Chapter Forty-Five: Varg

CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

VARG

Sounds filtered into Varg’s thought-cage, gently, like dawn seeping into the world. The crackle of torches burning, echoing, the murmur of voices, indistinct. The dripping of water, rhythmic.

He realised he was cold. And that he hurt.

He opened his eyes.

A roof of stone, slick with moisture, shadows shifting on it. He saw figures moving, stooping, heard the rustle of hushed conversation.

“He’s awake.” A face filled Varg’s vision: Torvik, who grinned at him.

“I knew you’d live. I told them,” he said. “I told them. You’re a fighter, brother.”

“Live,” Varg croaked. Memories swirled in his thought-cage, of a red-eyed man, Glornir on his knees, bloodied, Vol screeching and flames in the air. A pale sword.

Pain thumped rhythmically inside his head, and his left side felt numb.

Where the bone sword hit me.

More faces over him: Svik, Røkia, Einar.

“Where…” Varg mumbled. He shifted, felt straw stabbing into his back.

“We are underground, in a catacomb,” Torvik said. “This place is a marvel. It is filled with treasures. Relics, silver. The bones of a god!”

Varg turned his head, which was a mistake, a flare of pain shooting through him. He saw he was lying on a stone floor, straw beneath him, a figure beside him: Jökul, unconscious, a blood-soaked bandage wrapped around his head. Beyond Jökul were other figures laid out on the floor, two of them wrapped from head to boots in linen. Halja kneeled beside one of them. Tears streaked channels through the blood and grime on her cheeks.

Varg looked away, her grief etched so raw that he felt wrong to watch her.

Røkia appeared over him.

“You managed to take the cover from your spear, and buckle your helm on,” she said. “I am very proud of you.” Varg was not sure if he was really awake or just dreaming, because she smiled at him.

Svik pushed Røkia out of the way.

“Back with us, then, scrapper,” Svik said with a grin and twirled one of his moustaches. He did not look like he’d just fought in the shield wall, against skraelings and a troll the size of a barn. Einar’s big head loomed behind him, grinning more broadly than he had done to Svik’s fireside tales.

He heard the sound of a door opening, a voice behind Svik and the others, commanding.

“You did good,” Svik whispered, smiled at Varg and patted his cheek. Then Svik was being yanked out of the way, a new face appearing. It was Vol, looking down at him. Her face was grey and drawn, black pools around her eyes.

“How do you feel?” she asked him.

“I hurt,” Varg grunted. He moved and realised that most of the pain came from his left side, focused around his ribs.

“You are fortunate to feel at all. Orna’s talon has left its mark upon you.” She smiled at him, a cool hand resting on his forehead. “You have a courageous heart, Varg No-Sense.”

He did not feel courageous. He had just been trying to stay alive. Until the red mist had swept him up in its violent currents.

He tried to speak but she shook her head.

“Sleep is your healer. Rest, now, and ask your questions when you wake.”

He shook his head, wanting to ask his questions now. There were so many of them.

“Sofaðu græðandi svefninn,” Vol whispered as she stroked his forehead and his eyes fluttered, his thought-cage sinking into a soft and swirling river.

Varg jerked awake. Blinked. He had been dreaming. Of blood and combat, of trolls and other creatures, of wild, ferocious bears and pale-eyed serpents. Of wolves.

“It’s all right, brother,” a voice said, a hand patting his shoulder, and he looked to see Torvik sitting beside him, his back leaning against the rough-carved rock of the chamber they were in. Varg sucked in a deep breath and realised that he could feel his left side now. The pain made him grimace. He tried to sit up.

“Don’t rush it,” Torvik said to him. “You have been struck with the bone of a dead god; it is going to hurt for a while.” He grinned and shook his head. “You fought a dragon-born wielding the talon of dead Orna, the eagle-god, and you slew him.” He whistled. “That is a saga-tale, and no denying. Better than Svik’s troll-tales for sure. One to rival even the tales about old Skullsplitter.”

“Where are we?” Varg croaked.

“A catacomb,” Torvik said. “Full of ancient wonders. They have been digging here a long while, have unearthed an ancient place. Vol thinks it is Rotta’s chamber.”

The name was familiar to Varg from fireside saga-tales. Rotta was one of the dead gods, the rat, who had played his siblings Orna and Lik-Rifa off against each other, fanning the hatred between the eagle and dragon that had exploded on the day of the gods-fall. In the end Rotta had betrayed Orna too many times and fled from her wrath. She had hunted him down and found him, confined him to eternal punishment in the chambers beneath Frang’s Falls, where he was chained to a rock and bewitched serpents were made to crawl across him for eternity, their poison dripping upon him, burning and searing his flesh.

“And you know what else the saga-tales say was supposed to be kept in these chambers?” Torvik whispered, leaning closer.

“What?” Varg breathed.

“The Raudskinna, Rotta’s Galdrabok, rune-carved on the bloodied skin of Orna’s daughter.”

Varg sucked in a long breath. The Raudskinna, said to contain the knowledge of life and death. Orna used Rotta’s own rune-spells to keep him alive during his torment, always living, pain without ending.

“Just a saga-tale, surely,” Varg said.

“Aye, that’s what I thought about Rotta’s chamber, and dragon-born, until yesterday.”

Varg couldn’t argue with that.

“It is a strange place,” Torvik said, “and far more beneath the ground than you would ever imagine. Chambers and scores of tunnels. Barrack rooms and kitchens. They even have horses stabled down here. And there is a chamber full of hundreds of straw mattresses, but only big enough for bairns.” He shook his head.

Varg realised his throat was dry, and painful. It hurt to swallow his own spit. He lifted a hand and touched his neck.

“Ah, yes, that most likely hurts as well,” Torvik said. “The troll tried to squeeze the life from you, remember?”

It came flooding back.

“But you stabbed him a dozen times in his hand, like a furious wasp,” Torvik smiled.

“Water,” Varg wheezed.

Torvik unstoppered his water bottle and helped Varg to sit up, leaning him against the cold rock wall. Varg realised his tunic was gone, his torso wrapped in a linen bandage. The pain in his left side surged and spasmed with each movement, but the water in his throat was worth it, soothing as liquid silver. Varg looked around the chamber: a room maybe twenty paces across, with thick wooden doors at either end. Water dripped from the roof, glistening in the torchlight. Jökul still lay close by on a bed of straw. His bandage had been changed, his chest rising and falling rhythmically. Beyond him the two dead Bloodsworn lay wrapped in their shrouds. One was Vali. Varg remembered fighting shoulder to shoulder with him in the shield wall.

“You have won your battle-fame, brother,” Torvik said. “Glornir must surely invite you to make your oath. I just hope he asks me too.”

Through the pain, Varg noticed that he was growing accustomed to Torvik calling him brother. More than that, he was liking it.

“He will. You fought well, and bravely,” Varg croaked. “I saw you.”

“Aye,” Torvik looked away. “Truth be told, I was scared to death and cannot remember the half of it. But I am alive, and there was blood on my spear when the fighting stopped.” He looked at Varg. “But you have outshone me with your battle-fame, Varg No-Sense, like a sun outshines the stars.” He looked at Varg, his smile gone. “I think many would be jealous of your battle-fame.” He shrugged. “But not I. I am proud to call you brother.”

“You saved my life,” Varg said, remembering the skraeling as it had stood over him. “That is battle-fame enough, in my thought-cage.”

Torvik’s grin returned, warm and genuine. “And I will save your life again, if need calls, and I have breath in my body.”

“And I you,” Varg breathed.

Torvik laughed. “Listen to us,” he said, “like two grey-beards of battle.”

Varg could not help but laugh, and regretted it, pain pulsing in his ribs.

One of the doors opened and Vol walked in, a plate of bread and a bowl in her hand. She smiled to see Varg awake and pulled up a stool, sitting down beside him.

“Fish stew and some bread,” she said, offering the plate and bowl to Varg. She looked him up and down. “I did not expect to see you looking so well. To be struck by the talon of a dead god is no small thing.”

Varg realised he was starving hungry and spooned the fish stew into his mouth, huffed and blew at its heat. He dipped the chunk of bread into the bowl, soaking up the stew and sucked on that instead.

“Where is it?” Varg asked her as he blew on the stew.

“In there,” Vol said, nodding at the door on the far side of the chamber. Varg realised he could sense it, a pulsing through his body, like a dull headache. Vol undid the knot of his linen bandage and unwound it, nodded and clicked his tongue as she looked at Varg’s wound. He looked down and saw that his whole left side was mottled purple and black, a line of blisters across his rib where the bone sword had connected with him.

No wonder it hurts.

Vol laid her hand upon the wound, palm open.

“Sár gömlu guðanna, sára galdrabeins, lækna, laga, ná sér,” Vol breathed, and Varg felt a relief from the pain, like when he had scraped the skin from his knee as a bairn and Frøya had blown upon it.

Vol looked into Varg’s eyes.

“You saved me. You saved Glornir, and we are grateful.” She smiled at him. “This akáll you want. Tell me of it.”

Varg stared at Vol.

He sucked in a deep breath. It was a responsibility he had guarded like treasure. As if speaking of it would release it, like a captive bird. He swallowed.

“I do not know all that happened. Some of it is… blurred,” he said.

“Tell me what you know, then,” Vol asked him.

“It is for my sister, Frøya. She was murdered.”

“Yes,” Vol nodded, “this we know.” A look came over her face, a pain shared with Varg.

“I understand love for a sister,” Vol whispered, squeezing Varg’s hand. “My own sister is… missing. I worry for her.”

“I am sorry to hear that,” Varg said.

Vol shook her head. “It is probably just my thought-cage, making things seem worse than they are. Uspa is strong. I imagine I will see her soon.” She looked at Varg. “So, you were telling me…”

“All right then,” he said, summoning the strength to tell his tale. “Frøya and I were sold to a farmer, Kolskegg, when we were young. Five, six winters.” He shrugged. “Kolskegg was not a kind man. All Frøya and I had were each other. We were close.” A smile twitched the corners of his mouth at the memory of his sister. “So close that we came to know how the other felt, without having to say it. Just a look. And as we grew, even when apart I could…” He looked up at Vol. “I could feel her, in here,” he touched his chest. “It sounds like I am moon-touched, saying it out loud, but it was real.” He paused as he dealt with the surge of memories. “One day I was out clearing a new field of rocks for a winter pasture, and I felt her scream. I felt it in my bones. I knew something was wrong.” Another pause, then he continued. “When I got back to the farm I was told that Kolskegg had sold her. This was a year ago, I do not know to whom. Kolskegg told me that if I continued to fight for him in the pugil-ring, earned him enough coin and won the pugil-purse of our district, that I would buy my freedom, and maybe even enough to buy Frøya back. He said if I won this last fight that he would give me a sack of coin and the name of those who bought her.”

“Did you win, brother?” Torvik asked.

“Aye,” Varg muttered. “I won. Though I was beaten and battered. Afterwards I was carried back to Kolskegg’s barn and flung on a pile of rotting hay, could hear Kolskegg and his freedmen celebrating their win in his hall. As I lay on the ground, I…” He choked on the words. “All the time we were apart, I knew she was there. That Frøya was well.” He shrugged. “I just knew. But as I lay there, tasting my own blood in my mouth, I felt her scream. And then I felt her die.” Muscles in his face twitched and his fists clenched, knuckles white. A tear rolled down his cheek. Torvik reached out and squeezed his arm.

“I got up,” Varg continued, wanting to get it all out now that he had begun. “I went to Kolskegg and asked him for my coin, asked him to remove the thrall-collar around my throat. He laughed, said he would be a fool to ever allow such a gold-bringer to just walk away from him. I…” Varg looked down at his hands, shook his head. “The next thing I remember, my hands were around the throat of one of his freedmen, crushing the life from him. They were dead: Kolskegg, all of them, the walls of the hall covered in their blood, pools of it glistening on the ground, and I was stood there among them, chest heaving, blood-drenched. I found the key to my collar, took it, and a purse of coin, and ran.”

A silence settled among them.

“And that is why Leif Kolskegg hunted you, for the murder of his father,” Vol said. It wasn’t a question.

“It wasn’t murder,” Varg snarled.

Vol just looked at him, held his gaze and Varg returned it, fierce, raw.

“And you have something of your sister?” Vol asked as she looked away. “If I were to attempt this akáll I will need a link to her.”

“Aye. I have a lock of her hair from a comb she left behind.”

“Good,” Vol nodded. She looked up at Varg, sympathy in her eyes. “You are aware, an akáll will show you the last moments of her life? That could be hard for you. They will not bring you joy.”

“I understand,” Varg said, “but I must know what happened to her. I have sworn vengeance on her murderer. I will see who did the deed, in an akáll.”

Vol squeezed his hand.

“Will you do it?” Varg asked her.

“I will speak to Glornir,” Vol said. “He is chief; it is his decision.”

“But, have I not earned it?” Varg said, with surprise, a flicker of fear and anger.

“That is not for me to say,” Vol said, wrapping the bandage back around him. A draught blew through the chamber, making the torches flicker. The door creaked and Skalk walked in, Olvir and Yrsa behind him. He was smiling, limping and leaning on his knotted oaken staff.

“Here you are,” he said to Vol. “I have been looking for you. I have injured my leg and hoped you would be able to help.”

“Injured?” Vol said.

“How can you be injured when you did not fight?” Torvik muttered under his breath.

“Yes, here,” Skalk said, stopping and pointing down at his leg.

“Where?” Vol said, shifting her weight to turn and look at Skalk.

He swung his staff into Vol’s head, a short, hard blow, a crack and she collapsed, her eyes rolling back into her head.

Torvik grunted and rose, reaching for his seax.

Yrsa stepped forward and punched her spear into his throat, ripped it free, arterial blood jetting. Torvik clutched at the wound, blood spurting through his fingers, gurgled and flopped back against the wall, slid down to sit beside Varg, who was staring, frozen. He moved, grunted with pain, and then Olvir’s sword was hovering over his chest. He stared wildly at Torvik, who looked back at him. His friend’s hand grasped for him, and Varg held it, looking into Torvik’s eyes.

“Brother,” Torvik choked through his own blood.

“He needs a weapon in his fist, to walk the soul road,” Varg cried.

“I am not putting a weapon anywhere near you,” Skalk said. “I saw you fight a dragon-born.”

“I will do nothing, I swear it,” Varg pleaded. “Please,” he said, his eyes still locked with Torvik. He could see the life draining from him. Then there was a gurgled hiss and Torvik was gone.

“Can you walk?” Skalk asked him as Yrsa strode to the door on the far side of the chamber, opened it and went in.

“You are a murderer,” Varg breathed, shock, fear, anger swirling through him.

“Enough of that,” Skalk said with a wave of his hand. “We do what we have to do.”

Varg glowered up at Skalk. “Why am I still alive?”

“You have a choice, Varg. I watched you slay one of the Tainted. A dragon-born.”

“I attacked him from behind,” Varg muttered. “Took him by surprise.”

“The dragon-born have been widely thought to be a saga-story,” Skalk continued, ignoring Varg. “Extinct, if they ever existed, until I saw that one walk out into broad daylight with a talon of dead Orna in his hands. And you slew him. That is a rare deed. Glornir with all of his battle-fame could not do that. So…” He sucked in a deep breath, staring at Varg intently. “I know that you wish an akáll performed, which I can do for you, and I would like you at my side, as one of my oathsworn. That is my offer: come with me, swear your oath to me, and I will give you what you want.”

Varg just stared back at Skalk. The pain in his side, the murder of Torvik, the stink of blood and voided bowels filling the room: it was like some fevered nightmare.

Yrsa emerged from the far room carrying a chest. She placed it at Skalk’s feet, and he squatted, slid the bolt and opened the lid. Waves of power leaked from the chest like heat from an opened oven. Varg saw the pale gleam of the bone sword, a sheaf of rolled parchments, and other things as well. He grimaced and looked away.

“What is wrong?” Skalk asked him. Frowned. “Can you feel this?”

“You cannot?” Varg muttered.

“Hhmmm,” Skalk murmured, a glitter in his eyes. He closed the lid with a snap and the throbbing power receded. The Galdurman stood and hefted the chest.

Varg looked at Torvik’s hand in his, already growing cold.

Torvik is dead. He was my… friend.It felt strange to think that, when Varg had been friendless his whole life. He felt the surprise and fear becoming overwhelmed by the anger rising in his belly. Looked to Vol, who lay unconscious on the rock floor.

“Take her,” Skalk said to Yrsa, who squatted and pulled Vol up over her shoulder, stood and walked to the chamber’s exit. She looked out.

“Clear,” she said to Skalk.

“Take her to the horses,” Skalk said and Yrsa disappeared from view, her footsteps echoing, fading. He was watching Varg and saw his eyes following Vol.

“She is coming with me,” Skalk said, “I have never seen a Seiðr-witch so powerful. She is wasted on the Bloodsworn, will make a fine thrall to me.” He smiled. “So, back to my offer. Swear your oath to me, and you will have your akáll. Yes?”

My oath. Varg’s hand went instinctively to the pouch at his belt, but it was gone: must have been taken off with his tunic. A rush of panic. Frøya. Only moments ago, he had been talking of her with Vol. His hopes were like ashes in the fire now. And Skalk offered him a chance of fulfilling his oath to Frøya. My oath, he thought. My whole life, everything I am is bound up within that oath. He looked at Torvik, at his dead eyes.

“I can walk,” he said. He shifted his weight, grimaced, pushed himself up with one hand, then stopped when Olvir’s sword tip touched his chest.

Skalk smiled and nodded. “Help him,” the Galdurman said to Olvir, who lowered his blade and offered Varg his arm.

Varg gripped it, and heaved Olvir forwards, the warrior stumbling and falling on to Varg, trying to raise his sword.

He felt a burst of pain as Olvir fell on him, the man’s mail coat scraping on Varg’s bare skin, an elbow in Varg’s ribs. Olvir’s feet scrabbled on the rock floor and Varg locked the warrior’s sword arm and punched him in the face with his other hand, Olvir grunting, spitting blood. He twisted, breaking free, and Varg dug his heels into the wall at his back, propelled himself forwards and the two men fell across the room. Bright bursts of pain but Varg ignored them, spat and snarled at Olvir, bit into skin as Olvir was crushed close to him. He felt the spurt of blood in his mouth, hot and metallic, bit down harder, wrenching his neck. Olvir screamed, Varg feeling the change in the warrior, from fight to fear, writhing and bucking, now, terror-filled, just trying to get away. Blood was in Varg’s throat, on his face, in his eyes, blinding. Olvir’s body was jerking, slowing, twitching. Varg rolled away, gasping, spitting up globs of blood. Wiped his eyes. Saw Skalk’s snarling face, his boot hurtling towards Varg, connecting with his wounded ribs.

An explosion of pain: he heard himself scream, but that was sucked away into darkness.