The Valhalla Saga 01 - Swords of Good Men Read online

  ‘Move!’

  The stocky blond blacksmith grabbed a small, nervous cloth merchant and pushed him out of the way. The autumn market seemed to bring an endless supply of them from all over the world, shouting and yelling, pitching tents around the old town, hawking their wares in the streets, in the square and anywhere else they could find room. Drinking too much and trying to get him to fight. That ugly bastard last night had almost succeeded, too.

  And now they were blocking the gate.

  Of course the broken cart didn’t help.

  He’d seen it happen, seen the driver, who was obviously another idiot, lead the cart too close to the side of the road in an effort to squeeze past another wagon and slip through the south gate, towards the harbour. He’d seen the rock and the hole, he’d seen the wheel bounce off one and into the other, and he’d heard the sharp crack when the axle gave. As the cart lurched, the man had tumbled off and banged his head. Served him right, Audun thought. Shouldn’t have let them in to begin with. But the road was blocked and this would not do. It would slow people down, keep them from the smithy and cost him business. And that he couldn’t afford.

  He shouldered through the crowd in the market without thinking. Shouts and curses followed, but he didn’t care. Never had, never would, he muttered to himself. Talk is air.

  When he first came to Stenvik, he’d been awed by the sheer size of the walls. At a towering twenty-five feet, covered with turf and sloping upwards at a steep angle, they had seemed impossibly wide at the base. Audun had admired the construction as he rode through the north gateway with his travelling companions. A stone-walled corridor wide enough to take two carts and high enough with room to spare for a man to walk upright, it had still taken their caravan a decent time to get through. He’d thought highly of the stonework, although some of the logs in the ceiling near the inside had struck him as oddly placed. On both ends of the gateway massive wooden gates were suspended over the openings, secured by thick ropes used for raising and lowering. What they lacked in the craft shown in the stonework they more than made up for in reliability. The gates were essentially sturdy, iron-bound pine logs stacked horizontally and set to be lowered into grooves in the walls. A short tour of the town had confirmed that the other three gates followed the same model.

  At the time he’d been pleased with the craft of it.

  Standing in the shadow of the same walls nearly two years later, looking at the suspended south gate, it seemed more like a cage door. And now the gateway was partially blocked by the cart. The space around the cart was crammed with the usual group of useless onlookers that seemed to gather on every such scene to lay blame, give pointless advice and avoid taking any action whatsoever. Audun gritted his teeth. Three of them were standing around the rear of the cart looking particularly miserable and staring alternately at the wheel, the broken shaft and the placid draft horse still tied to the trace.

  He grabbed the nearest shoulder and yanked, forcing the man to face him.

  ‘You. Lead that half-dead nag on my signal.’

  The man blinked and stared blankly back at him.

  ‘Now! Move!’ Audun half shoved the man towards the horse and turned his attention to the broken axle. Huge bags of feed had been piled topsy-turvy on the cart, and the jolt had proved too much. A quick inspection confirmed his suspicions. The other wheel would stay on, but this one was gone and would not carry weight. The cart would not be mended here, and there was hardly space to unload it.

  Audun took up a position at the rear end, feeling under the collapsed side for a grip. When he’d found it, he spat into the palms of his hands, rubbed them together and grabbed the edge of the cart.

  He bent his knees, straightened his back and growled low. Breathing through his nose, he slowly straightened his legs and lifted the corner of the cart. Moving his leg behind the wheel, he pushed it away from the wagon. The two men at the back stood by and gawped, as did the hapless farmer standing by the horse. ‘You two – help me, or by Thor I’ll drop it on your feet and smack you in the head!’ Audun hissed through clenched teeth. He turned to the front and snapped: ‘And you – get the bloody horse moving!’

  After a brief moment of confusion, the farmers bumbled into action.

  The two men in the back squeezed in on either side of Audun and tried their best to help bear the weight, and the third farmer started leading the horse. Sporadic cheers followed them through the gate and out of Stenvik.

  ‘Off the road!’ Audun commanded as soon as they’d cleared the gateway.

  ‘But …’ one of the farmers protested meekly.

  Audun bit off the words, each a measured threat. ‘Off. The. Road.’

  A couple of moments later the wagon was off the path into Stenvik, jolting among hastily pitched tents and rickety wattle huts outside the walls.

  ‘Down,’ he commanded. ‘Softly. Don’t break anything else.’

  The farmers complied, and slowly the cart was brought to a halt.

  While the two at the rear coughed and tried to catch their breath, the farmer leading the horse approached Audun, dragging his feet and staring at the ground.

  ‘Thank you for helping us. We could have been stuck there all day. Now we can—’

  ‘So this is yours?’ Audun cut in, bent double and breathing heavily.

  ‘What? Yes … yes it is.’

  ‘Seven silvers.’

  The farmer looked at him, stunned.

  ‘… What?’

  ‘Seven silvers.’ Catching his breath, Audun straightened up and looked the farmer in the eyes. ‘I go get the tools and fix your cart. You give me seven silvers.’

  ‘But … I’ve not … It’s been a poor market for us!’

  ‘If you’ve made enough money to buy and pile feed bags on your cart until it breaks, you have no cause to complain.’ Audun walked over to the single wheel on the back end of the cart. He put his foot up on the axle, casually testing how much weight it supported. ‘I could always convert it into a sled for you …’

  The farmer looked at him, dejected.

  ‘… Five?’

  Audun frowned, then nodded. ‘Five silvers it is. Stay here.’

  He turned around and headed back into town.

  *

  ‘Valgard! Come quick!’

  The boy who poked his head in through the doorway could not have been more than eight years old. Golden rays slipped past him, casting their light on dust motes dancing in the air in the tiny wooden hut.

  A slim man with sloping shoulders sat hunched over a workbench in the corner. Jars and bowls of various sizes were ordered all around him on the surface. A small carved wooden figure of a woman holding a bundle of plants looked down on the tabletop.

  ‘Calm down. What’s happened?’ His voice was soothing, but he did not move a single muscle to acknowledge his visitor.

  ‘A cart broke in the south gate and a farmer fell and hit his head. He’s not moving and everybody’s angry.’

  Valgard kept his eyes trained on the workbench. In his hand was a short but very sharp knife, on a small slate of stone in front of him a handful of black berries. He had just pierced the skin of a berry and was pressing it into a bowl, counting the drops. Sensing the boy was still hovering in the doorway, he sighed.

  ‘I’ll be there in a moment.’

  ‘I’ll go tell!’ the boy shouted as he sprinted off.

  Valgard listened to the tread of the boy’s feet fading into the sounds of the town. It had been a good morning so far. He was nearly done with the juice for the mixture. Just two more … His knife hand began to shake. Valgard clenched his teeth and hissed: ‘No. No, you don’t. No.’ He forced himself to breathe as he’d learned. Slow. Slow everything down. He watched as the spasms in the hand died away till at last it was still and steady.

  He cut twice more into the berry, collecting the juices into the bowl with practised ease and stowing the berries in a box. Then he took a satchel near the doorway and made to leave, but paused
and reached for another small bag that sat on the far right of the workbench, grabbed it and left the house.

  Behind him, a drop of black juice dripped from the knife point onto the bench.

  It didn’t take Valgard long to find his patient. The cart driver was powerfully built, thick-limbed and out cold. He came to with a shriek and a moan as the cold water hit him in the face.

  ‘You just banged your head. It’s going to hurt for a while. Chew this when it does. Try not to move too much for a couple of days.’ Valgard pulled something that looked like a sliver of wood out of his bag. The driver eyed it and frowned. ‘Don’t be a fool. Take it. It’s just willow bark. Not too much at a time and you’ll be fine in a week,’ Valgard said gently.

  Accepting the bark with reluctance, the driver looked at Valgard, the satchel and the empty water bucket at his feet. He blinked rapidly and his mouth moved, but no words came out.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ Valgard assured him. ‘You drive carts; I patch you up when you fall on your head.’ He stood up and headed back to his house, leaving the driver to look in confusion at a single wheel on a broken axle and wonder where the rest of his cart was.

  *

  ‘If I ever have a son, I will send him out with gold enough to afford better lodgings than these.’ Ulfar ducked under the rickety doorframe and stepped into the street outside. The dockhand’s shack looked considerably worse in daylight than it had under the stars last night. ‘In fact, I think we might be sleeping in somebody’s outhouse. Indeed, if I ever have a son, I’ll buy him better lodgings, better—’

  ‘— clothes, prettier wenches, better food, finer wine and a golden chariot to cart your lily arse between silk pillows,’ Geiri finished as he emerged from the doorway behind the tall young noble.

  Ulfar flashed him a winning smile. ‘Are we a little bit prickly today, my brother?’

  Geiri shot him an annoyed glance. ‘Be quiet if you value your teeth, you traitor. And our fathers may share the same mother, but that does not make me your brother.’

  Ulfar threw up his hands in a gesture of mock innocence. ‘Am I not your brother in arms, in travel and in song?’ he said, eyes glinting with poorly hidden amusement.

  ‘Not after last night you’re not. I’ve a mind to dump you back home and have them collect their debt of honour like they’d planned.’

  Ulfar dismissed Geiri with a wave. ‘Forget it. I was bored. It was just one kiss. And you didn’t miss much. She smelled of sheep. Now, do you know your way around this town?’

  ‘Of course I don’t. Have you been to bloody Stenvik much?’ Geiri shot back. ‘Here’s what I know. It’s the only sizeable town this far west. Most defensible outpost on the west coast, apparently. Done. That’s all. Nobody should ever need to come here and the sooner we’re out the better. It’s an outpost and nothing more.’

  ‘Geiri, Geiri, Geiri. We must control ourselves.’ Ulfar subtly changed stance, aping someone much older as he beckoned for his travelling companion to follow him down the street towards the harbour. ‘You have been sent …’ he began, sounding remarkably like a pompous middle-aged chieftain. Geiri could not help but smirk. ‘You have been sent out into the world to see the sights, meet the men of note and let them know who you are. As a young man who will inherit the world’ – Ulfar’s sweeping gesture took in three wattle huts, a dirty screaming child running after a dog and a man pissing in the street – ‘it is your solemn duty to get to know other and lesser peoples, find out what they eat, what they use, what they need and what they sell. Stenvik has become an important hub for trading and raiding. It may not look like anything, but there is much to be gained by connecting to their chieftain. Sigurd Aegisson. Man of reputation. Trade connections. Think forward, son.’ At the end of his speech, Ulfar nodded sagely, blinked at Geiri and grunted, breathing loudly through his nose.

  ‘I’ve said it before and I say it again – I hope you’ve never imitated my father to his face,’ Geiri said with a smile.

  ‘No. Never,’ Ulfar said gravely. ‘I have, however, done so to your milkmaid Hilda on occasion.’ He winked at Geiri.

  ‘What? And you never told me?’ his cousin exclaimed. Ulfar shrugged and tried his best to look innocent. ‘It doesn’t really matter, though …’ Geiri added. ‘I seem to remember her telling me that your impressions had made’ – Geiri made a suggestive hand gesture – ‘little impression on her.’

  Ulfar considered this then nodded. He’d have to give him this one. ‘Well countered, Geiri. I’ll make a man of you yet.’

  ‘You always have to win, don’t you?’

  ‘Always, Geiri. Always.’

  ‘Well, maybe if you’d not needed to win the fight with Karle you wouldn’t have had to come here.’

  ‘It was an accident, I keep telling you,’ Ulfar snapped. ‘Not my fault he turned out to be the Queen’s cousin.’

  ‘His arm broke just as much,’ Geiri replied, enjoying himself.

  ‘Well he didn’t die. More’s the pity. And his arm has healed now and I’m still out in the middle of nowhere playing nursemaid to clueless royalty,’ Ulfar said.

  ‘Shut up or I’ll treat you like you deserve.’

  ‘Much like a bleating ewe, you simply don’t have the balls.’

  The insults were comfortable and well-worn by now; something to pass the time. Their walk had brought them back down to the harbour. Behind them lay a town of hastily pitched tents, woven huts and frail wooden shacks. The old, run-down longhouse where they’d been drinking last night was visible over the tops of the houses. Ulfar’s head pounded with the memory. This was what their dockhand guide had called the old town.

  ‘Right then, Ulfar the Conqueror. Work your winning magic. Find us the way to the chieftain of this important hub of fish smell, street piss—’

  ‘Will you cease your endless complaining,’ Ulfar shot back as he scanned the area. ‘I’ll figure this out. We’ll ask someone. Find a nice fish-girl … or three …’

  She caught his eye because she seemed to be the only person in the square who wasn’t moving. In fact it was almost unnerving how completely still she was. She just stood there, looking out to sea. Ulfar smiled to himself. She looked ripe for the picking.

  ‘Now, young Geiri.’

  ‘I’m three months older than you.’

  ‘Yet you never act like it. Now, young Geiri, I gather you had some trouble with the women last night. Watch and learn.’ Ulfar shot a meaningful glance towards the woman standing on the pier.

  Geiri followed his gaze and frowned. ‘That one? She’s clearly waiting for a boat to come in. She’s not going to—’

  ‘Quiet, Geiri. Just watch the master.’

  Ulfar ignored the bustle of the square. Instead he homed in on the girl. She did seem almost unnaturally still, though. As he sauntered towards her he wondered where the conversation would flow. Usually he was good at reading from their initial reactions what they wanted to hear, whether they wanted to be pushed or led, tempted or turned. He knew Geiri was staring daggers at his back and probably hoping he’d trip or something of the sort. Well, let him. Ulfar would never have Geiri’s wealth or honour, but the girls loved him better. Always had, always would.

  Only a few steps now.

  He planned his route, drifting towards her and stealing a glimpse. She was very pale but he liked that. Must mean she stayed a fair bit indoors, which was strange for this kind of town. Maybe she was a craftswoman. The red hair was nice. Looked a bit Celtic. He’d been with a slave girl a couple of months back somewhere on the mainland – hadn’t understood a word she said, but they’d got on well enough.

  The memory made him smile.

  He’d let himself accidentally happen to be near her now. Time for playing the lost traveller. In a smooth motion he turned towards the red-headed girl and put on a winning smile. ‘Hello. I’m wondering if you could tell me …’ And the words died in his throat. It was as if he didn’t exist to her. She didn’t acknowledge his presence. Instead
she just stared at the sea. A spark shot up and down his spine. A challenge! He’d not had this before. The eyes. The eyes! Catch the eyes. He redoubled the charm, cleared his throat and moved so he was between her and the horizon.

  ‘Hello!’ He smiled. ‘I just arrived in town and was …’

  Slowly, as if waking from a dream, she seemed to register him and realize that he was there. She looked him in the eyes and Ulfar felt like he’d been struck.

  ‘I’m … I’m … I’ve … We’re …’ he stammered, blushed and turned away. Furious heat burned his face. What? What just happened? His feet decided for him and walked him away from the pier, back towards his cousin.

  Geiri looked him up and down. ‘So? Was it incredible? Did she laugh? Did she cry? Did she beg to bear your children?’ Ulfar found he couldn’t speak. Instead his eyes were drawn past and through Geiri, out to sea. After what seemed like an age he finally found some words. ‘She … um … she … Yes. I mean no.’

  ‘Ulfar … did you hit your head? What happened? What did she say to you?’

  Ulfar briefly inspected his feet and fidgeted with his hair. ‘Nothing. Let’s go.’ He turned and walked away. Anywhere would do as long as it was away from the harbour. Vaguely aware that Geiri was shuffling behind him, Ulfar looked around for the biggest road leading out of the harbour square.

  There.

  A paved road ran due north, past the longhouse. As they breached the half-circle of houses around the harbour the old town thinned out around them. Ulfar drew a sharp breath.

  What had looked like a hill when they arrived was in fact a fortress. The walls were massive, curving away in a perfect circle from a gate at the end of the road. They were the height of at least three if not four grown men, almost vertical and overgrown with grass. Sentries walked the walls, patrolling the gate at the end of the road.

  ‘Slow down, will you?’ Geiri muttered behind him as they walked towards the gate. Ulfar was in no mood to reply. ‘So that’s the new town. These guys seem to be serious about their fortifications, don’t they? This is like Trelleborg,’ Geiri ventured. Ulfar kept walking. The gate in the wall turned out to be the entrance into a short tunnel with a steady stream of people going in and out. They emerged on the other side and into a market square with stalls and carts wherever there was a bit of space. A road led straight north from the market to the centre of town, where a longhouse rose above the roofs of the surrounding houses. Without a word Ulfar walked towards it.