazed. Something dark, a huge boulder, hurtled past me, still spraying snow and blood, rolling down the hill towards the trees. There was a splintering crash and a single grunt.

And silence.

Shaking woke me and I stared up at Illugi, ashamed that I had fallen asleep at all when everything else was bustle and purpose.

‘We are in Strathclyde,’ he said. ‘We have a task inland. Einar will explain it all later, but best get ready for now.’

‘Strathclyde,’ muttered Pinleg, shoving past us. ‘No easy raiding here.’

The landing was almost a disappointment for me. With my sword in one hand and a borrowed shield in the other – Illugi Godi’s, with Odin’s raven on it – I waited in the belly of the Fjord Elk as it snaked smoothly into the bow of land.

Shingle beach stretched to a fringe of trees and, beyond, rose to red-brackened hills, studded with trees, warped as old crones. There were rocks, too, which I took for sheep for a moment and was glad I had not called out my foolishness.

Since nothing moved, everyone relaxed. Except for Valgard Skafhogg, who bellowed at my father as the keel ground on shingle stones, calling him a ship-wrecking son of Loki’s arse. My father bellowed right back that if Valgard was any good as a shipwright, then a few stones wouldn’t sink us and, from what he had heard, Valgard couldn’t trim his beard. Which was a good joke on his nickname, Skafhogg, which means Trimmer.

But it was almost good-natured as we splashed ashore, to a smell of bracken and grass that almost made me weep.

It was bitter cold and you could taste the snow. The sail was dragged out, unfurled and draped over a frame – not as a shelter, since it was sodden; we only wanted it to dry out a little. Then we’d put it back, for when we returned to this place, we’d be in a hurry to get away from it.

Lookouts were posted and fires were lit for us to dry clothes and, above all, get warm. I staked out the sheep, as I had before, on a long line for her to crop what she could of the frozen grass and brown-edged fern and bracken.

She had little time to enjoy it and I was almost sorry when she was up-ended, gralloched and spitted. Brought all that way in damp misery, simply to be the hero-meal before the Oathsworn went into fight: I identified strongly with that wether.

I wondered about the fires, since the wood was wet and smoked and you could see it for miles, but Einar didn’t seem bothered. Now that we were so close, he had tallied that warmth and a full belly was worth the chance of discovery.

My father, now free of any duties, since he had done his part, crossed to where I sat shivering by the fire and trying not to wear my drying cloak until the rest of me had lost some water.

‘You need some spare clothing. Maybe we’ll get some soon.’

I glanced sourly at him. ‘A seer now, are you? If so, tell us where we are raiding.’

He shrugged. ‘Someplace inland.’ He stroked his stubbled chin thoughtfully and added, ‘Strathclyde’s not a place to raid these days, never mind inland. Still, Brondolf is paying good silver for it, so we do.’

‘Brondolf?’ I asked, helping him as he started to erect a shelter from our cloaks, making a frame of withies.

‘Brondolf Lambisson, richest of the Birka merchants. He hires the Oathsworn of Einar the Black this year. And last, come to think of it.’

‘To do what?’

My father tied cloak corners together, blowing on his fingers to warm them. The sky was sliding into dour night and it would soon be colder yet. The fires already looked flower-bright comforts in the growing dark.

‘He leads the other merchants of Birka. The town was a great trading centre, but it is failing. The silver is drying up and the harbour silting. Brondolf seems to think he has found an answer. He and his tame Christ godi, Martin from Hammaburg. They keep sending us out to get the strangest things.’ He broke off at a thought and chuckled, uneasy as all Northmen were with the concept. ‘Who knows what he is doing? Perhaps he is working some spell or other.’

I knew of Birka only from old Arnbjorn, the trader who came to Bjornshafen twice a year with cloth for Halldis and good hoes and axes for Gudleif. Birka, tucked up in an island far east into the Baltic off the coast of Sweden. Birka, where all the trade routes met.

‘Is that where you have been all these years, then: searching out dead men’s eyes and toadspit?’ I demanded.

He made a warding sign. ‘Shut that up for a start, boy. Less mention of… such things … is always safer. And, no, I wasn’t always doing that. For a time I thought to have a white bear safely tucked away, the price of a small farm.’

‘Is that what you told my mother? Or did she die waiting for your return?’

He seemed to droop a little, then looked at me from under his hair – it was thinning, I noticed – one eye closed. ‘Go fetch some bracken for bedding. We can dry it at the fires beforehand.’ Then he sighed. ‘Your mother died giving you birth, boy. A fine woman, Gudrid, but too narrow in the hip. At the time I had a farm, not far from Gudleif as it happens. I had twenty head of sheep and a few cows. I was doing well enough.’

He stopped, staring at nothing. ‘After she died, there didn’t seem much point in it. So I sold it to a man from the next valley, who wanted it for his son and his wife. Most of the money went to Gudleif, when I made him fostri. Some he was to keep and the rest was for you when you came of age.’

Surprised by all this, I could only gape. I had known she died … but the knowledge that I had killed my mother was vicious. I felt clubbed by Thor’s own hammer. Her and Freydis. They’d do better to call me Woman Killer.

He mistook my look, which was the mark of us, father and son. Neither knew the other and constantly misread the signs.

‘Yes, that was the reason Gudleif’s head went,’ he said. ‘I thought him my friend – my brother – but Loki whispered in his ear and he used the money on his own sons. I think he hoped I would die and that would be an end of it.’ He paused and shook his head sadly. ‘He had reason to think that, I suppose. I was never a good husband, or a good father. Always trying to live the old way – but too much is changing. Even the gods are under siege. But when he fell ill and sent for his own sons, thinking he was dying, Gunnar Raudi sent for me and Gudleif knew it was all up with him.’

‘So he did try to kill me in the snow,’ I said. ‘I was never sure.’

Rurik shrugged and scratched. ‘Nor he, I think. If Gudleif had wanted you dead, there were easier ways, though Gunnar Raudi wouldn’t have gone with it. A sound blade is Gunnar and you can trust him.’

He broke off, looked sideways at me and scrubbed his head in a gesture I was coming to know well, one that revealed his uncertainty. Then he chuckled. ‘Perhaps, after all, Gudleif sent you to Freydis to have her make you a man.’ His look was sly and he laughed aloud when my face flamed.

Yes, Freydis had done that, popped me on her the way Gudleif used to put me on his horses when I could barely walk. He made you wrap your hands in the mane and hang on until you learned to ride or fell off. If you fell off, he would pop you on again.

When I thought of it, Freydis was much the same. Blurry with the mead I had brought, greasy-chinned with lamb, she had caught me by the arm and dragged me close, stroking my hair and answered the riddle she had set me and I had failed to understand.

‘I can manage everything, have done since my Thorgrim, curse his bad luck, fell down the mountain,’ she said dreamily. ‘The year after that, Gudleif arrived at my door. I can cart dung and spread it on the hayfields, herd cows, herd horses, milk, make bread, sew, weave … everything. But Gudleif provided the thing that was missing.’

I couldn’t move, could scarcely breathe, though I was hard as a bar of sword-iron and too dry-mouthed to speak.

‘Now he cannot and he sends you,’ she went on and rolled me on her.

‘Come. I will teach you what you were sent here to learn.’

‘Good was Freydis,’ my father said, himself bleared with fond memories. ‘Gudleif swore she was a witch and had made him return every year and stay until he could hardly crawl on the back of a horse to ride off the mountain. If Halldis knew, she kept quiet over it. She was rich as good earth, was Freydis… but lonely. All she wanted was a good man.’

I looked at him and he grinned. ‘Aye, me too. And Gunnar, probably. In fact, if there was a man who hadn’t ploughed that field, then he lived in the next valley but one and was too lame to travel.’

I said nothing. I wanted to tell him of Freydis and her spell and how she had killed the bear with a spear while I ran … A vision, again, of that head, lazily turning, spraying fat drops of blood in an arc. Had she smiled?

When I eventually crawled to the side of it, the bear was already dead, the haft of the spear driven clear up and out the top of its skull by the impact with a tree. It had hit the slope and over-run its own feet. It was still a huge cliff of snow, frightening even when still. I saw, numbly, that the hair under its chin was soft and nearly pure white. One sprawled paw, big as my head, was shaking gently.

I sat down, trembling. Freydis’s spell had worked. Perhaps the price had been her own death. Perhaps she knew. I blubbered and there was no one reason for it. For her. For the knowledge of my own fear. For my father and Gudleif and the whole mess.

Eventually, I was shaking too much to cry. I was half-naked in the cold and had to get back to the hall. The hall and Freydis. I didn’t want to go back there at all, where her fetch might be, waiting accusingly. But I would freeze here.

The bear shifted and I scrambled away. A final kick? I had seen chickens and sheep do that with their throats cut through. I didn’t trust this bear. I remembered Freydis and my fear, took a deep breath, crossed to it and drove Bjarni’s sword into where I thought the heart would be, deep inside the mass of that white cliff.

It was a good sword and I was strong, made stronger yet through fear. It went in so smoothly I practically fell forward on the rank, wet fur; there was no great gout of blood, just a slow welling of fat drops. The sword was in nearly to the cross guard and I couldn’t get it out.

Eventually, shivering uncontrollably, I gave up and slogged back up the slope, through the door and into the ruin of the hall, wrapped myself in her cloak for the warmth and waited, sinking into the cold, where Bagnose and Steinthor found me.

It was a bad enough memory to have rattling round your thought-cage. Now, to add to all that, there was a new horror: a vision of me, like a small bear, clawing another Freydis from the inside out, charging out from between her legs in a glory of gore and challenge. I couldn’t see the face of the woman, my mother, though.

I shook my head, near to weeping, and knew it was for me more than anyone and wanted to back away from that, ashamed.

My father gripped my forearm wordlessly. Probably he thought I was mourning Freydis, or my mother. Truth to tell, I was not even sure which myself.

More alone than ever, I picked my way through the camp, where men chaffered and yacked and busied themselves, out into the trees to get bracken, aware of his eyes following me, aware that he was as much a stranger as all the others.

I wondered if he had taken his brother’s head, or if Einar had. What must it feel like, to have to kill your brother? Even just to watch him die?

Yet they were still men, these Oathsworn. Grim as whetstone, cold as a storm sea, but men for all that.

Most had wives and families – in Gotland, or further east – and went back to them now and then. Pinleg had a woman and two little ones whom he sent money back to by traders he could trust. Skapti Halftroll had more than one woman in more than one place, but he spent all his money on finery. Ketil Crow was outlawed from somewhere in Norway and had no one but the Oathsworn.

There were others, though, who were men apart. Sigtrygg was one, for he called himself Valknut and wore that rune symbol on his shield, three triangles known as the Knot of the Fallen. It meant he had bound his soul to Odin, would die at the god’s command and even the swaggerers walked soft around him.

Einar himself was a mystery, though most people had the idea he was an outlaw, too. Pinleg joked that our jarl, dark and brooding under his sullen, crow-wing hair, had been thrown out of Iceland for being too cheerful. He was the only one who dared joke about Einar.

Later, when bellies were full and the conversation had died, men took to cleaning their weapons, taking great care with the blades to gently grind out all the dark spots they could. Einar stood next to the biggest of the fires and the men gathered silently round him in a half-circle, facing the black sea as it sighed on the shingle. Behind, a wet mist crept stealthily down the mountain.

‘Tomorrow, we head inland from here,’ Einar said, his dark eyes moving from one to the other. ‘Pinleg, you will stay here with nine others and guard the ship and our belongings.’

Pinleg grunted his annoyance at that, but he knew why … in a long, fast march, he wasn’t the best choice.

He also knew, I learned later, that he would get his share of the spoils, since no one kept anything for himself. In theory. Actually, everyone stole a little: silver dropped down breeks into boot-tops, or stowed in bags under his balls or armpits. Those caught, though, suffered whatever punishment the Oathsworn decided, which certainly started by losing all their booty and almost always included pain along the way.

‘We seek what will be easy to find: the Christ temple of St Otmund,’ Einar told us. ‘It will be the only substantial stone building for miles, with outbuildings of wood, so look for that. We raid it and get out, fast. This is a well-defended kingdom and the days of good raiding here are long gone, so take only what you can carry – no slaves, no livestock, nothing heavy.

‘The only thing we must get is a … a … reliquary.’ He stumbled over the foreign word, then looked at the puzzled faces. ‘It looks like a chest, well made, well carved and decorated. That we must get.’

‘What’s in it?’ asked Ketil Crow lazily.

Einar shrugged. ‘Bones, if everything I hear about such items is true.’

‘Bones? Whose bones?’ asked Illugi Godi curiously.

‘St Otmund, almost certainly,’ answered Einar. ‘That’s what these Christ-followers do with saints. Stick their bones in a chest and worship them.’

‘Fuck,’ offered Valknut disgustedly. ‘More spell stuff. What are they cooking up in Birka?’ He made a warding sign and just about everyone followed.

‘Good question,’ growled Skapti. ‘What does Birka want with this pile of bones?’

Einar shrugged and looked darkly at them all. ‘All you need to know is that they are outfitting us for next year. Every man will get enough for a new set of clothes, top to toe, and the Fjord Elk will be fitted with new gear, too. And we get to keep what we take from raids other than what was asked for.’

Everyone fell silent, nodding at that. Skapti hoomed in his throat and growled, ‘Just show me where they are, these saints.’

Those who knew better chuckled and Valknut told him: ‘Saints are dead followers of Christ. Their chief priests vote the best dead people to be gods in their Valholl.’

‘Votes, Sig? Like in a Thing?’ scoffed Skapti. ‘No fighting for it?’

‘They don’t believe in fighting,’ Valknut said loftily. ‘They believe in dying and when they do they are called martyrs. And the ones they think are better martyrs than others become saints.’

People who knew nodded, those who were learning this shook their heads in sceptical disbelief. Skapti hoomed disgust. ‘Well, if that’s the way of it, then we shall make lots of martyrs tomorrow, with little risk.’

Einar held up one hand, his hair like black water breaking round the stone of his face. ‘Don’t be fooled. What the Christ-followers say is one thing, yet this kingdom supposedly follows the White Christ and for people who don’t believe in fighting, they can make a shieldwall that will turn your bowels to piss if we are unlucky enough to meet one. Move fast, stay quiet and we’ll get in and out faster than Pinleg on a woman.’

Laughter and nudgings of Pinleg, who grinned and said, ‘I have heard tales of treasure, Einar. Dragon hoards, no less. I would not like to think I am pissing about in the rain chasing some child’s firepit story when I could be getting in and out of a woman.’

There was a sudden silence and I wondered why Pinleg had voiced that where others, clearly, had kept their teeth together. Later, of course, I found out why Pinleg could say what he chose.

Einar swept his black eyes over them once more. ‘There is such a thing being spoken of …’ He held up a hand as Pinleg cleared his throat to spit. ‘Rest your oar a moment,’ he said and Pinleg swallowed. Einar stroked his moustaches, looking round before he spoke.

‘This Martin, the monk, is a deep-thinker, who can dive into the world’s sea of learning and fish out choice morsels. Lambisson thinks highly of him and keeps him close – and Brondolf is no cash-scatterer, as we know.’

Grim chuckles greeted this and Einar scrubbed his chin. ‘I have … uncovered some things that make me believe there is more to these Birka matters than is carved on the surface. There’s a snake-knot tangle to it, though, so when I know more, you will know more.’

Pinleg grunted and that seemed to be assent. The others milled and muttered to each other.

Einar held up both hands and there was silence. ‘Now, we are Oathsworn and have two here – Gunnar Rognaldsson, known as Raudi, and Orm Ruriksson, known as the Bear Killer. You know our oath … is there anyone who will stand the challenge?’

Challenge? What challenge? I turned to my father, but he nudged me silent and winked.

Slowly, a man stood, uncomfortably it seemed to me. A second stood with him and my father let out his breath with relief.

Einar nodded at them. ‘Gauk, I know you have waited for this moment since your foot went bad on you and you lost the toes last year.’

Gauk stepped into the firelight, his face made more gaunt with the shadows playing on it, and nodded. ‘Aye. Without those toes, my balance is gone. Sometimes, unless I am careful, I fall over like a child. One day I will do it in a fight.’

Everyone nodded sympathetically. If he stumbled in a shieldwall, everyone was put at risk.

‘So you will step aside, with no fight and no shame?’ asked Einar.

‘I will,’ said Gauk.

‘For whom?’

‘Gunnar Raudi.’

And that was that. Gauk would be free to leave here the next day with whatever he could carry away and Gunnar Raudi would take his place. My mouth was dry. I realised that the way into a full crew of the Oathsworn was to challenge and kill someone already in it, then take the binding oath. Unless, of course, that someone volunteered to go quietly.

Gauk and Gunnar were already clasping forearms and Gunnar was (as polite custom demanded, I learned) offering to buy what Gauk couldn’t carry away on his back. Sweating and chilled, I glanced at the other man as Einar turned to him.

‘Thorkel? Are you going with no fight and no shame?’

‘I am, for Orm Ruriksson.’

There was murmuring at that. Thorkel was a seasoned fighter, a good axeman and I was, as Ulf-Agar yelped out, only a stripling.

‘A stripling who killed a white bear,’ my father snarled back at him. ‘I don’t recall any tales of your doings, Ulf-Agar.’

The little man’s dark face went darker still and I knew then what Ulf-Agar’s curse was – that of legend. He wanted one to live after him; he was jealous of those who had what he sought and could not steal.

He was welcome to it, I said to myself, since it was a lie and shame made me hide it from everyone’s sight, though it sickened me.

Einar stroked his chin, pondering. ‘It’s hard to give up a good man for an untried one. That’s why we fight. How do we know what we get if we don’t see newcomers fight?’

Thorkel shrugged. ‘No matter what he is like, he will fight better than me, for I do not want to fight at all. Not against the Christ-followers, for my woman in Gotland is one and I promised her – swore an Odin-oath – that I would not raid their holy places. So best if I leave, for if that is the way Birka’s thoughts are going, I cannot go with them.’

Einar scowled at that. ‘You swore an oath to us all, Thorkel. Is that to be overturned by a promise to a woman? Is your oath to us less than that to a woman?’

‘You have never met my wife, Einar,’ said Pinleg gloomily, his wiry body swathed in a huge cloak. ‘Breaking an oath to her is not done lightly.’

Everyone who knew Pinleg’s woman laughed knowingly. Before Einar could answer, Illugi Godi rapped his staff on a stone and there was silence.

‘It is not a promise to his wife,’ he said sternly. ‘It was an oath to Odin. However stupid that may have been, it is still an oath to Odin.’

‘Our oath is made to Odin,’ Einar argued and Illugi frowned.

‘Our oath is made to each other, in the sight of Odin. Thorkel’s own Odin-oath may be truer, but I am thinking he must live with the consequence of swearing too many oaths. Anyway, he does not break his oath to the rest of us if one stands in his place.’

There was nodding agreement to that and Einar shrugged and turned to me. ‘Well, you take the place of a good man, Orm Ruriksson. Make sure it was worth the trade.’

I stepped forward as bid and clasped Thorkel’s forearm. He nodded at me, then moved off.

And that was it. I was now part of the Oathsworn of Einar the Black.

Later, I saw Thorkel and my father head to head in conversation and something niggled at me and worried and gnawed until I had to voice it.

‘You arranged it,’ I accused and, to my astonishment, my father grinned and nodded, putting a finger to his lips.

‘Aye. Thorkel wanted to go, has done for a time. He has an Irish woman in Dyfflin, which is just across the water from here, but made no Odin-oaths over her. By Loki’s arse, what sane man would do that, eh?’

‘Why does he want to leave?’

My father frowned at that and self-consciously scrubbed his chin. ‘Tales of Atil’s treasure,’ he answered gruffly. ‘Thorkel believes it foolishness, thinks Einar’s thought-cage is warped.’

‘Why didn’t he say that, then?’ I answered, with all the stupidity of youth.

My father batted my shoulder – none too gently, I thought – and answered, ‘You don’t say such things to the likes of Einar, unless you have a head start and fast feet, or are prepared to fight. No, Thorkel wanted out when he got here and didn’t want to fight for it and didn’t want to lose all his stuff.

‘This way, he gets to leave safely with a bag of hacksilver – and you get a good sea-chest, a spare set of clothes and a decent shield.’

‘I have nothing—’ I began and he clasped my forearm, his eyes gleaming in the darkness.

‘I did little enough for long enough,’ he said. ‘I need take big strides to catch up and I will not make old bones on a farm now, I am thinking. So I will spend my shares how I choose.’ He paused then and added, ‘Keep your lips fastened round Einar. He is a dangerous man when his brows come together.’

So, in the star-glimmered dark before dawn, I found myself assembled with the others, sword in hand, clutching Thorkel’s shield with its swirling design of rune snakes, shivering and sick to the pit of my stomach.

We helped shove the Fjord Elk back off the shingle before the tide went out and stranded it there for hours. My father, of course, was staying behind since he was shipmaster and Pinleg would need him if they came under attack. So was Valgard, in case the ship was damaged. The eight others who stayed were hard enough men, but were all those who, for one reason or another, were not the fastest on their feet.

I was surprised that Skapti was going with the main body – not that I was going to say aloud that he was too fat to move fast – and more surprised than that to see him wearing a mail hauberk. A few others had mail, too, but had left off the padding of spare tunics usually worn beneath it.

Later, of course, I learned that no clever man expecting a fight and having good mail will willingly give it up and, since the easiest way of carrying it is to wear it, that’s what they did.

The two who were leaving said their farewells, hefted their bundles and packs and struck off in the opposite direction from the one we would take. By the time we reached the Christ temple, they would be far enough away not to be considered part of the act. If they moved fast, of course.

Ulf-Agar had unrolled his mail from the fleece it was kept in, the sheep-grease fending off the rust. I thought to try to mend the rift between us and stepped forward to offer a helping hand as he hefted the ring-heavy mail by the shoulders.

Instead, he slapped my hand away and scowled. This was too much and I felt my hackles rise. Then Illugi Godi stepped between us and ushered me away, talking the while as if nothing had happened.

‘Good sword you have there, Orm Ruriksson. Here’s a tip, though: run it through the fleece of one of those fresh-killed sheep a few times. It’s been splashed on by the sea and that rots metal faster than anything I know. Really, you need a sheath for it, but not a soft leather one, since that rots the metal fast, too. Better one made from wood, with a sheepskin lining. That way you can use the sheath as a good club if you have to …’

Out of earshot, he clasped my shoulder in friendly fashion and glanced back to where Ulf-Agar’s tousled head was emerging from his mail, his arms flailing. ‘You meant well, but I fear you’ve made things worse. It’s a thing among mail-wearers that if you can’t put it on or take it off unaided you shouldn’t have the stuff. So you just insulted him.’

‘I didn’t know,’ I said, my heart sinking.

‘I think he knows that,’ answered Illugi Godi, ‘but it won’t help. Some evil gnaws him, and until he beats it to a pulp you and he will always be glaring. Unless you can fight him, I’d steer away wherever possible.’

My father came up as Illugi strode away and, at his questioning look, I told him what had happened. He stroked his chin and shook his head. ‘Illugi is a good man, so you can take his advice. Mostly. Like us all, he has his reasons for being in the Oathsworn.’

‘What are his?’ I demanded and he shut one eye and squinted at me quizzically.

‘You want to know a lot. He thinks Asgard is under siege from this White Christ and our gods are asleep.’

‘And you? What are your reasons?’

He scowled. ‘You want to know too much.’ Then he forced a smile and produced a round leather helmet. ‘One of Steinthor’s spares. He picked it up last year, but can’t wear it himself.’

It looked fine to me – a little too big, no fastening strap and a nice metal nasal. ‘Why can’t he wear it?’

My father tapped the metal nose protector. ‘He’s a bowman. Blocks your sighting, does a nasal. Bowmen all wear helmets without them. And no mail – even half-sleeves snag the string. That’s why they stay well out on the edges of a fight and pick people off.’ He spat. ‘No one likes bowmen – unless they are your bowmen.’

We clasped hands, forearm to forearm.

‘Stay safe, boy,’ he said and turned back to the ship.

Einar, helmeted and mailed and wearing two swords in his belt, shield slung over one shoulder, looked at the assembled men. He handed a spear with a furled cloth on it to skinny Valknut. ‘Move steady and quiet. Stay together – anyone who stops for a piss or a pull on the way risks being left on his own and we won’t be going back to find them. We hit fast and hard, collect what we came for and get out. Don’t try and carry off anything that weighs more than you. You’ll either fall behind or have to leave it in the end.’

He glanced around one more time and nodded, then took the head of our pack and led us at a steady, fast walk up through the trees, into the night-shrouded land, towards the first silvered smear of dawn.

It was a good pace, uphill. No one spoke and there was silence until the pace began to tell in louder, ragged breathing. That and the shink-shink of slung shields on mail, the swish of the bracken underfoot and the odd clink and creak of equipment was all that marked the passage of nearly fifty fully armed men.

After an hour, Einar stopped us. The sky was milk-white, shading to grey towards us. Somewhere behind that, a winter sun fought to claw over the thin, black edge of the world. Trees were outlined in skeletal black – and there was something else.

It was a dark bulk with a tower and the faint, reddish glow of a light. Everyone saw it; there was a general, hushed business of tightening straps, unshipping shields, hefting weapons.

Einar had us take to one knee, then sent Geir and Steinthor off into the night. Briefly silhouetted against the dawn sky for us, they would be invisible to any watcher from the tower. I rubbed dry lips, hearing my breathing magnified by the helmet’s cheekpieces into a rasp. That looked like a powerful strong building – and, as the light grew, you could see other, smaller buildings huddled round it.

Geir and Steinthor slid back. We all listened.

‘The light is on the gate in a wooden wall that stretches all round it,’ reported Geir, rubbing his dripping bag of a nose. ‘The gate is the only way in unless you want to go over seven feet of timbered fence. It was built for defence, was this place.’

He paused, for effect as it turned out, since Steinthor grinned and added, ‘But the bloody gate is wide and welcoming open. It’s been a long time since anyone attacked them. They have forgotten.’

‘A big stone temple and six outbuildings,’ Geir added, ‘all wattle and withy. A stable, for sure. Perhaps a smithy – I can smell the banked fire and tinsmith metal. There’s a good covered bread-oven. The others could be anything.’

Einar rubbed his nose and squinted. Then he shrugged. ‘One way in, so that simplifies the planning.’

He rose up and we followed. At a fast pace, we followed Geir and Steinthor, almost running through the bracken and, as we neared the gated wall, where the first rose-light of the rising sun touched the moss-gentled points of the timbered fence, we broke into a silent run, piling through the gate under the light set to welcome weary travellers.

Resistance was slight, almost none. By accident, Ketil Crow stumbled over the watchman, a slumbering man in brown robes, huddled in a little hut beside the gate. Ketil had turned aside and gone into it looking for loot, but couldn’t see anything in the dark.

Until the querulous voice revealed the watchman, he thought there was no one else in the building, which was so small and cramped he couldn’t get room to swing a slashing sword properly. Ketil Crow was flailing around, while the unseen watchman screamed and then the sword stuck in a beam and, cursing, Ketil Crow couldn’t get it out.

By this time, half the company had heard the commotion and, seeing his predicament, were howling with laughter. The watchman, crashing into Ketil and knocking him off his feet, stumbled out of the building, mad with fear and near flying in his panic.

That was when Valknut stepped forward and threw his hand axe, which smacked into the left side of the man’s forehead with a sound like dung thrown against a wall. The force flung him sideways and he fell on his back, gurgling like some strange, long-nosed beast, the blood welling out of the mess of his face in a growing pool.

Ketil Crow hurtled out of the building, dark with anger, and the jeers stopped as he swung this way and that. But, as the men congratulated Valknut on his throw – it was generally agreed to be a fine one, since it wasn’t a balanced throwing axe – there were chuckles and sniggers in the darkness at Ketil’s expense.

Wordlessly, Valknut put one foot on the dead man’s bloody chest and, with a flick of his wrist, removed his axe. It came away with a small sucking sound and Valknut, with a brief, blank look at Ketil Crow, wiped the blood and brains on the dead man’s brown robe and strode off, axe in one hand, spear with furled banner in the other.

Ketil Crow caught me looking and I blinked at his expression, then wisely found the stone temple with the tower more of interest and trotted towards it.

It was, it seemed, one large hall, with an impressive flagged floor. The tower held no archers, nothing more than a bell. There were two brown-robed figures sprawled, spewing blood on the flagstones. Half a dozen others were penned at the far end of this hall by the rest of the Oathsworn and Einar was head to head with Illugi Godi.

It was a strange place and I gawped. It had benches and a sacrificial altar, which was where most of the people were. Behind the altar, above their heads, was a window, filled with pieces of coloured glass in the shape of a man wearing, it seemed, a glowing hat. The walls, too, were painted with strange scenes.

The dawn light that spilled from that window was like Bifrost, the rainbow bridge, and it stained the altar. I did not know it then, but such a window was as rare as teeth on a hen – I did not see another until the Great City, Constantinople.

But it was nothing next to what was below it, stuck on the wall. Two thick beams, one vertical, one horizontal, held the wooden figure of a man, hanging there by his hands. No, not hanging, I saw. Nailed, through his hands and his feet. He had some strange crown, which stuck spikes in his forehead, and what seemed to be another gaping wound in one side. It was a fine carving.

‘Is that their god, then?’ I asked Illugi Godi, much to Einar’s annoyance.

‘The son of their god,’ answered the priest. ‘The Romans stuck him on those poles, but the Christ-followers say he didn’t die.’

That was impressive. I had thought any god who allowed himself to be nailed to a bit of wood wasn’t up to much – ours were clever or strong fighting men, after all – but if he had survived all that and come out smiling, this Christ was to be reckoned with.

‘Finished?’ demanded Einar pointedly. Then he turned to Illugi Godi. ‘So where? You are the expert here, priest.’

Illugi Godi squatted, fumbled in his pouch and came up with his rune bones. I saw the brown figures flailing one hand back and forward on their chests, which seemed to be their way of warding off the evil eye. I laughed. Illugi wasn’t evil.

He cast; the bones tinkled. He took some fine white sand from his pouch and blew it off the palm of his hand towards the altar, then stood and smiled.

‘There,’ he said and pointed at the altar. As a hiding place, it wasn’t hard to work out – it was almost the only thing in the hov of this hall. And, I saw, the sand he had blown hadn’t settled neatly where the altar touched the flagstoned floor. It had sunk into the cracks, which meant it was hollow beneath. He was clever, was Illugi Godi.

Einar and Valknut circled it, but there was nothing: no handle, no mark of any kind. Puzzled, they were scratching their heads when Gunnar Raudi, wiser in the ways of hiding valuables, stepped up, leaned his shoulder into it and gave it a shove.

With a grinding sound, the altar slid back several feet, revealing a set of stone steps. A torch uncovered a small chamber and the contents were soon up and on the flagstones.

There was a thin silver plate, two metal cups – gold, Illugi said – and a couple of hollow silver columns, which Gunnar Raudi said were sticks for holding fat tallow candles. Strange to relate now, but I had never seen the like and was so marvelling at them I nearly missed the next wonders.

Geir came up from the chamber with two chests. The first was clearly the one Einar wanted, a fat, ornate effort about the size of a man’s head. The other was flatter; Geir held it up and turned it round. It was studded with coloured glass and had a huge clasp on it, which Geir snapped off easily, bit and announced admiringly: ‘Silver.’

Then, to my astonishment, the chest fell open in two halves and loads of leaves riffled. Geir turned it over and over while I stared, my mouth dropped open like a droop-lipped horse. ‘It’s full of leaves,’ I said, wondering. ‘With colours on them – and little animals and birds.’

‘It’s a book,’ said Illugi Godi patiently as Geir chuckled. ‘The Christ monks make them. It has their holy writings. Like runes.’

Not much, I thought scornfully. Runes were worked on stone, or wood, or metal; otherwise, how would they last? Geir ripped one of the leaves out to show me how this book thing worked and I heard a brown-robed man, one with silver hair, moan.

Steinthor, more practical, grunted with annoyance over something else. ‘No women, then?’

‘Christ priests don’t go with women,’ advised Illugi Godi and Steinthor shot him a hard glance.

‘Bollocks. I have tupped women before in these Christ places.’

‘There are women Christ priests,’ Illugi said patiently. ‘But they don’t go with men.’

‘Just as well,’ grunted Einar, cuffing Steinthor on the shoulder. ‘No time to plough any fresh furrows here and no one is dragging any shrieking women with us. Anyway, why are you here? Didn’t I tell you to make sure all these brown-robes were rounded up?’

As if in answer, the air was split with a massive ringing boom, followed by another. There was a moment of stunned panic, then Einar roared, ‘The bell. The fucking bell…’

Gunnar Raudi was first, spilling into the little chamber at the far end beneath the tower.

The defiant man in a brown robe lasted long enough for a second pull on the rope before Gunnar’s blow sprayed his teeth and blood and brains against the opposite wall. The bell, as if his ghost still tugged the rope, continued to boom a couple more times before swinging to silence.

In the main hov of the hall, the men were licking their lips, weapons up, uncertain and on edge. Steinthor, aware that he had put everyone at risk, shrugged apology, ducked hastily under Einar’s scowl and scurried off to scout.

Black-raging, Einar swept up the fat chest, indicated to a couple of men to pick up the rest, then turned to Ketil Crow and Ulf-Agar, jerking his chin at the huddled brown-robes. ‘Kill them, then join us at the gate. We’ll have to move fast now.’

I left, half looking back – Valknut pushed me impatiently through the door as the screams began.

Outside, the Oathsworn gathered silently together. No buildings had been torched, the ringing bell had interrupted that and someone said we should do it now, but Einar pointed out how long it would take to get a fire lit. ‘They’ll be coming after us,’ he growled. ‘Now we head for the Fjord Elk – and fast.’

With Geir and Steinthor running ahead, he led us off at a fast pace, almost on the edge of a trot. It was full daylight now, but overcast, smirring with rain. I noticed that the birds were mad with song.

We were halfway to the ship, perhaps a little more, labouring up a slope of red bracken, when they caught us up.

Skapti, huffing in the rear, suddenly yelled out and pointed behind us. We all stopped and turned; dark against the browns and withered greens, the horsemen came on, urging their mounts through the tangling bracken and gorse.

‘Top of the hill, form a line, three deep,’ roared Einar. ‘Move.’

The Oathsworn may have been stumbling and out of breath, but they knew their business. I was the only one who didn’t.

They slid into three ranks, the mailed men in front, the spearmen second and everyone else in the third. Einar saw me as he strode along the front. ‘Guard Valknut, young Orm. Sig, let them see whom they face.’

Valknut slid the thongs from the furled cloth on his spear. A banner spilled out, white with a black bird on it. I realised, with a sudden start, that it was the Raven Banner. I was about to fight under the Raven Banner, as in a saga tale.

Valknut hefted his axe in his free right hand and grunted at me, ‘On my left, Bear Slayer. You are the shield I don’t have.’

I nodded. Geir and Steinthor were on the same side, the left flank of the line. On the other, Skapti took station, where there was room to swing his long Dane axe.

Einar chuckled, wiping the drips from the edge of his helmet. ‘Not horse, these. Fyrdmen on ponies. You won’t have to face mailed horse today, just the fat levy of some local noble.’

I watched the horsemen dismount; saw that most of them were in leather and had shields, spears and axes. Just like us.

One of them, mailed and shouting, bullied them into three ranks, again like us. There were a lot of them, perhaps twenty or so more than we were and they overlapped us. I heard the swish of Skapti’s axe, testing range.

The rain was invisible and soaking. We dripped, waiting in the bracken and heather.

Einar shook rain from his eyes and grunted, peering at the men below us. They were in no hurry to come at us and, suddenly, Einar strode over to Skapti. They had a brief, grunting conversation, then Skapti simply dropped his axe and hauled out the heavier of the two swords he wore, the one he called Shieldbreaker. Einar fell in behind us.

Skapti strode to the front, swinging his shield on to his arm. ‘We can’t wait. That’s what they want and they will be bringing up more men, I am thinking, before they take on the Raven Banner.’

There was a general mutter of agreement and Skapti nodded. ‘Boar snout. We have to break their shieldwall here, scatter them.’

He strode several paces to the front and everyone seemed to slide into position like a cunning toy. Shields overlapped, they crowded into a wedge, shoulders hunched into the shields, pushing. In front, Skapti pushed back, as if trying to hold them, his feet skidding on the bracken, a delicate balance between strength and footwork.

Balked, the men shoved; the power of the wedge grew as it moved downhill, with Skapti as a brake. With nowhere to go, I fell in at the rear, still with Valknut.

About twenty paces from the line of the fyrdmen and their overlapped shields, Skapti roared something and the men behind increased their effort. Skapti took two, three steps, raised his shield, lifted his legs off the ground and was shot forward, a huge battering ram at the point of the boar snout.

The fyrdmen’s shieldwall smashed apart; men were flung sideways. The Oathsworn were in among them then, the fight a grunting, flailing, slipping, sliding mess of whirling steel and blood and flying bone.

On the fringes, some of the fyrdmen dashed forward; two arrows spanged off their shields and they stopped, seeing Geir and Steinthor nocking fresh ones. They huddled behind their big round shields and backed off, all save two, who came on, heading for the Raven Banner and Valknut.

And me.

Valknut backed off a pace, hefted the axe and then hurled it. It cannoned off one man’s shield, spinning through the air into the bodies behind.

With a triumphant roar, he came stumbling at Valknut, who stuck the Raven Banner pole firmly in the ground, whipped out a long seax and, ducking under the swing and the man’s shield, kippered him open with a swipe along the belly. He was still running when his stomach opened and all the blue-white coils fell out like rope, tripping him.

The other one came at me. I was petrified … but I weathered his first rush; I felt his sword whack on my shield, bounce off the metal rim and just miss my nose.

He hacked a backstroke and, before I knew it, I had done what Gudleif and Gunnar Raudi had taken pains to teach me … I slammed the blunt point of my sword at the bottom of his shield, the force of the blow tilting it forward and exposing the whole shoulder and side of his neck.

Then I carved a stroke downward before he could recover. The blade going in felt no different to chopping wood, since it smashed into the shoulder and collar bone, half carving his arm from the socket.

He gave a shriek and fell away, dropping his sword, clutching at the wound as if to fasten the gaping sides together. I stood there, scarcely believing what I had done, my mouth gawping like a dead cod.

‘Finish him,’ growled Valknut and I looked at him, then back to the wounded man. No, not man. Boy. He fell, lay on his back, chest heaving, no longer even groaning. The blood flowed thickly out of him; by the time I was peering at him, the rain was pooling in the hollows of his unseeing eyes. No older than me …

I felt a smack on the back and whirled, sword up.

Steinthor held up a placating hand, chuckling. ‘Easy, Bear Killer. That was well done, as neat as any I have seen – but don’t gawp at it or you’ll end up lying beside him.’

But the fight was over. The fyrdmen – those not groaning or lying like little sacks on the sodden ground – were running, not even waiting to take their horses. The leader was down, carved up under the combined efforts of Einar and Skapti. Panting men knelt or stood, gasping, legs apart, heads down. One or two, I saw, were retching.

Steinthor expertly patted the corpse beside me, gave a grunt of satisfaction and came up with two small slivers of hacksilver and an amulet in the shape of a cross. He tossed the amulet to me and stuffed the silver down his boot. ‘Keepsake,’ he chuckled and moved on to the next.

Einar was cleaning his sword. Skapti Halftroll was moving among the bodies, making sure the fyrdmen were all dead.

Illugi fed something from a flask to one of our own, who lay shivering in the rain, hands clutching his stomach. Blood leaked between his fingers.

‘Tally?’ demanded Einar.

Skapti thumbed one side of his nose and snotted. ‘Eight of them dead, more who will feel how bad their wounds are when the fear that keeps them running wears off.’

‘Us?’

‘A few wounds. Harald One-eye’s serious; someone carved half his foot off, so we’ll have to carry him. And Haarlaug has a belly wound,’ answered Illugi.

‘Bad?’ asked Einar. Illugi paused, moved to the groaning man, knelt, sniffed and then came back to Einar.

‘Soup wound, I think, though it will take an hour to be sure. We’ll have to carry him and that will kill him, for sure.’

Einar stroked his wet chin and then shrugged. He drew out his short seax and moved to Haarlaug. Around him the other men collected themselves, stripping what they could find from the dead. The soft, silent, smirring rain dripped.

‘Haarlaug,’ said Einar. ‘You have a belly wound. Illugi Godi fed you some of his soup and he can smell it even so soon after.’

He let the words hang there. The man grunted, as if hit afresh. His face, already pale, went to milk and he licked dry lips. Then he nodded. He knew what it meant to smell Illugi Godi’s soup from your opened belly.

‘Make sure Thurid, my wife, gets what’s mine,’ he said. ‘And tell her I died well.’

Einar nodded. Someone thrust a seax at him and he took it, then wrapped Haarlaug’s hand tight round the hilt.

‘Give my regards to all those who have gone before,’ he said. ‘Say to them, “Not yet, but soon,” from me.’

Those nearest muttered their own prayers and nodded at Haarlaug, commending him to Valholl. Now that the moment was on him, though, his eyes rolled in panic and his mouth started working.

Einar was swift, lest Haarlaug lose hold and let his fear ruin his dignity. The short seax flashed across the white throat, leaving a red line and he thrashed and kicked for a few minutes, eyes bulging and Einar holding him, one hand on his mouth, the blood soaking his sleeve.

Then he stopped and Einar placed one hand over his face, closing Haarlaug’s wild eyes, leaving it there for a moment, kneeling. Illugi Godi chanted softly, almost under his breath. The blood pooled under Haarlaug’s lolled head.

Then Einar rose up. ‘Strip him quickly, then we go. Ottar, Vig, get the mail and weapons off that leader and whatever valuables he has – there’s a torc round his neck that looks like silver. Finn Horsehead, fetch one of those horses and load Harald on to it. Move.’

In seconds, it seemed, before I had even plodded back to the top of the hill, Haarlaug was a pale, sad shape in the red hillside, laid neatly on his back, hands clasped on the deer-horn hilt of the knife on his chest, the only thing they left. The rest struggled wearily up the hill, clutching a shirt, breeks, boots – even his woollen socks. Ottar and Vig panted to the top, one draped with a mail shirt, the other clutching a sword and an extra shield. Ottar looked back, hawked and spat. ‘No way to leave one of our own,’ he said. ‘He should have been decently howed up.’

I saw the other huddled, still shapes. I couldn’t even tell, now, which was the one I had killed.

‘Move,’ growled Einar and, as he passed, slapped me lightly on the shoulder. ‘Good fight, boy. You’ll do.’

And that was it. Twenty minutes later we were panting and gasping down through the trees and out on to the wet-black shingle, stumbling up to where the Fjord Elk swung.

I remember that I was more afraid trying to board her than I was in the fight, since she was so far out we had to wade to our chests and, if it hadn’t been for them throwing out the boarding plank, none of us would have got on board at all.

As it was, between rain and sea, I landed on the deck, miserable, wet, chafed, shivering and more tired than I had ever been in my life. I couldn’t believe that anyone had any strength left, but the same ones who had just fought dumped their weapons, slithered out of mail, took oars and worked the Elk out into the wind, where the sail was hauled up and we were off.

And all the time, I saw the boy’s eyes, the rain filling them like tears, felt Einar’s hand slap my shoulder and heard him say, again and again: ‘Good fight, boy. You’ll do.’