Fin Gall (20 page)

             
It took another fifteen tense minutes for the riders to approach the gate. At their head was a young man, his beard dark brown and cropped short, his helmet glinting bright. He wore a white tunic over his mail shirt and a red cape. He looked like a king, and such he was. He reined his band to a stop twenty feet from the gate.

             
Along the wall, bows were raised to the ready. “Archers! Lower your bows!” Magnus called and the bows came down again.

             
The Irishman in the white tunic approached, and behind him came another, not so well fitted out, and one of the standard bearers as well. The lead man raised his hand and spoke. His accent was Gaelic, but his speech was Norse.

             
“Lord Magnus!” he called.

             
“Lord Cormac Ua Ruairc,” Magnus called back. He looked down at Kjartan Swiftsword, standing on the right end of the shieldwall. “Kjartan, it’s all right. Open the gate.”

             
“Open the gate?” Asbjorn, standing well behind the shieldwall, shouted his impotent protest. “I forbid you to...”

             
Asbjorn’s forbidding came too late. Kjartan tossed off the bar and pulled the gate open. The shieldwall melted away, the Vikings standing to either side as the Irish war party rode slowly in, Irish and Norse eyeing one another warily, like two packs of wolves that come upon one another in the woods.

             
Cormac Ua Ruairc slid down from his horse. He extended a hand to Magnus. Magnus took it, shook, clapped Cormac on the shoulder. It was only the second time they had met, though their couriers had gone from one to the other for a month or more. The Irishman looked as Magnus remembered - strong, smart and able. A king and worthy of the title.

             
“I demand to know what this is about!” Asbjorn said as he came puffing up, but Magnus could hear the edge of panic in his voice.

             
You would do well to panic,
Magnus thought. He addressed Cormac. “My Lord Cormac, this is Asbjorn Gudrodarson, known as Asbjorn the Fat.”

             
“Well named,” Cormac agreed. His men were fanning out on their mounts, making a presence there inside the Baldoyle monastery. There was nothing overtly threatening in their actions, but there was also no question as to where the military strength rested.

             
“Asbjorn,” Magnus continued, “this is Lord Cormac Ua Ruairc, king of Gailenga.”

             
Asbjorn glared at Cormac. Cormac looked with amusement on Asbjorn, then turned to Magnus. “Who is he? What is he doing here?”

             
“Orm foisted him on me. He is of no concern.”

             
“Of no...” Asbjorn sputtered and Magnus turned, swinging his fist, and hit Asbjorn hard in the face. Asbjorn staggered back, blood flowing from his open mouth, then tripped on his feet and fell hard. Magnus was over him in a flash. He yanked the sword from Asbjorn’s scabbard and tossed it aside. No one, not even Asbjorn’s men, made a move to interfere.

             
“Where is the crown?” Cormac asked.

             
“We are being led to it now. No more than a day or so.”

             
Cormac frowned. “I thought you would have it.”

             
“So did I,” Magnus said. “But I do not.”

             
“Pray don’t forget what that bitch’s whelp Máel Sechnaill is capable of. After he stole his whore daughter from my brother Donnchad, he tied my brother to a stake and personally ripped the guts out of him. They told me you could hear the screaming half a mile away. He will do the same to us. We cannot stop him, and take Brega, if I do not wear the Crown of the Three Kingdoms.”

             
“A day or so. No more.”

             
Cormac looked into Magnus’s eyes, looked hard. “You had better be right, Lord Magnus,” he said, and for the first time since this great chance had presented itself, Magnus Magnusson wondered if he might have made a mistake.

Chapter Twenty-One

...[
H]eathens shall come to you from me...

a
race of pagans who will carry you into bondage...

                                         
The Epistle of Jesus

                                             
9th Century Irish Text

              T

wo days after arriving at Tara, Harald Thorgrimsson’s fever broke. It was like stepping from a dream world into daylight, like stepping from a sweltering smith’s shop into the night air. One moment he was burning up, tossing in a nightmare sea, and the next he was cool, comfortable,
aware.

             
His eyes were closed and he kept them closed as he tried to organize his thoughts. He did not know where he was. He listened. The few sounds he could hear were distant and muted and nothing that he recognized. The air had no familiar smell.

             
He opened his eyes. He was looking up at the underside of a wood-plank ceiling with carved beams. The room was bright and sunlit. He could see the tops of stone-built walls covered with whitewashed plaster.

             
He wanted to sit up but understood that he did not have the strength. He rolled his head to the right. There was a tapestry on the wall, a polished table with a silver bowl and pitcher. It was a fine room, finer than he was used to, finer even than his grandfather’s home in East Agder, which was the finest home he had ever seen.

             
He heard a little gasp on his left side and rolled his head that way, alarmed now. It was a girl, but he did not recognize her. He looked at her face and she looked at him and his first thought was that she was beautiful, a beautiful girl. Green eyes. Dark brown hair that reminded him of the luxurious mane of a horse his father had once owned.

             
She leaned closer to him and put her hand on his forehead. Her skin was smooth and soft and cool and felt delicious. She said something in a sweet and lilting voice but the words made no sense. Harald was suddenly afraid that this was a Valkyrie, come to take him away, or that he was being welcome into Valhalla. But Valkyries, the eaters of the dead, he had always understood, were not gentle and kind like this one.

             
The girl turned and spoke toward the door and her tone was loud and commanding. A voice on the other side of the door responded and Harald heard footsteps going away.

             
The girl turned back to him and she smiled and he tried to smile as well. His lips were dry and they hurt when he moved them. The girl took a damp cloth and wiped his face and Harald no longer cared where he was.

             
It was not long after that the door open and a man came in, an important man, Harald gathered, judging by his clothing and manner. He looked down at Harald but his face did not have the same tenderness as the girl’s and it made Harald, who had thought himself among friends, a bit apprehensive.

             
“You’re awake,” the man observed.

             
Harald nodded.

             
“What is your name?”

             
“Harald.” The word came out like a croak. His voice sounded odd to him. And it was only then that Harald realized the man could speak his own language. A thousand questions floated in his head.

             
“What is this girl’s name?” he asked.

             
The man frowned and looked at first as if he would not answer. “Brigit,” he said at last. “And I am Flann mac Conaing, chief councilor to my Lord Máel Sechnaill mac Ruanaid, King of Tara, rí ruirech of Brega.”

             
Harald nodded. It seemed as if those words were meant to impress, but in truth he had no idea what this man was saying. Save that the girl’s name was Brigit.

             
“Where am I?” More practical questions began it insinuate themselves. “Where is my father? And Ornolf, and the others?”

             
“Who is your father?”

             
“Thorgrim Night Wolf.”

             
“He is the jarl in command of your ship?”

             
“No. Ornolf is. Where are they?”

             
The man frowned. “They are coming for you. The crown that you took, it belongs to my Lord Máel Sechnaill. They are returning it. Until then you will stay here.”

             
Harald squinted at the man. There seemed to be some implied threat there, though he could not be certain.

             
Crown?
he thought. He did not recall any crown, but again there seemed to be a great deal he did not recall.

             
“What crown is this?” Harald asked and he saw something pass over the man’s face and had the idea that he should not have asked that question.

             
“The crown you fin gall...you Norsemen, captured from the curragh.”

             
Harald nodded. He remembered the curragh, the fight on the heaving seas. Vefrod Vesteinsson hacked to bits by the Irish crew. He did not remember any crown, but he thought it was best if he did not say as much.

             
Despite Harald’s nodding agreement, that uncertain look was still on the man’s face. He said something to Brigit and she said something back, and then he turned and left.

             
Harald looked up at the girl.
Beautiful.
She is beautiful,
he thought and he was sure he would think that even if he were not as weak as he was, if she had not been there to care for him.

             
“Brigit...” he tried her name.

             
She smiled at him. “Harald,” she said. Her expression, her tone, was that of a mother speaking to a gravely sick child, one unlikely to live, and it made Harald uneasy.

             
Máel Sechnaill was not happy to suffer any fin gall to live. He was most certainly not happy having them under his roof, eating his food, tended to by his men.

             
The taking of hostages was a common enough practice, and there was protocol that dictated how they were to be treated. But hostages in the past had always meant Christian hostages, not heathen Norse swine.

             
Máel Sechnaill was not happy.

             
And he was even less happy listening to what Flann mac Conaing had to say.

             
“He knows where the crown is. He’s lying if he says otherwise,” Máel said, but it was more of a question. “All these gall lie. They don’t know how to tell the truth.”

             
“I don’t think so, Lord Máel,” Flann said. “He’s young, and he lacks any subtle art. I think he genuinely knows nothing of the crown.”

             
“You think these swine don’t have it after all?”

             
“I don’t know.”

             
“Your sister said they have it. She is with them still.”

             
“Yes. And Morrigan is generally not wrong about these things. But now there’s some doubt. As your chief counselor I thought I should warn you.”

             
Máel nodded and ran his fingers through his short-cropped white beard. This whole hostage thing had been Flann’s idea, Flann and his sister Morrigan, and it took substantial courage for Flann to come before his king and admit it might be going wrong. But Flann was courageous that way, and rarely wrong, and that was why Máel Sechnaill kept him.

             
“That one, Harald, is just a boy. He might not be privy to everything. How many other of these fin gall do we have?”

             
“Two, my lord.”

             
“Bring them here.”

             
Ten minutes later the other Northmen were kneeling on the stone floor in front of Máel Sechnaill’s low wooden throne. One was called Olvir Yellowbeard and the other Giant-Bjorn, or so Flann had informed Máel. The names went out of Máel’s head as quickly as they came in. He was no more concerned with names for the fin gall then he was for names for the boars or harts that he hunted.

             
He turned to the one called Giant-Bjorn, who seemed the bigger and dumber of the two. Even on his knees his head was even with Máel Sechnaill’s chest. His hair was wild, his beard was like an unkept hedge. His hands were bound behind his back.

             
“What did you do with the crown?” he asked. Flann translated.

             
“I don’t know of any crown,” Giant-Bjorn said.

             
“The crown you took from the curragh,” Máel said, his voice growing softer, a danger sign for those who knew him.

             
“There was nothing on the curragh. A few weapons, some mail shirts, we took those. There was nothing else.”

             
Máel Sechnaill kicked Giant-Bjorn hard in the stomach and the big man fell over, gasping for breath. Máel waited. Giant-Bjorn shouted something, spitting in fury as he did. Flann did not bother to translate. Máel Sechnaill could guess at the Viking’s general meaning. He nodded to the guards and they lifted the fin gall and put him back on his knees.

             
“There was a crown on the curragh and you took it. What did you do with it?”

             
Flann translated the words. Giant-Bjorn glared. Máel did not intend to waste much more time on this. Giant-Bjorn did not know it, of course, but this questioning was for Olvir Yellowbeard’s benefit, not his.

             
“What did you do with the crown?”

             
“There was no crown.”

             
“Are you a Christian?”

             
The last question, when translated, took Giant-Bjorn by surprise. When he did not answer, Máel Sechnaill tried again. “Do you believe in Jesus Christ? Would you take him as your God?”

             
Now Giant-Bjorn looked more confused than anything. “Jesus Christ, as my God? My gods are more powerful than yours. I wouldn’t crawl to your Jesus like you do!” He spit on the floor for emphasis.

             
Máel Sechnaill pulled the double-edged dagger from his sheath. He had done his duty, as far as he or Father Gilbert were concerned, had offered the heathen a chance at salvation. With that, he slashed the man’s throat, the razor-sharp blade opening his neck wide. Giant-Bjorn fell on his side, feet kicking, writhing, making a gurgling sound as the blood ran over the stone floor and the life drained fast away.