Blood Will Follow (27 page)

“That it has,” Bug-eye said. He mumbled something else, but Valgard couldn’t make it out and didn’t care. The rim of light under the longhouse door was a lot more tempting.

If the north was indeed coming for him, he would prefer for it to do so when he was warm and dry.

Valgard woke up in the dark. The air was so heavy with the smell of warm, damp bodies that he might as well have come to in a barn full of wet dogs. His skin crawled. Moving carefully, he pushed off his thick woolen blanket.

The winter cold was still there, on the edges. He raised his head and looked around, allowing his eyes to adjust to the darkness. Soon the bodies of the men faded into shapes, a deeper black against the night inside the cold hall.

The ray of moonshine that slashed through the doorway as the longhouse door opened was a shimmering, pure slice of silver.

A shadow slipped through, and in an instant the door was closed again, all without a sound.

Taking care to move slowly, Valgard eased his head down onto his bedroll. His heart thumped so loudly in his chest that he was sure he’d meet a blade any second. A sharp one, wielded without mercy.

The shadow form was burned into his eyes, backlit by the moon. Only one person in their party was that short and slim. Something about the way she moved . . .

With infinite care, Valgard pulled the blanket over his head and hoped Thora hadn’t seen him looking.

“
Up! Get up!
”

The screams jolted Valgard awake.

The longhouse was all chaos and fear. Men were leaping to their feet, cursing, reaching for swords. Without thinking, Valgard rolled out of the way and under a table. His world was reduced to a line of stomping feet and rough, rasping voices shouting, “They’re outside!”

The walls shook as something bashed into them.

“Blades to the door!” Botolf ordered.

Thora’s voice sliced through the noise. “Stand firm, you fuckers! Don’t flap about like chickens! You’ll end up sticking each other, and that’s for personal time only!”

Laughter and cheers.

The walls shook again. There was a roar on the other side that sounded like several men—or one really big one. Thora roared back, and the men soon joined in, banging their swords on tables, shields, and anything else they could find.

Whatever was outside didn’t appear to like the sound of that. When the noise died down, there was nothing to be heard.

“Hjalmar, Skapti, Einar, to me,” Botolf growled from the doorway. “Bring five bastards each. Thora!” Orders were shouted. Someone called for a torch, and flickering light heralded the smell of burning pitch. The door opened and large men filed out, armed and dangerous. Then it slammed shut.

The men inside the longhouse grew deathly quiet as they listened for the sounds of clashing blades.

There was nothing.

Valgard crawled out from underneath the table moments before the door flew open and Botolf stomped in. The men nearest to the door took two steps backward.

“Nothing out there,” he growled. “Nothing.” No one spoke. “No tracks. Nothing.”

“Post eight men by the door,” Thora snapped. “And another eight outside.” Some of the men groaned, but a dirty look silenced them. “You fucking do as I say, or I’ll personally slit your throat while you sleep and save our northern friends the trouble, whoever they are. Get to it—the rest of you, back to sleep.” With that, she stalked in Botolf’s wake to the dais, where they’d dropped their bedrolls.

The men started bickering among themselves about guard duties. The ever-present Ormslev appeared to be everywhere at once, poking and prodding the men into submission. One by one, surly warriors shuffled to the door.

Valgard pulled his coat on. His legs and back ached as he shuffled forward, willing himself not to think about what he was doing and hoping he’d called it right. “I’ll do a shift,” he said.

Bug-eye turned and looked at him with poorly disguised contempt. “Will you.”

“I’m ready and—” He didn’t finish the sentence. Instead he ignored the screaming protest of his back and twisted to the left as hard as he could, shifting his body out of the way of Bug-eye’s meaty hand. The trek-master’s eyes opened in surprise when Valgard wasn’t where he thought he’d be. Instead, the skinny healer grabbed his wrist and pulled. Holding it in a vice-like grip, Valgard fell on Bug-eye’s elbow, bringing a forearm to the bigger man’s face. Already off balance, Bug-eye crashed to the floor. Valgard ended up lying on top of the trek-master, elbow on his throat. “Ready and able. You have a problem with that?”

The fat, bald man coughed, spat, and laughed, a coarse, braying sound. “Fuckin’ ’ell, d’ya see the fucker! Fast as a snake, this one! D’ya see ’im?” he said, lying on his back. “Fucking take all the shifts you fucking want.” He chortled. “Do we need the others? Heh.” Bug-eye laughed to himself as he clambered to his feet. “I’m getting old. Fucker. Heh. See that?”

Their encounter over, Valgard limped away. In his head, a plan was forming, but he needed more information. When he glanced behind him, Bug-eye was back to his usual commanding self.

“Inside or out?” A square-jawed man with a short red beard—Skapti—somehow managed to bite even the shortest words in half. Around him, the men were looking at Valgard like they had never seen him before.

“Out,” Valgard said.

“Suit yourself,” Skapti said and opened the door.

Valgard wrapped his coat tighter. The cold night air smelled of blood, steel, and promise.

The landscape outside was an odd blend of ghostly grays, pitch black, and the occasional silvery strand of moonlight on frozen snow. The longhouse faced the sea, and beyond the coast the world opened out into an endless line. Closer to home, shadows danced a silent dance beneath the white dunes.

Pretty hard to hide anyone in this
, Valgard thought. It had stopped snowing soon after he stepped out, and soon after that his brilliant plan deflated. He would find no tracks to show Botolf. He had no idea where the attackers had come from. He did, however, now have wet and achy feet to go with his knotted back.

When he noticed Thora standing right behind him, he very nearly added a stopped heart to the list.

“Nice night,” she said.

After a couple of attempts to catch his breath, Valgard managed to squeak an agreement. He glanced over her shoulder as casually as he could, but for some reason he couldn’t see any of the other guards.

“Listen,” she said, leaning in. “I don’t have much time. I know what you seek. And I can tell you where it is, but I can’t come with you to get it.”

Valgard blinked. He stared at her, searched for the telltale twitch, but there was nothing. If it was a lie, it was the best he’d ever seen. She looked older, somehow. More settled.

“Oh, really? And what am I looking for?” he said.

“You seek the powers that Loki bestowed upon Skuld,” Thora said without preamble. “You want to find the source of her magic, the runes that made her strong. I know where they are—I sailed with the crazy bitch.” She turned to him and looked him straight in the eye. Valgard found himself wishing that she had a knife to his throat instead. “Do you think you’re strong enough, Healer?”

“I—I . . . ,” he stammered.

To his surprise, Thora’s face softened. “You’re stronger than you know,” she said. “You’re stronger than they know. And I think you always have been.”

Valgard stared at her. His head struggled to make sense of it, but his heart flew. She understood him. She said the words he’d never spoken. She saw who he was.

“I . . . am strong enough,” he said.

“I know,” she purred. Valgard swallowed and pushed distracting thoughts away. “You need to get to the cave.” She pointed toward the hillside, toward the black spot on the white that suddenly looked so obvious. “I won’t go with you. My survival depends on Botolf believing that I’ll never leave his side. You’ll have to speak your own case, and I will not be able to support you or recognize you. Do you understand?”

Valgard nodded. “I do.” He took Thora’s hands. “Thank you.”

She looked at him then, her eyes filled with wisdom and mirth. “No, Valgard. Thank
you
. Just remember who your friends are, hm? Now go inside. Your shift is up, and they’ll come looking.”

He turned to face the longhouse and struggled to sharpen his thoughts. Visions of power, strength, and victory swirled in his head. He staggered toward the stripe of light around the door, and soon man-shapes came into view. He raised a hard; they did likewise.

When he entered the longhouse, he blinked and shook his head. Somehow Thora had made it back before him and was now deep in conversation with Botolf. Valgard tried to comprehend how fast she’d need to be to have managed that, but his mind warped at the thought.

“—Your spot?” He became aware of a presence close to him. A big, thick-necked man, one of Hakon’s, was talking to him. “Where’s your spot?”

“Down by the channel, between the two huts,” Valgard muttered.

The man left, muttering some less than complimentary descriptions of southerners.

A clear thought popped into Valgard’s head: rest. He’d need rest. He had a big day tomorrow.

It could hardly be called a dawn. The night just became slightly less determined, slightly less oppressive. A couple of rays of light with the best of intentions could be discerned over the mountains, creeping interminably slowly across the peaks and slicing through the bleak blackness of the ocean.

Valgard tried to rub the aches out of his legs. His calves felt like ancient roots, and his thighs might as well have been bone.
No wonder the raiders are always furious
, he thought.
A couple more weeks of this and I’d be very happy to split someone’s skull just because he looked at me wrong.
He shifted, pushed, and stretched until he was finally standing up, then tried to roll his shoulders. The result was neither pretty nor pleasant, but he was up.

He limped outside and found Botolf sniffing the air, with Thora by his side. Valgard was relieved to see that she was playing her part perfectly. She looked mildly annoyed to see him. “Wolves,” the chieftain said without looking at him, “two of them. Last night. Big ones, too. We found tracks down there—by your post, actually. You keep your luck, Grass Man.”

Valgard looked toward his guard spot. The red was vivid in the pale half-light, the white bones even more so. There was not much left of the thick neck. Bile rose in his throat, but he clamped his mouth shut and forced it back down. “I think we need to check the caves. If you send Bug-eye, I’ll go with him,” he blurted out.

“Hm? Fine,” Botolf said. “The men need something to do. Take thirty. Skapti will follow,” he added. “Thora?”

“Send the fucker up the hill if he wants. Couldn’t give a shit,” she snarled, then went back to staring at the endless expanse of snow. “Can’t see a single flake out of place,” she muttered. “As if they flew in.”

Botolf wandered off, apparently led by his nose.

This was the moment. “I’ll be back,” Valgard said to Thora.

She turned to look at him. “What?”

“I’ll come back,” he said.

She looked at him as if he’d lost his mind. “Bring your entire fucking family of crippled goat-babies for all I care, you reedy, dick-faced pus-bubble.” With that, she turned and went back to hunting tracks.

Valgard couldn’t help but smile. And here he’d been thinking
he
was good at games. This was a proper player right here.

“Crippled goat-babies.” He chuckled and shuffled off to find Bug-eye.

The light was the color of lamb’s wool, gray and cloudy. Skapti’s handpicked bunch stood in the yard, shuffling their feet and silently hating him. A handful of Hakon’s men stood to the side. Valgard swallowed and motioned to Bug-eye. It was time.

“Let’s go.”

WEST
OF
LAKE
HJALMAREN,
CENTRAL
SWEDEN

LATE
NOVEMBER,
AD
996

They woke swaddled in a blanket of thick, heavy cold that the morning sun did nothing to dispel. Goran stretched, grimaced, and stretched again. Behind him, Arnar rose and went about his business with slow, steady movements, buckling on his sword-belt and feeding the horse some choice straw from his bag. Inga stirred on the ground.

Without taking his eyes off the shadowy forest behind them, Ulfar shook his head. “Let her sleep,” he said. “She’ll need the rest.”

“She gets the time it takes me in the bush,” Goran said. “If south is where we’re heading, we need to get going.” With that, he disappeared behind the trees, loosening the string around his waist as he went. Ulfar was left with Arnar, who made no more effort than usual at idle chat.

Ulfar felt for his legs, expecting them to ache after yesterday’s troubles. They didn’t, and that made him feel vaguely ill. He healed five times as fast now, but it felt . . . wrong, somehow. Like he’d stolen something. And try as he might, he couldn’t shake the feeling that someone was watching them from the shadows.

Goran walked back into view. “Wake the girl,” he said.

Arnar bent down and gently touched her shoulder, and Inga mumbled something, voice thick with sleep. When she opened her eyes, she looked utterly confused for a moment. She rose and looked at them dully, awaiting orders. Arnar handed her the horse’s reins. She accepted without question.

A few heartbeats later, they were mounted and leading the horses down the path at a slow walk. The road turned out to be just beyond the hills, as Ulfar had said. Behind them the forest around Uppsala faded out of view with the rising sun.

At midday, they met two riders flanking a medium-size wagon.

“Hail, travelers,” Ulfar shouted.

“Hail,” the portly man in the driver’s seat replied. The men on either side of him were just like all the swords for hire Ulfar had ever seen: lean, silent, and observant, exactly as interested as they were paid to be. Their master was bald, with a face that looked like his favorite thing was catching people in a lie. “May the road protect you and shield you in the dark.”

“May the road favor you and yours,” Ulfar replied. The mercenaries sized them up and appeared to decide they posed no threat. “What news?”

“Forkbeard is in the south, stirring up shit,” the merchant said, curling his lip. “Utterly ruins my route, the motherless goat-buggerer.”

“Sorry to hear that,” Ulfar said. “Heading to Uppsala?”

“Aye,” the merchant said.

“They’re doing well these days,” Ulfar said. “The young king looks like he could be one to bet on. What are you carrying?”

“A whole wagon full of none of your business,” the bigger guard said. His partner on the other side shifted in his saddle.

“Well,” Ulfar said, casting a glance at the wagon. “From what I saw, none of your business—especially in sacks like that—sells for a fair amount in Uppsala. Or it did three days ago, at least. You’ll do well.”

At that, the merchant’s face softened a little bit. “Kind words, traveler. Easy, boys.” The guards relaxed, but their hands stayed near the hilts of their weapons.

“Add some news and we’re even. Where’s Forkbeard having his fun?”

“Down south—far south, close to the west coast down Skane way.”

Ulfar raised a hand in thanks and nudged his horse onward. Behind him, his three companions followed.

The soggy ground slurped as Arnar’s horse approached Inga’s. “How are you feeling, girl?” Arnar rumbled. Thin tendrils of cold mist floated like patches of wool around the animals’ legs. Up ahead, Goran picked their path through the marshes.

“I am well, I suppose,” Inga said. “Getting the hang of riding.” She leaned forward and patted the mare’s neck. “Old Amber here will make sure I die from a sword rather than a broken neck.” The horse snorted.

“Shh,” the big man said. “Calm now. You will have a long and happy life. Long and happy. And I know, because I’m old. So shut it, you twig,” Arnar said, twinkling at Inga. “She’s treating you well enough?”

Inga straightened up in the saddle. “We know each other now,” she said. “Thank you. My thighs are sore, but that can’t be helped.”

“No, it can’t. We’ll stop soon. Rest will do you good.”

She smiled at him then. “You are a kind man, you know.”

“Piss,” Arnar said. “I just can’t stand soft, squishy womenfolk crying is all.”

“Shut up, old bear,” Inga said affectionately. “You love me like a dog loves his master, you do.”

“Oho! You’re a sight more lively than last night, you are.” Arnar grinned through his bushy beard. “I should—”

The sound of hoofs on hard ground added to their conversation. “Thanks be for that,” he added. “Hate the bogs.”

“Why?” Inga said.

“The smell,” Arnar said. “It smells like desperation.”

“No,” Inga said. “That’s not it. Desperation smells like half a bed, and salt on the air, and a horizon that’s never broken by the right sail.”

Arnar glanced at the girl. “You’re older than you look,” he said.

“And you’re kinder than you think,” she replied.

They rode on.

The light was fading to their left. “Company,” Goran said under his breath, as three horsemen approached them at a leisurely walk, the sun at their back. “Hail, travelers!” the rider on the left shouted.

“Hail,” Ulfar shouted back. “Heading?”

“East,” the man said, closing the distance. “But happy to share a camp.”

Ulfar glanced at Goran, who glanced toward Inga and shook his head quickly. “We’re pushing on a little farther, thank you,” he said. “Best of fortune to you.”

“And you, travelers.” The three men were only twenty yards away now. Ulfar’s senses screamed at him, and he found himself struggling to keep from drawing his sword. Goran’s face betrayed similar tight-lipped restraint. The distance closed, and then the men were past, without giving them a second glance. The leader just nodded casually, and then they were gone.

A good while later, Arnar came up to them. “Hmph,” he said.

“You’re right,” Goran said. “I’d be worried that I’d wake up with steel in my throat.”

Behind them, a smooth blackness was spreading across the sky.

“Find a place to camp,” Ulfar said. We’ll have two men awake tonight.’

“It’ll be fine,” Goran mumbled. “They were just bony little buggers. Ill-kempt and ill-fed. Horses weren’t much better. Probably on their way to Uppsala to seek work. They weren’t interested in us. It’ll be fine.”

The campfire had died down to a handful of smoldering embers. The night sky was clear, and a waning moon shone softly in a darkened dome dusted with white specks.

Ulfar watched over his traveling companions. Arnar slept peacefully, snoring into his big beard. Inga lay curled up close to the warmth; she tossed and twitched. Her eyes flew open, and a curse
died on her lips. Twirling around, she searched for Ulfar. “On my grave,” she said. “I knew—I knew those men.”

“Really?” Ulfar tried his best to sound uninterested.

“I did. They . . . they were from Stenvik,” she whispered, looking out into the darkness. “I—think I saw them with Valgard. Just before I left.”

“I see,” Ulfar said. A gust of wind caught the fire and blew a handful of sparks into the air. “And you think—”

“I don’t know,” Inga said. “I hope I’m not right. I thought I should tell you about it.”

“Good decision,” Ulfar said. “Now get some sleep, if you can. You’ll be up and on guard in a while.”

She looked on the verge of saying something but held her tongue and lay down on her side. The dim glow from the fire caressed her curves as she drifted off to sleep. Moments after the tension left her body, the darkness near Ulfar shifted and Goran appeared at his side. The old man wouldn’t be too bad for blood-work, Ulfar mused.

“She’s scared,” Goran said. “Nothing out there—is there?”

“Saw some trees earlier on,” Ulfar said. “Oh, and a bush. Looked scary. Hold on a minute . . .” Ulfar shaded his eyes with his hand. “Hm. Can’t see anything right now. Because there is no light,” Ulfar muttered under his breath. “And because ‘out there’ is a big place. Those three runts are out there. Definitely. But they’re not the only ones, and there’s not much we can do about it apart from staying awake and making sure we’re not gutted in our sleep.”

“Hmph,” Goran said. “Fine. I just didn’t like the look of them, is all.”

“Well, if you’d have trusted your sense of whose looks you liked and didn’t like, you wouldn’t be in this mess in the first place,” Ulfar said, grinning.

Goran appeared to accept that and slunk off to his sitting place.

Ulfar threw a handful of wrist-thick branches on the fire and turned his back to the flames as they crept around the wood. It was going to be a long night.

They hit the camp just as the first stripe of sunlight emerged in the east.

Arnar’s life was saved by a carved stick. He threw himself forward off his makeshift tree-stump seat and felt the wind sweep the back of his head as the steel passed him by. “
Up!
” he bellowed.

Ulfar and Goran rolled over and sprang to their feet to find three shadowy figures among them, swinging axes.

Inga got to her knees, then screamed as one of the figures hit her with a vicious kick in the back. Goran stepped into the breach and aimed a swipe at the man’s ribs, forcing him backward to create space for Ulfar and Arnar.

Arnar growled and swung at the bigger of the two black shadows remaining. The man just managed to block the blow, staggering backward from the force of it. Arnar followed, pushing him away from Ulfar and Inga.

The last man swung his ax wildly. Shadows and moonlight made his face look like a snarling skull.

“Who sent you?” Ulfar snapped.

“You’re coming with us,” the man said. His voice sounded hoarse, as if it was struggling with the words.

“We can talk,” Ulfar said, stepping back from the wild swings.

“He said no talk,” the man said, swinging at him. Ulfar blocked the swipe and felt his teeth jangling. They traded blows in the gloom, metal clanging against metal.

A movement in the dark, a burst of sparks.

Ulfar’s opponent screamed in pain and whirled around, holding his head and looking for his new attacker. Ulfar ran him through, put his boot in the man’s side, kicked him to the ground, and yanked his sword free.

The moonlight caught on Inga’s face, fingers splayed, a wrist-thick tree branch from the fire at her feet.

A crunching sound came from their left. “Fucker,” Arnar grunted.

Moments later, Goran emerged from the shadows, bloodied and dazed but still standing.

Ulfar knelt by the fire and blew gently on any embers he could still see. Slowly, reluctantly, the flames rose again. Arnar disappeared, only to return shortly after with three suitable sticks.

“Here,” he grunted at Ulfar.

Goran sat silently and watched as Ulfar bound kindling around the tip of each branch and held them gently over the fire until they flared into life.

The dancing tongues threw odd, shifting spheres of light on the ground. Thickening blood pooled underneath Ulfar’s attacker. A lump with a misshapen head lay where Arnar had been fighting.

“Where’s your man, Goran?” Ulfar asked.

“Fell in the water,” Goran said. “Sank like a stone.”

“Was he dead?”

“He’s not coming up anytime soon.”

Ulfar rubbed his left eye with his free hand. “Inga?” He gestured with his toe at the dead man.

Inga knelt down and studied the dead body. “I know him,” she said. “He was in Stenvik for the market when the raiders hit. Had a farm near Moster, I think. That one . . .” She looked at Arnar’s fallen opponent. “I’m . . .” Inga made to go over to the corpse, but Arnar reached out a hand to stop her.

“Hit ’im in the face,” he said, almost apologetically. “Won’t be much use.”

“One’s enough,” Ulfar said. “We’ll get going, I think. Never know if they have some friends coming.”

The group of four broke camp without more words and were on their way with the rising sun.

The morning mist lingered, drawing a faint, gray veil over the ground. Goran grunted and cursed under his breath.

“That’s the third time!” Ulfar said.

“Hmph,” Arnar said. “Thought we’d cleared ’em.”

The gray-haired guard mumbled something and pulled on the reins of his horse. With great effort, the animal dragged itself out of the knee-deep bog.

“Not a step wrong yesterday, and now you’re practically ready to swim south, Goran. What’s up, old man?” Ulfar said.

Goran did not reply. Instead he mounted and rode on.

Inga looked at Ulfar, who shrugged. “Leave him to it, I guess. Maybe this morning got to him.”

The old scout rode ahead, silent and slump-shouldered.

At midday, Ulfar sat down on a roadside rock. They were mostly clear of the bogs and mires, but gray clouds bunched and roiled overhead, promising rain and misery. The mist had still not quite left them. Arnar and Inga sat by themselves, engaged in conversation. The woman appeared to be the only one of them the big, bearded man had more than four words to spare on.