Norseman Raider (The Norseman Chronicles Book 4) (4 page)

I stepped in front of the stone’s face so that I could see the rest of the inspiring carvings.  The square roof under which Odin stood was not a roof
at all.  It was not a building or longhouse or other dwelling.  It was the horizontal piece of the Christian cross.  Odin was at war with the events of the Ragnarok under the unmistakable watch of the Christian symbol.  The stone seemed to say that the One God was in charge of it all.  Impossible, I thought with a smug shrug.  On the other side of the cross, under that horizontal section was the carving of a different event.  At the time, this scene was unfamiliar to me.  A man carried a book in one hand.  In his other he carried his own short cross.  From this smaller cross dangled a long fish.  And beneath all that, under the man’s stomping feet, was a dying serpent.

I couldn’t look at the image
s any longer.  They unsettled my stomach.  It could have been the sour ale that did its work on my belly, but it felt like the events on the stone shook my foundations.  The carvings clearly showed that whoever commissioned it believed that the fall of the old gods would usher in the rise of the One God.  I shuddered.

I turned
, frowning.  With a grunt to get myself moving, I awkwardly sauntered toward the hall where the rumbling of multiple conversations and songs inside rose and fell.  I pushed the church and the stone to the back of my mind.  Soon Godfrey would begin his Tynwald.

. . .

Everything was foreign.  My life was in the lurch.  I pushed my way into the hall and wedged between the broad shoulders of warriors, fishermen, and farmers.  Free men and free women sang and drank.  A couple grunted atop a mead table.  A thin blanket half-covered them as the young man mounted the drunken woman.  She continued drinking, ale spilling while he rutted like a mountain goat.  I saw Leif’s men, those who had volunteered to come with us on our exile, and felt comfort.  I walked to them and found a seat.  Their bruised faces gave me weak smiles and nods.

“Let’s see if thi
s king can rebuild a Norse army,” said Leif.  He was eager, seemingly unfazed by the countless changes that had occurred in his life since we left our homes.  I was envious of the way he glided from one situation to the next without a care.

“A Christian Norseman army,” I corrected,
unable to stop thinking about the Christian dominance over the old gods from the stone.

Leif smiled. 
Like Godfrey had, he played with a tooth, loosened from the day’s battle, with the tip of his tongue.  Fresh blood seeped into his saliva when he dislodged a miniature clot.  “Either way, Norse and Thor or Norse and the One God, I’ve told you I mean to lead men.  I mean to be a wise, moderate, and fair leader of my people.  By the time we return to Greenland, it will be my turn to be jarl in place of my father.”

“Do you think Godfrey is the one to teach you all that?”
  A small, waifish girl came by with mugs of ale on a platter.  We each took one.  The barefoot little thrall gave me a snarl and walked to replenish her load.

In answer to my question,
Leif flashed one of his knowing smiles.  He’d done this ever since we became true friends.  It was like he knew something I didn’t.  Perhaps, since his birth, Leif had been able to feel confident about the future no matter the situation.  But I always attributed his self assurance to the night he spent sitting atop a barrow mound – awake on a barrow mound!  I say the last with emphasis because as most men know, though you may not, the spirits of the gods grant a man the powers of divination once he has spent an entire night unspoiled by sleep while perched on a man’s grave.  Leif was always sure – even when the circumstances seemed to demonstrate otherwise – even when I was not.  He was even more certain since that night on the grave.

Leif glanced over to where Godfrey was kissing his wife
, Gudruna.  The woman was pressing her lips hard against her husband’s, knowing that he had bruises and wounds from the game all over his face.  Both of her hands clutched the back of his head, pulling it tightly to hers.  Gudruna giggled while she toyed with her man.  To pay her back the small pain she caused, Godfrey fished his hand under her brightly colored tunic and into her brown dress.  He pinched one of her nipples.  Gudruna yelped and slapped him on the cheek.

Godfrey and his woman stepped back from one another laughing. 
They snatched up their half-empty mugs of ale and finished them in one, long draught.  Leif looked back to me and pointed to the King of the Isles with a tip of his head.  “Probably not the one to instruct me in the ways of wise leadership, but it will be fun.”

Fun, I wondered?
  Or, would following the fool king lead us to an early death?

. . .

Godfrey was still laughing with his woman when Killian, the village priest, stepped to the fore and raised his hands to calm the crowd.  “A Christian priest acting as the lawgiver, leading the Thing?” I asked, aghast.

“They call it the Tynwald, Halldorr,” said Leif as if that were enough to answer my question.

“Free men and free women of Ballaquayle, Kirk Braddan, Knock y Donee, Ramsey, Andreas, Balladoole, and Ballateare welcome to the Tynwald,” began Killian.

“And Doarlish Cashen!” shouted a large women with an angry face and
stern brow ridge that would make any warrior afraid enough to stop dead in his tracks.

Killian was not cowed
by the woman’s bluster.  “I was coming to that Lady Edana!”  She was far from a Lady in the traditional sense.  Killian chose his words wisely, like a warrior chooses his weapon based upon the nature of his opponent and the coming battle.

The village priest was diminutive.  He had dark eyes and black hair to match.  I did not know the man, but had heard that Killian had a reputation for fighting,
in both the traditional meaning and with words.  Apparently, he did not back down from any argument.  The story went that Godfrey decided to keep Killian alive when the former first invaded the island just because he admired the priest’s tenacity.  Since then the two had developed a deep friendship based upon a mutual respect for strength.  Godfrey appreciated Killian’s mind.  Killian enjoyed the protection and brawn offered to the island by Godfrey’s might.  “Had you given me but a moment, I was prepared to introduce your cause to the Tynwald first.  I’m now of the mind to push off your business to the last, but since this is a congregation of free men and women I’ll leave it to them.”  Killian scanned the crowd, which had fallen silent at the prospect of a raucous argument between the two.

“I’ll not be last!” Edana
huffed.  “I’ve waited since the last meeting of the Tynwald to plead for my divorce from that!”  She pointed with a thick thumb to the lump who must have been her husband.  He had long since passed out in a corner near the thrones.  He still hugged a cup of ale.  He’d wetted his trousers.

Loki
found a spot next to our group.  He appeared as battered as were we, but chatted like we were long friends.  He leaned in and whispered.  “The king and Killian can’t permit a divorce,” he explained.  “Her husband is something of an important person.  He was a minor chieftain on the island at Godfrey’s arrival.  So I guess he’s a noble.  He may even have relations in a powerful Irish or Scottish clan.  Edana is our king’s cousin.  Godfrey offered her hand in marriage to keep his back secure.  Godfrey doesn’t want to disappoint men like Ketil who can build an army while we are without one.  So Killian and the king delay to keep the truce in place.”

“Why not just say, no?” I asked.

Loki grinned.  “This way is more fun.”

“There’s a reason you wait,” said Godfrey
over the waiting crowd.  The king had a saex drawn and now spun it on its tip atop a thick table.  Godfrey looked at the knife, not the woman.  “The priest runs this assembly with the approval of our people.  You’ll abide by the decisions just like the rest.”  Edana’s husband rolled over, groaning.  I swore that I saw his eyes open and aware as he went.

“Who
exactly is he?” I asked.

“
Horse Ketil,” Loki said.  “He’s mostly worthless.  The king lets him nip his ale all day and all night.  Once in a while Ketil awakens enough to go a-Viking with us.  The drunken ass forever wants treasure to fall into his lap.  Godfrey always feels obligated to let him come, since it was Ketil who helped negotiate the peace between his family and Godfrey.  The politics of the Irish Sea, don’t you know.”  Loki rolled his eyes.  I didn’t know politics, but I knew that a man that felt he deserved something for nothing could be dangerous, especially if he sobered up.

Edana scowled at her cousin, the king. 
Killian didn’t wait for Edana to protest further.  “All those who hope to delay hearing of the Lady Edana’s divorce petition until the Tynwald next meets, answer with aye.”

“What happened to going last tonight?” barked the thick-armed woman.
  From one side of her head her drab brown hair stuck out like the quills of a hedgehog.  The other side appeared as if she had just rolled out of bed since it was matted and stuck to her temple.  Just looking at her made me pull out my walrus tusk comb and run it through the hair of my beard.  Though we often had to wade through filth, most respectable Norsemen and our women prided themselves on cleanliness. Not so with this creature.

“Aye,” answered nearly every voice
in the room.  Many of them were in some way kin to Ketil.  Hushed chuckles followed.

“And so by unanimous consent, the petition will be heard when we next meet,” said Killian with a firm, dark stare. 
I noticed that the priest didn’t bother asking for any dissenting opinion.

Edana
had experienced this same setback before.  She pushed her way through the crowd and, with a massive paw, punched open the doors at the end of the hall.  Several retainers, unarmed like the rest of us, followed her out.  Horse Ketil stayed.

The gathering remained oddly quiet until the door slapped shut.  Then a round of laughter and chattering erupted.  I later learned that
neither Edana nor Horse Ketil was considered insufferable by the citizens of Man.  The free men and women at the Tynwald did not give any thought to the personalities of husband or wife.  Those gathered, like men and women far and wide, did not care a whiff about the politics at stake.  Godfrey merely tolerated the pair, waiting until a better option came his way.  The king exploited the indifference everyone harbored for the couple and pushed off his cousin’s divorce petition again and again.  It kept the peace on the island and made for a terrific sideshow.  The latter is why people came to the Tynwald in the first place.

Leif leaned in.  “You see,
Halldorr?  This is just like home.  A Tynwald is run no different from a Thing.”  He was right.  Arguments, disagreements, ale, happy petitioners, angry participants, sex on tables, it was all part of every Thing I’d ever attended.

“What were
all those arguments about?” asked Tyrkr.  He was Leif’s thrall.  Actually, he was Erik’s thrall, but he’d volunteered to come into exile with us in order to protect Erik’s son.  Tyrkr’s native tongue was German.  He had learned Norse later in life after a group of Danes had captured and sold him into the frigid north.  We considered his accent humorous, his inconsistent comprehension more so.

Though
he was a slave, I liked Tyrkr very much.  Our crew treated him as nearly an equal.  But he still understood his place when it came time to sharpen blades, prepare the morning meal, or to slosh out a dung bucket.  I decided to lie to him, for fun.  I spoke slowly so that he could get a better grasp.  “That woman who just stormed off wants to marry the man in the corner over there,” I said pointing to the drunken husband.  “But it seems they have a tradition that one of the man’s kinsmen must sleep with her first.  She’s upset that no one volunteered.”

“Oh,” said Tyrkr with an understanding nod as if what I just told him made any real sense. 
“I suppose I could do it.”  The thrall held out his hands wide and swayed his hips as if he was humping the large woman right there.  Leif gave a chortle.  Tyrkr shrugged with a devious grin.  I smiled and shook my head, slightly disappointed that my ruse didn’t go further.

“Settle yourselves,” scolded Killian
after he had let his meeting ramble.  “We’ve much work to do.  All our exertions tonight result from the transactions of man, but we must perform them as if we do so for Christ.  Let us labor well.”  I was really not sure of this Christ person.  He was somehow related to the One God, though he must have been in many ways even more important since the Christians were named for him and did many of their daily tasks in his name.

A string of people and animals were trotted before Killian and the king.  There was an argument about a
bride-price for an upcoming wedding.  The father of the bride said that twelve ounces of silver had been agreed upon.  That was the standard price at the time and most of the rumbling from the crowd began to side with the father.  After taking one look at the bride and her family, though, Killian easily surmised that no bachelor in his right mind would have offered more than eight ounces silver.  The priest didn’t bring the matter to a vote or consult the king.  He used his own authority to levy a decision.  Godfrey waved his approval, though Killian didn’t seek it.

There was
the case of an old farmer, nearly blind, who complained that a neighbor had slowly been moving his land markers further onto his land so that his crop of barley shrank every year while the neighbor’s grew.  The aged, crusty man had waited five seasons, he said, in an effort to be neighborly before he reported the crime.  With narrowed eyes, Killian accused, “It is widely known that you can barely see a hand stuck in front of your face, you have no sons left, no wife to support your allegation.  How is it that you expect to make such a claim and have it believed?”