Chapter Twenty-Six: Varg

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

VARG

Varg stood in the stern of the Sea-Wolf, behind Torvik and a handful of other warriors. More stood behind Varg, all of them jostling and laughing and singing as figures leaped over the starboard top-rail and ran the oar-dance, leaping from oar to oar as the Sea-Wolf was rowed into a sharp-sloped fjord. Surviving a summer storm seemed to be something worth celebrating among the Bloodsworn. Varg agreed, a faint echo of the fear still lingering in the pit of his belly that he had felt as the waves had risen and the lightning-scarred skies had unleashed a torrent so heavy he could not see his hand in front of his nose. He had been certain his death was at hand, fragmented memories seared into his thought-cage like the incandescent bursts of lightning that had crackled through the heavens above him, the sound of Einar bellowing orders and the dimly glimpsed figure of Glornir strapping himself to the top-rail so that he could keep his grip on the tiller without being hurled overboard. The skies were clear, now, as if the storm had never been, the air fresh, and the sun was sinking into the rim of the world, turning the now calm ocean and fjord to molten bronze.

Torvik climbed on to the top-rail, looked back at Varg and the others, then leaped on to the first oar, teetered for a moment, then found his balance and leaped to the next. Only two days had passed since they left Liga, but to Varg it had felt like a lifetime.

Like a new life, as if I have been reborn.

His hands were raw and blistered from rowing and handling what felt like leagues of sea-soaked rigging, his face red and burned by the sun, his clothing sodden from the sudden storm that had swept out of the north, and yet he felt… happy. It was a strange sensation, when all he had known his whole life was toil and misery, the only light in his life during the long dark of servitude being Frøya. He tensed just at the memory of her name, a flutter of happiness and guilt in his belly, a reminder of why he was here, of the oath he had sworn. To find her body and avenge her murder. To rip and tear his sister’s killers. He had sworn it as he had stood blood-drenched over Kolskegg’s still-warm corpse and his oath hovered now in his mind and blood like a dark-winged raven, croaking that time was passing.

I have not forgotten you. I will never forget you. And my oath stands, I will make it happen. But if I feel some moments of cheer as I walk that path, or find some friends, is that so bad a thing? Should it feel so… wrong?

“Go on, No-Sense,” a voice said behind him, Svik pushing him, and Varg blinked, shook his head and saw that there was no one between him and the top-rail. He jumped up on to the rail and stood there a moment. Around half the crew were rowing the Sea-Wolf, thirty oars rising and falling, the other half taking part in this oar-dance. Ahead of him Torvik leaped from oar to oar, grinning and whooping. Varg sucked in a deep breath and leaped on to the first oar, timed it so that it was dipping as he landed, his feet spread, knees bending as the oar began to rise. He felt the air churn around him, swirled his arms and then he was stable, standing on the oar, a grin splitting his face.

“Get on with you,” Svik yelled, the warrior standing on the top-rail now, waiting his turn at the first oar. Varg grinned and leaped, landing on the next oar with his left foot, dipping and pushing off, leaping to the next one, moving on as if the oars were stepping stones across a river that were too small to take both of his feet.

There was a cry and a splash ahead of him, and Varg glanced to see Torvik disappear into the fjord’s ice-blue embrace, an explosion of sun-flecked foam as he resurfaced. Varg ran on, along the entire starboard length of the ship until he was leaping on to the rail before the prow. A smile and dip of her head from Vol the Seiðr-witch from her usual place in the prow, one of Edel’s wolfhounds there, panting and watching Varg, nudging him for a neck-scratch. He quickly obliged and then he was leaping back on to the portside rail, one foot slipping and then he was leaping again, airborne, weightless, landing with a thump on the first oar. There was a flash of a black beard and teeth as Jökul the smith grinned over his oar at Varg.

Varg grinned back as he bent his legs and leaped onwards. There were many things that he was learning in his short time with the Bloodsworn, shield and spear under the merciless tutelage of Røkia, ship craft from seemingly everyone, but some skills came naturally to Varg and did not need teaching. Endurance, determination, and balance. He was light on his feet. On Kolskegg’s farm during the Winternight celebration that followed the harvest Varg had taken part in the tree-run, where those willing had to run across a river full of cut timber trunks that spun and moved under your feet. It was not unknown for men and women to be crushed or drowned during the trial, but Varg had won it every year since his first attempt, when he had only eleven winters on his shoulders. And so, he was enjoying this trial and faring better than many of the other Bloodsworn, as attested by the shrieks and splashes occurring around him.

The stern was in sight, a handful of oars dipping and rising between him and Glornir, who stood at the tiller. Varg landed on an oar, his leg bending to go with the oar’s flow, but it jerked beneath him, dipping when it should be rising. He swung his arms, balanced for a heartbeat, then his foot was sliding and he was falling, plummeting to the water below. He glimpsed a snarl of red beard staring over the oar-port, Einar Half-Troll grinning as he watched Varg fall, and then he hit the water.

It was cold as ice, snatching his breath away. He sank, turning, thrashing for a moment, unsure which way was up. He expelled some air and tracked the bubbles, followed them, and then his head was bursting from the water and he was gasping in air.

The hull of the Sea-Wolf was gliding away, Glornir steering the ship towards a shallow bank on the fjord. A few figures were still leaping across the oars, Svik among them. Varg swam for shore, along with a dozen or so others.

Shouts drifted from the Sea-Wolf and the anchor-stone in its wooden frame was heaved on to the top-rail and dropped overboard, Glornir choosing to get his feet wet rather than scrape the hull on the fjord’s bank. Bloodsworn were leaping over the side and splashing ashore as Varg’s feet touched the ground and he began to wade to shore. A figure appeared, standing on the bank, waiting for him.

It was Røkia, a shield and spear in her hands.

Varg shook his head as he emerged from the water, a wind blowing across him and causing him to shiver, despite the lingering warmth of the setting sun.

“You are not serious?” Varg said to her. “I am soaked to the skin – unfairly, I might add, as Einar Half-Troll threw me from his oar.”

“I am always serious,” Røkia said, stone-faced.

This is a truth, Varg thought. He sighed. “Give me a few moments to change my tunic and breeches and dry off in what is left of this sun.”

“Ha, just what I would have expected from a warrior with No-Sense,” Røkia said. “Do you think your enemy will kindly wait for you to dry your feet and arse if they come upon you in a fjord or river? No, they will fall upon you like wolves and seek to carve you into small pieces, using their good fortune of finding you unprepared. You must learn to fight and survive under the worst of conditions, not the best.”

“That is what I have done all my life,” Varg muttered under his breath.

Røkia threw his shield to him and strode away, either not hearing or choosing to ignore his words. Varg caught the shield rather than let it empty his mouth of teeth, and trudged after her, dripping on the fjord’s grassy bank. He glimpsed Svik on the Sea-Wolf’s top-rail, holding his arms up and dancing a jig.

He must have won the oar-dance.

Røkia turned again, this time throwing him his spear, which he caught deftly, its leather sheath in place over the blade.

“Come and kill me then,” Røkia said, a cold smile on her lips as she raised her shield and set her feet.

There was a smell of woodsmoke as fires were kindled and iron pots hung for supper, the crackle of butter melting in pans. Varg’s belly growled.

He sighed, shoulders slumped, then sucked in a deep breath and straightened.

Might as well get on with it. Getting beaten up by Røkia is the only path to food.

He lifted his shield and checked the grip on his spear, as Røkia had taught him. They were only a few days away from Liga, but each night Røkia had put his shield and spear in his fists and continued with his training. At first, she had continued teaching him shield work, adding the principle of treating the shield as a weapon as well as a form of defence, using both the iron boss and the hide-bound rim. The second night she had put a spear in his hand and taught him the two main grips. He approached Røkia now with an overhand grip, the shaft angled down, his blade pointed at her shield boss. This gave him a longer reach than the reverse grip, with which he noted Røkia held her own spear, though he knew his overhand grip was weaker.

Best to use the longer reach as I approach, a chance to draw blood before I am in range of her own strikes.

Røkia grunted as he approached and he took that as her approval of his choice, and then he was jabbing at her, aiming at shoulders, legs, trying to find a weakness around her shield.

“Side steps,” she grunted at him over her shield rim. “You’ll not find an opening by coming straight at me like a stupid old boar.”

Varg listened, shuffling left and right, keeping his spear shaft jabbing, in and out, his strikes almost finding her flesh, but always ending with the dull thud of his leather-bound blade meeting her linen-wrapped shield. And then Røkia was stepping in, using her reverse grip on her spear to sweep his own away, stepping closer still, her blade slipping inside his shield and raking across his chest, her sharp-angled face close enough that he could smell the apple and onions on her breath.

“You now have a wound,” she said, then smiled at him as she shoved her shield into his chest. He took a step back, stumbled over her foot that she had sneakily placed behind his, and then his arse was on the grass and he was looking up at her, her leather-wrapped blade touching his throat.

A position he was becoming all too familiar with.

“A good start,” she said, “but when you failed to strike me, you should have broken away and shifted your grip. And never stop fighting until one of us is dead. I wounded you with my strike, but it would not have been a killing blow. Not immediately, anyway.”

She offered him an arm and heaved him to his feet.

“Again,” she said.

Varg stood in a line of the Bloodsworn, a bowl in hand. It was dark now, the summer sun long disappeared beyond the horizon, the sky a scattering of stars above him. He had changed out of his sweat- and fjord-soaked clothes into a fresh tunic and breeches from his sea-chest. Hearth fires flickered, sending shadows dancing, the sound of the fjord lapping at the shore and the creak of the Sea-Wolf on the water. He reached the pot hanging over the fire and ladled fish stew into his bowl, then turned and walked away, looking for somewhere to sit. He saw Svik stooping to speak to Einar Half-Troll, who was as big as the boulder he was sitting against. Svik pulled a loaf of bread from beneath his cloak and handed it to Einar, then sat down with the big man.

“Congratulations for your victory on the oars,” Varg said to Svik as he approached them.

“It is all in the reflexes,” Svik smiled and dipped his head at Varg. “I do not like getting wet,” he said. “It makes a mess of my beard, so I have learned to have light feet and fine balance.”

“That is something I do not have to worry about,” Varg said, rubbing his head and chin. Although, to his surprise, he found that his stubble had grown and it was no longer scratching and itching his palm.

“No, but it will grow,” Svik said solemnly. “Soon you will have hair as pretty as mine. You did well on the oars. It is a shame you… slipped.”

“I did not slip. I was thrown,” Varg grunted, not able to stop himself looking at Einar. “As I think you may know.” He looked pointedly at the loaf of bread that Einar was ripping chunks from. “And as Einar well knows.”

“I like bread,” Einar grunted.

“Are we even, now?” Varg asked the big man.

“No,” Einar said, not looking at Varg. He tore another chunk of bread from the loaf Svik had given him and dipped it in his fish stew, slurped on it, then slowly looked up at Varg. “You got wet, but I see that you are already dry. Me, I can count your teeth by their imprints in my leg, and will be able to do so for all the years of my life.”

“It was a fight,” Varg shrugged.

“That is a fair point, Half-Troll,” Svik said. “You were trying to smash his bones with your fists.”

“I was holding back,” Einar sniffed. “I was being kind. I even told him to stay down, and how does he repay my kindness? By biting me.” He pulled a face. “I do not like to be bitten.”

“I am now most clearly aware of that,” Varg assured him, “and I swear that I will never put my teeth in you again.”

“Hhmmm,” Einar rumbled, his brows knitting. Varg thought he could almost see the big man’s thought-cage churning as he turned Varg’s words over. With another rumbling breath Einar tore a chunk of bread from his loaf and offered it to Varg. “Sit and eat, then,” Einar said.

“My thanks,” Varg said, thinking that this was as close to a truce as he was likely to get. He sat beside Einar, as Torvik appeared and joined them.

“I hear Einar threw you in the fjord,” the young apprentice scout and blacksmith said, a big grin on his face. Varg looked from Torvik to Einar.

“I… slipped,” Varg said.

Einar nodded, a rumble of what Varg took to be approval reverberating in his chest.

Torvik looked at the three of them.

“You slipped on Einar’s oar, along with an uncommon number of others, and Svik won,” Torvik said. “Hmmm.”

Varg slurped on his bread.

“It is true, I am blessed with good fortune,” Svik said, twirling his red moustache. “And also, I am a remarkable oar-dancer. What can I say? Some bread for your fish stew?” Svik offered to Torvik, smiling.

“I hear the Skullsplitter was a remarkable oar-dancer,” Torvik said as he took Svik up on his offer of bread.

“Skullsplitter?” Svik said, raising an eyebrow. “No, the chief was big and heavy as a bear. Dancing on oars was not one of Skullsplitter’s skills. Splitting skulls with a long-axe, however…”

“How did a warrior like that fall?” Torvik muttered. “I heard it was in a sea-battle, falling from the Sea-Wolf’s rail in a coat of mail and drowning.” Torvik shook his head.

“Aye,” Svik said, his face unusually melancholy. He sighed and shook his head. “It was a hard-fought battle, and no denying.” He looked around at their camp, the Bloodsworn going about their evening meal. “If I were you,” Svik said in hushed tones, “I would not speak so loudly of Skullsplitter’s fall around Glornir. He still mourns the death of his brother; it is a grief that sits heavy on his shoulders.”

Torvik nodded.

Footfalls and the murmuring of conversation stilled. Glornir walked towards the hearth fire, Vol at his side, and Skalk, Queen Helka’s Galdurman followed them, his knotted staff in his fist. The two warriors from Queen Helka’s retinue were with him, gleaming in their fine brynjas. The man Varg had learned was named Olvir, a scar over one eyebrow shifting the set of his eyes, and the proud-faced, thin-lipped woman was called Yrsa. They both wore swords at their hips and dark cloaks over their shoulders, both pinned with brooches of silver fashioned into the likeness of eagle wings. Wherever Skalk went, they were close behind him. Varg had seen them all taking shifts on the oar-bench, and glimpsed them bailing water furiously during the sea storm that had swept over them.

“Your ears, Bloodsworn,” Glornir said as he came to stand by the hearth fire. “For those who do not know, this is Skalk, famed skáld and Galdurman of Queen Helka. He has some words for us, about our mission.”

Varg stared at Skalk. He was a tall man with an honest face, laughter lines thick as crow’s talons at his eyes. His shoulders and chest were broad, everything about him suggesting a warrior’s bearing, not a sorcerer’s.

He is a Galdurman… I could ask him to perform anakáll and save myself much time. Who knows how long it will be before Glornir is satisfied that I have proven myself?

“It is always good to know what lies ahead, no?” Skalk said, nodding and smiling at the Bloodsworn. “So, I will tell you why my queen has hired you, and what I know of the task she wishes you to perform. We are travelling to the source of the River Slågen, from which this fjord flows.” He gestured to the glossy-dark of the fjord behind them, glittering in the starlight. “That river will take us to the foothills of the Boneback Mountains, on the north-western border of my queen’s lands. Something there is killing her people.”

“A lusty ram or aggrieved goat, perhaps,” Svik called out, laughter spreading around him. “We have all heard the tales of loneliness among those who live within the shadow of the Bonebacks, and what that can do to a man.”

“This is no laughing matter,” Skalk said, pausing to stare at Svik. “Not if it were your kin that were being… consumed. At first, people were disappearing from farms and more remote places, and we thought it was on account of raids from Jarl Störr across the river.” A frown creased his brow as he mentioned the jarl’s name, a flicker of fire-glow in his eyes. “The region shares a border with Jarl Störr’s land, and though there is officially peace between the jarl and my queen,” he looked around them and smiled knowingly, showing small white teeth behind his blond beard, “we all know that a jarl teaches his drengrs the art of war through raiding.” Warriors among the Bloodsworn nodded, seeming to Varg as if they were remembering their own pasts.

“But then, we began to find those who had disappeared,” Skalk continued. “Or, find parts of them.” Another frown. “They were being eaten. Or at least, some of them were.” He shook his head. “A queen must protect her people, and so action must be taken. But the queen’s hird are spread thinly along her borders, and so she thought of you, the Bloodsworn, known for their fair-fame reputation, and she heard news that you were within her own lands, at Liga.” He spread his arms, gave another smile. “There are vaesen loose in Queen Helka’s domain, killing and eating her people, and they must be stopped.”

“What vaesen?” a voice called out. It was Røkia, Varg saw.

Skalk shrugged. “That I do not know. There have been no witnesses. Ones with big teeth and long claws, I would guess, judging by the bite marks and wounds on the remains we have found. Trolls, or Huldra-folk, maybe Vittor, or wights? I do not know. But whatever they are, I suspect that there are more than one or two of them.”

“How many dead have you found?” Svik called out.

Skalk looked at him.

“It is hard to tell exactly, you understand,” Skalk said. “Here a leg, there an arm, elsewhere just a bloodstain.” He looked up at the star-flecked sky. “Perhaps as many as thirty.”

Murmurs rippled around the Bloodsworn.

“That is a lot of dead, which means a lot of vaesen, most likely,” a new voice said, quiet and sinuous. It was Vol, standing beside Glornir. “They must have crossed from beyond the Bonebacks, and that means finding a way past the Grimholt. Past your tower of guards. How is that possible?”

Skalk turned a heavy-browed look upon Vol, eyes abruptly cold and hard.

“I am not accustomed to answering the questions of thralls,” he said, “or hearing their criticisms.”

Glornir straightened, and Varg felt a shift around him, a sudden tension in the air that made the hairs on his arms stand on end.

“It is not a criticism,” Vol said, speaking slowly and ignoring Skalk’s insults, “just an observation. If vaesen have found a way through the Bonebacks…”

“I am not being clear,” Skalk said, glowering at Vol. “You are a thrall. Do not speak to me unless I give you permission.”

“Vol has saved my ship and my crew more times than I can count,” Glornir said with a glare. “Thrall, freedman, all on my ship risk their lives, and will be respected for that. If you choose to travel on my ship, with my crew, you will give her the same respect as any other of my Bloodsworn. Or we are going to have a problem. Do I make myself clear?”

Skalk stiffened, and his guards, Olvir and Yrsa, shifted. Fingertips twitched, brushed a sword hilt.

“She is a Tainted thrall,” Skalk said with a sneer.

Glornir shrugged. “I am not in the habit of repeating my words,” he said.

“Neither am I.”

“It is my ship, and my crew. You can always walk from here,” Glornir said.

“It’s my coin,” Skalk said, his voice quiet now, cold.

“Queen Helka’s coin,” Glornir replied. “If you want to pay someone else for your vaesen-hunting.” Glornir gave a thin smile, holding Skalk’s gaze.

There was a long, drawn-out moment, and then Skalk smiled. “As you wish. You will do the fighting, and the dying if there is any to be done, so…” A shift in his shoulders suggested the matter meant nothing to him. “I will ignore the collar about your thrall’s throat.” He looked around at the gathered Bloodsworn, his easy smile back on his face. “That is all I know. We shall travel there together and root out the vaesen-filth. And Queen Helka will show her gratitude to you with a chest of silver.”

Skalk stepped around Glornir to the iron cookpot hanging over the fire and ladled some fish stew into a bowl, then walked away, Olvir and Yrsa following.

Varg sat and stared at his own bowl, his thought-cage whirling.

Galdurmen and vaesen. I am sailing into an adventure, hunting trolls or wights or whatever the Boneback Mountains are hiding.

A shiver ran through him.

Troll-hunting is a long way from Kolskegg’s farm.

There was a humming in his blood: fear or excitement, he was not sure.