The Broken Sword Page 6

  Foaming like a maddened beast, Valgard took a stick and thrust it into the fire. When it was well alight, he touched it to the dry wood of the hutch. He stood outside while it burned, ready to strike with his ax at anything which might show itself. But there were only the leaping flames and the piping wind and the snow hissing as it blew into the fire.

  When only ashes remained, Valgard shouted forth into the night: ‘For you I have lost home and kin and soul, for you I am resolved to forswear my lifetime and league with the lands of darkness, for you I have become a – troll! Very well, witch, if still you live, I will follow your advice. I will become earl of all the trolls in England – perhaps even one night king of all Trollheim – and I shall hound you down with all the powers I have. You too, like men and elves and all else in my way, will feel my vengeance, and never will I rest until I have flayed alive you who broke my heart with a shadow!’

  He wheeled about and loped eastward, soon lost in the flying snow. Crouched below the earth, witch and familiar grinned at each other. This was just as they had planned.

  The crew of Valgard’s ships were the worst of vikings, most outlawed from their homelands and all unwelcome wherever they went. Thus he had bought a garth of his own where they might winter. They lived well, on meat and ale and wine stolen during the summer, with women and thralls likewise reaved, but were so quarrelsome and unruly that only their chief could hold them together.

  When word of his outlawry reached them, they knew it would not be long ere all men in the Danelaw came to put an end to them, so they busked the ships and themselves to sail. But they could not agree on whither it should be, now in winter, and there was much dispute and some killing. They might have sat thus till their enemies were upon them had Valgard not returned.

  He came late at night into the great hall. It was a wild place, where the huge burly hairy men sat draining horn after horn, growing drunk until their shouting shook the walls. Many snored on the floor beside the dogs, while steel flashed between others, whose comrades were more apt to egg them on than step between them. To and fro in the brawling fire-bloodied company scurried the terrified thralls, and women who had long since wept out all their tears went from hand to hand.

  Valgard stepped into the hall and up to the empty high seat – a tall and terrible figure, face set in even grimmer lines than his men remembered, the great ax which had begun to be called Brother-slayer over one shoulder. Silence spread in waves through the hall as folk noticed him, until at last only the crackling flames had voice down its length.

  Valgard spoke: ‘It is plain we cannot stay here much longer, but that may be just as well. I know a place where we can win even greater wealth and fame, and thither we sail the dawn after tomorrow.’

  ‘Where is that, and why not leave tomorrow?’ asked one of his captains, a scarred old outlaw by name Steingrim.

  ‘As to the last, I have a business here in England which we will attend tomorrow,’ quoth Valgard. ‘And as to the first, our goal is Finnmark.’

  Now a great uproar arose. Steingrim finally raised his voice above it: ‘That is the worst rede I ever heard. Finnmark is poor and lonely, and lies across seas which are dangerous even in summer. What can we win there save death, by drowning or by the sorcerers who dwell in the land, or at best a few miserable earth huts to huddle in through a long cruel winter? Near at hand are England, Scotland, Ireland, Orkney, or even Valland south of the channel, and in all there is a good booty.’

  ‘I have given my orders, and you will follow them,’ said Valgard bleakly.

  ‘Not I,’ answered Steingrim. ‘I think you have gone mad in the forest.’

  Like a leaping wildcat, Valgard was out of his seat and up to the captain. His ax, already aloft, crashed down into Steingrim’s skull.

  A man yelled and thrust at Valgard with a spear. The berserker sidestepped, yanked the shaft from his hands, and drove it through him. Pulling the ax from Steingrim’s head, Valgard stood looming in the firelight with his eyes like flakes of sea-ice. He asked very quietly: ‘Does anyone else wish to argue with me?’

  None spoke or moved. Valgard stepped back up to his high seat and said: ‘I know my plan looks foolish, but the fact is I have word of a great garth built in Finnmark just this summer, where all a man could wish is stored. They will not await vikings in winter, so we can take it easily enough. Nor do I fear rough weather on the way, for we have spent all winter at sea before this.’

  This seemed well to the crew, who remembered how Valgard’s leadership had been to their good, so they shouted they would follow him. After the feast was under way again, he gathered his captains.

  ‘We have a place near here to sack ere leaving England,’ he said. ‘ ’Twill be no hard task, and good booty is to be had.’

  ‘What place is that?’ asked one man.

  ‘That of Orm the Strong, who is now dead and cannot ward it.’

  Even the outlaws thought this would be an evil deed, but they dared not gainsay their chief.

  9

  Ketil’s grave-ale became also a feast for Asmund and Orm. Men drank silent and sorrowful, for Orm had been a great man and he and his sons well-liked. Despite the frozen ground, the thralls began making a howe the day after the murders.

  Orm’s best ship was dragged from its house into the grave. In it were laid many costly treasures, and meat and drink for the long voyage, horses and dogs were killed and put in the ship, and all whom Valgard had slain were placed in it with the best of clothes, weapons, and armor, and with hell-shoes on their feet.

  When the task was done, some days later, Aelfrida came forth. She stood in the dull gray light of the lowering winter day, looking down at the still, dead faces of Orm and Ketil and Asmund. Her unbound hair swept down to their breasts and hid her own face from those who stood watching.

  ‘The priest says it would be a sin, or I would slay myself now and be laid beside you,’ she whispered. ‘Weary will life be. You were good boys, Ketil and Asmund, and your mother is lonely for your laughter. It seems but yesterday I sang you to sleep on my breast, you were so little then, and all at once you were great long-legged youths, goodly to look on and a pride to Orm and me – and now you lie so quietly, with the snow drifting down on your faces. Strange—’ She shook her head. ‘I cannot understand you are slain. It is not real to me.’

  She smiled down at Orm. ‘Often did we quarrel,’ she murmured, ‘but that meant naught, for you loved me and – and I you. You were good to me, Orm, and the world is all at once so cold, so cold, now you are dead. This I ask all-merciful God: that He forgive certain acts you did against His law. For you were ignorant of much, however wise with a ship or with your hands to make me shelves and chests and little carven toys . . . And if so be God cannot receive you in Heaven, then I pray Him I too may descend to Hell to be with you – aye, even if you go to your heathen gods, even there I would I could follow you. Now farewell, Orm, whom I loved and still love – farewell.’

  She bent and kissed him. ‘Cold are your lips, Orm,’ she said, and looked bewilderedly about her. ‘Thus did you never kiss me, Orm. This is not you, dead in the ship – but where are you, Orm?’

  They led her out of the ship, and the thralls labored long casting earth over it and the grave-chamber built on its deck. When they were done, the howe rose hugely at the edge of the sea and the waves came up the beach to sing a dirge at its foot.

  The priest, who had not approved of this heathen burial, would not consecrate the ground, but he did whatever else he could and Asgerd paid him for many masses for the souls of the dead.

  There was a young man, Erlend Thorkelsson, who was betrothed to Asgerd. ‘Empty is this garth now that its men are gone,’ quoth he.

  ‘So it is,’ replied the maiden. A cold sea-wind, blowing fine snowflakes, ruffled her heavy locks.

  ‘Best I and a few friends should stay here some days and get the place in order,’ he said. ‘Then I would we should be wed, Asgerd, and thereafter your mother and sist
er can come live with us.’

  ‘I will not wed you till Valgard has been hanged and his men burned in their house,’ she said angrily.

  Erlend smiled without mirth. ‘That will not be long,’ he said. ‘Already the war-arrow goes from hand to hand. In a few days the land will be rid of that pest.’

  ‘It is well,’ nodded Asgerd.

  Now many of those who had come to the feast went home, but the folk of the garth sat behind, and also Erlend and some half-dozen other neighbors. As night fell, a strong wind came with snow on its wings, howling around the hall. There was hail too, banging on the roof like night-gangers thumping their heels on the ridgepole. The hall was long and dark and cheerless, and all folk on the place huddled together at one end of it. They spoke little, and the horns passed often.

  Once Aelfrida stirred from her silence. ‘I hear something out there,’ she said.

  ‘Naught can I hear, and naught would be abroad tonight,’ answered Asgerd.

  Freda, who liked not her mother’s empty stare, touched her and said timidly, ‘All alone are you not, Mother. Your daughters have not forgotten you.’

  ‘Aye – aye!’ Aelfrida smiled. ‘Now you are all which is left – Orm’s seed dies not, and the long dear nights we had are not in vain—’ She looked into Erlend’s face. ‘Be good to your wife. She is of the blood of chieftains.’

  ‘What else could I be but good to her?’ he said.

  There came of a sudden a great beating on the door. Above the hooting wind rose the shout: ‘Open! Open or we break in!’

  Men clutched for their weapons as a thrall opened the door – and was at once cut down by a flashing ax. Huge and grim, guarded by two men’s shields held before him, snow mantling his shoulders, Valgard stood looking in.

  He spoke into the silence: ‘Let all women here come outside and they shall live. But the hall is ringed with men and I am going to burn it.’

  A cast spear clanged off the iron-bound shields. The sharp reek of smoke in the hall seemed to grow stronger.

  ‘Have you not done enough?’ shrieked Freda. ‘Burn the hall if you will, but I for one would rather stay within than take my life of you.’

  ‘Then forward!’ shouted Valgard, and ere those in the hall could stop him he and a dozen of his men had come inside. Across the long fire they leaped, and up to the high seats.

  ‘Not while I live!’ cried Erlend, rushing at Valgard with drawn sword. The ax Brotherslayer flashed down, knocking the blade from his hand with a mighty clang and burying its beak in his side. He pitched to the floor and Valgard went up to the high seats and grabbed Freda’s wrist. Another of his men took Asgerd, and the rest formed a shield-burg about the two. They fought back to the door, killing three men on the way.

  The others made a wild rush to follow them, but were hewed down by vikings warding all ways out. Aelfrida cried and ran to the door, and her the men let go through.

  Valgard was just straightening up from binding Asgerd and Freda. The roof of the hall was already burning brightly, the roaring flames painting faces bloody. Aelfrida clung to Valgard’s arm and shrieked up into his face.

  ‘Beast and monster and unnatural son,’ she cried, ‘what new evil are you working on the last of your kin? What madness turns you on your own sisters, who have done you naught but good, and how can you stamp on your mother’s heart? Let them go, let them go!’

  Valgard watched her with moveless face and pale cold eyes. ‘You are not my mother,’ he said at last, and struck her. She fell senseless in the snow and he turned away, dragging the two captive girls aboard his ship.

  ‘Where are we going?’ sobbed Freda, while Asgerd spat at him like an angry cat.

  He smiled at them, grimly. ‘I will not harm you,’ he said. ‘Indeed, I do you a service, since you are to be given to a great king.’ He sighed. ‘I envy him. But knowing my men, I had best watch over you.’

  Such of the women as did not wish to be burned alive went out to the raiders, but many stayed inside with their men. The hall burned brightly, lighting up the garth for a great ways around, and erelong the other buildings had caught fire.

  Valgard summoned his men before dawn, for he knew the neighbors would soon see the burning, if they had not already done so, and arrive in force. The vikings entered the ships and stood out to sea, rowing against a wind which blew icy waves inboard.

  ‘Never will we reach Finnmark like this,’ grumbled Valgard’s steersman.

  ‘I think we will,’ he answered, and untied the knots of the witch’s leather bag. At once the wind swung around until it was coming from astern, blowing directly northeast in a great steady drone. When the sails were set, the dozen ships fairly leaped ahead.

  When the folk of the neighborhood reached Orm’s garth, they found only charred timbers and smoldering ash-heaps. A few women were about, sobbing in the dreary dawn-light. Aelfrida alone did not weep, or indeed say anything. She sat on the great howe with hair and dress blowing wild in the wind, sat unmoving, empty-eyed, staring out to sea.

  Now for three days and nights Valgard’s ships ran before an unchanging gale. One of them foundered in the mighty waves, and three others dropped sail in the dark and rowed away, and there was uneasy muttering everywhere. But Valgard overawed all thoughts of mutiny.

  He stood nearly all the time in the prow of his ship, wrapped in a long leather cloak, with salt and rime crusted on his helmet, brooding darkly over the sea. Once a man dared gainsay him, and he slew the fellow on the spot and cast the body overboard. He said little, and his crew trembled when his uncanny stare rested on them.

  He would not answer the pleas of Asgerd and Freda for word on where they were bound, but he gave them well of food and drink and saw that they were not bothered by the crewmen.

  Freda would not eat at first. ‘Naught do I take from that thief and murderer,’ she said. The salt streaking her lovely pale cheeks was not all from the sea.

  ‘Eat to keep your strength,’ counseled Asgerd. ‘You do not take it from him, since he has robbed it from others, and the chance may come to us to escape. If now we pray God for help—’

  ‘That I forbid,’ said Valgard, ‘and if I hear any such word from you I will gag you.’

  ‘As you will,’ said Freda, ‘but a prayer is more in the heart than the mouth.’

  ‘And not very useful in either place,’ grinned Valgard, wolf-like. ‘Many a woman has squawked to her God when I got hands on her, and little did it avail. Nevertheless, I will have no more mention of gods in my ship.’

  He lapsed into his dark thoughts and the sisters into silence. Nor did the men say much, so that the only sounds were the scream of wind in the rigging and the roar of sea past the bows. Overhead flew gray clouds from which snow and hail often whirled, and the vessels were alone on the running waves.

  On the third day, near nightfall, with clouds so low and heavy as almost to bring dusk by themselves, they raised Finnmark. Bleak and terrible rose the cliffs from the sea, surf snarling and shattering against them and naught on their heights save snow and ice and a few low wind-twisted trees.

  ‘Ill looks this land,’ shivered Valgard’s steersman, ‘and I see naught of that great garth whereof you spoke.’

  ‘Sail into that fjord ahead,’ commanded the chief.

  The wind blew them directly into it. Under mighty and sullen cliffs the ships sailed, through the thickening snowy twilight to ground on a rocky beach. Looking ahead, Valgard saw the waiting trolls.

  They were not quite as tall as men, but nigh twice or thrice as broad, with long arms like tree boughs and clawed splay feet. Their skin was green and cold and slippery, moving on their stone-hard flesh. Few of them had hair, and their great round heads, with the flat noses, huge fanged mouths, pointed ears, and eyes deep buried in their bony sockets, were like skulls. Their eyes were all black, pits of inky darkness and brooding horror.

  They were for the most part naked, or wore but a few skins, even in the freezing wind. Their weapons were chief
ly clubs, and axes, spears, arrows, and slings using stone, all too heavy for men to swing. But some wore helms and byrnies and carried weapons of the dwarf-forged alloys that were hard as iron.

  Valgard could not but shudder at the sight. ‘Are you cold?’ asked one of his men.

  ‘No – no – ’tis naught,’ he muttered. And to himself: ‘Indeed I hope the witch was right and the elf women fairer than these. But they will make wondrous good warriors.’

  Now the vikings drew their ships ashore and stood uncertain in the gathering dusk. And Valgard saw the trolls descend on the beach.

  The fight was brief and horrible, for the men could not see their foes. Now and again a troll might chance to touch iron and be seared by it, but they knew how to avoid the metal. Their laughter boomed hollowly between the cliffs, great rolling peals of mad thunder, as they dashed out men’s brains, or ripped them limb from limb, or hunted them up through the mountains.

  Valgard’s steersman saw his comrades die and his chief lean unmoving on his ax. The viking roared and rushed on the berserker. ‘This is your doing!’ he shouted.

  ‘Indeed it is,’ quoth Valgard, and met him in a clamor of iron. It was not long before he had slain the steersman, but by then the rest of the battle was over.

  Now the troll captain approached Valgard, the ground quivering ever so faintly under his tread. ‘We had word of your coming,’ his deep voice rumbled in the human tongue, ‘and give many thanks for the sport. Now the king awaits you.’

  ‘I come at once,’ said Valgard.

  Asgerd and Freda had swooned, and were not aware of being borne along a deep gorge and up a barren mountainside and past sentries into a cave. They came at last into the great hall of Illrede himself.

  It was a huge place, hewn out of rock but furnished with magnificence raided from elves, dwarfs, goblins, and other folk, including men. Great gems blazed on the walls amid rare tapestries, costly goblets and cloths were on the cunningly wrought tables, and the long fires burning down the length of the hall lit the rich garments of the troll lords and their ladies.