The Snow on the Cross (10 page)

“The herds are beginning their
migrations,” Malyn explained.  “Eirik always plans a hunt to store meat for the
colder seasons.  This is the time the herds are the fattest.  When the snows
come, they will scatter, and their food will be scarce.”

“Interesting,” I told her.  I wrote
down the tale of the beasts’ migratory patterns, and my quill began a rhythmic
scratching as I did so.

“Will you go?” she asked. 

I avoided answering her for the
moment and instead asked, “What do you call these herds?  Are they deer?”

“Eirik calls them hreinndyr,” she
told me.   “Will you go?”

I wrote the word down on my
parchment, but my spelling was probably incorrect.  I ended up writing the word
down as it sounded to me: reindeer.

“No,” I finally answered.  “Eirik
will kill me.”

“He won’t,” Malyn seemed eager to
reply.  “He told me he admires you.”

I refused to discuss the matter with
the girl, and I sent her back to Eirik’s house.  She left, somewhat dejected,
and I stood at my door and watched her leave.   I returned to my writing,
shutting the door against the cold air wafting in.  I still had a hard time
believing it was springtime here.  My soul ached with cold at the mere thought
of winter. 

I wrote for the remainder of the day,
but I found that I was running out of ink.  There was only enough perhaps for
two more pages and then there would be nothing.  I sat and wondered how I could
possibly get more ink in this wasted land.  Perhaps I could meet with the
traders at their next arrival.  Perhaps Eirik would purchase some on my behalf.

As it would turn out, Eirik did not
buy any ink, and my recordings stopped suddenly as the rest of my ink ran
dry.   As God has seen, in His wisdom, to allow me to write this now, I will
confess the truth to you who reads this.   For two years I lived in Eirik’s
stone church, and I only wrote about ten pages of records.  The rest is based
on my good memory of events, for I am still sharp of mind, even locked away as
I am now.  What follows may not be entirely accurate, but I trust God to guide
my hand and refresh my mind.

Now, listen well.  The hunt Eirik had
proposed involved two weeks out in the bitter night air away from shelter.  The
days would be filled with blinding white flashes of snow and ice and the thud
of hoofs against the frozen ground.  The excited shouts of the men as they
hauled down yet another kill would mingle with the battered whine of that beast
as the men hacked away at it on the ice, slicing off bits they didn’t need and
stacking the slabs they decided to take.  Red and white.  The color of red
never really meant much to me until I saw bright streams of it splattered
against the pure white silver-colored ice.  After that, I just felt queasy at
the thought.

Eirik came to collect me before
sunrise two days after Malyn told me of the hunt.  I was startled to see
fifteen men standing lined up at my door so early in the morning because I was
certain I made my intentions clear to Malyn.  Obviously, something was
misinterpreted in the translation, for here stood Eirik in person, waiting to
carry me away.  I stood a bit numb as the large man stared at me.  I felt like
the deer just before the arrow strikes.

He said something to me, of course I
didn’t understand him, but I assumed he was there to take me with him.  I heard
a familiar voice, but for a moment I could not process it.  Then I understood
it was my language I was hearing.  Bjarni was standing there behind Eirik, but
I didn’t notice him until he spoke up.

“Are you ready, Bishop?” Bjarni
asked.  “It is time.”

“Bjarni,” I said his name to get used
to the sound.  For a month I had only spoken to Malyn, so Bjarni’s voice was
quite a change.  “It’s good to see you again.”

Bjarni stepped up, shaking his
head.   “Are you ready?”

Bjarni did not want idle
conversation, but he had been at sea for the past month fishing.  Now he was
here, and he was growing impatient.  He sounded if he were speaking to a small
child.

“Are you ready?” he asked again.

“Ready for what?” I asked, knowing
what the answer would be.  I felt very angry with Malyn, but I discovered later
she had nothing to do with the decision.  Eirik was going to take me whether I
wanted to go or not.  Malyn had told Eirik I didn’t want to go, but it meant
nothing.

I looked at the spear Eirik was
holding.  It was as tall as he was, and a bright metal point glittered at the
top.  Eirik was meticulous about his weapons.  After each kill he carefully
removed every drop of blood, whether animal or human.  Now his spear looked
ready to pierce directly through me, and I felt a little weak.  The wood grain
around the top was stained with dark specks.  It is harder to clean blood after
it has soaked into the wood.  Eirik tapped his spear on the ground as if to
send me a message to hurry up.

He murmured something.  Bjarni spoke
up.

“The hunt awaits,” Bjarni told me. 
“And it will not wait for you, so come on.”

I looked behind me in confusion, as
if seeking help from an unknown source.  There were no answers.  Finally, I
replied.

“What should I bring?”

Bjarni touched Eirik on the shoulder
and whispered something to him.  I watched as Eirik pointed to the large packs
they had stacked beside them and said something back to Bjarni.

“Bishop,” said Bjarni.  “We have
prepared you a pack.  You need nothing else.  Come on.”

His tone suggested they had lost
patience with me.  The other men grinned at my distress.  “Very well,” I said. 
“Let’s go.”  I put my boots on as they watched, looked around at my

little stone church, and wondered if it was to be the last
time I would see it.  It had nothing to compare it to my cathedral at
Le Mans
, save that I called it home, but it
seemed a sanctuary while I was here.

Eirik seemed satisfied, and I didn’t
feel as lost with Bjarni coming with us.  At least I would have a translator. 
I stepped outside, wrapping the fur Malyn had given me around my shoulders. 
Eirik hoisted one of the packs and thrust it at me.  I caught it, nearly bowled
over by the weight.

I shut my door behind me, and we
began the walk.

* * *

Some of the men were dragging large
sleds behind them.  The sleds traveled a bit rough over the grasslands, but
with enough yanking and grunting, the men pulled them through.  I almost
thought about asking why I could not place my pack on the sled, for it was
weighing down my shoulders and causing my lower back to throb, but instead I
kept my silence.  I knew Eirik was judging me, and I did not want to seem too
weak in his presence.  Those sleds could just as easily carry a human body back
from the hunt.

We walked single file, and I found
myself jostled behind Bjarni and another man behind me.  I could not pronounce
these men’s names, so I sorted them by the color of the furs they wore.   Grey
and Black were walking behind me.

Eirik took the lead, and it was
apparent he knew exactly where we were headed, for he climbed the hills like he
had been born here.  The men never questioned their direction, and just as I
began to wonder when we would take a break from the walking, we stopped.  Eirik
had crested the next hill and stood gazing over the lands beyond.  The air was
quite colder here than by the sea, and I half expected to see snow at any
moment.  I watched as Eirik, half silhouetted against the horizon, raised his
arms.  He gave a wild shout in his own language and pointed.  I, along with the
others, finished the climb and looked down at the plains below. 

A pure ice field stretched before us,
dotted with dark patches of what I would later find out was lichen, but it was
not the lucidity of the land or the shimmering of the sunlight that skated
along the surface that truly amazed me.  A dark mass, moving ever so slowly,
was swarming along the plain.  Shaggy brown beasts bellowed and moaned as the
entire herd, thousands of animals, traveled across the ice field.  They swarmed
as insects, thick and black, and although they moved as one entity, it was
still difficult to distinguish where one ended and the next beast began.  The
ground was shaking as the slow moving river of what Malyn had called reindeer
coursed in front of us.  If this was Eirik’s idea of a skillful hunt, then his
skill must have been poor, for even I could have shot and arrow into the midst
of those creatures and struck down two or three, and I have never shot an arrow
before.

Eirik hoisted his spear and pointed
out several of the herd to Bjarni, who had moved up beside him.  The others
gathered, their eyes glowing with excitement.  I would have felt relieved if
Eirik had decided he wanted to stop here for the time being and camp, for we
had been walking for hours, and my back ached.  My legs began to quiver, and I
knew I was going to have to sit for a few moments to regain my strength.

Bjarni noticed my trembling as I
slowly sat in the chilly grass.  Eirik, it seemed, was ready to move on.  This
herd was not the one he was looking for.  In fact, Eirik sought better game
further north, where the snow fell in thick flakes and clumped in huge drifts
along the hills.  The Vikings began their descent down the other side of the
hill, and I was left with no choice but to follow.  I pulled myself up and
waited to see if I would fall back again.  My legs seemed to gain a little more
strength as I realized the others were leaving me behind.  I note that they
seemingly didn’t care if I came with them or not, for not a single one of them
wasted a backwards glance in my direction.  Bitter at this, I trailed after
them, forcing my legs to move despite the stinging of my back.

We reached the level plain of the ice
field, and it was good to walk on flat ground again.  The herd was rumbling
ahead of us to the left, but they ignored us as we trekked across the shining
ice.  The sky had turned a cold gray, and wisps of snow began to sail down as
we walked.  The Vikings paid this no mind, so I simply followed.  The hills
were left behind us and began to shrink in the distance.  Ahead of us was only
flat whiteness ringed by more hills an impossible distance away.  Eirik, as he
walked, began to string his bow.  It was a simple device, looking no more than
a mere stick with a string attached.  He popped the string on and flicked it a
few times.  His bow made a sharp hum as the bowstring pulsed.  Never breaking
stride and hardly turning to face his target, Eirik fit an arrow to the string
and with a sharp sting, let the arrow fly.

I watched as the arrow zipped
directly into the herd of beasts.  The mindless brutes watched dumbly as the
arrow sank deeply into one of their own.  The shot was clean, and I believe the
animal was slain instantly as it crumpled to the ice.  Even from where I stood,
I could see the feathers sticking out of the chest of the animal.  The rest of
the herd kept moving on as if nothing at all had happened.  The men were busy
shouting and praising the skill of Eirik’s casual shot.  I stood amazed at the
sheer indifference of the animals.

The two men with the sleds began
their approach to the felled beast, and it was only at their advance did the
herd scatter, splitting off in countless directions like cracks along a
mirror.  In a mere second the plain was empty, and we were alone.  There was
only the crumpled deer lying on the bloodstained ice, and the men who
approached it with axes in hand.

Bjarni was speaking to Eirik as he
took the string off his bow.  Eirik seemed detached from his kill, as if he was
acting out of a natural instinct.  His fluid motion with the bowshot was
nothing more to him than drawing his next breath, and I wondered, not for the
last time, how fast he could sink an arrow through me.

The men had loaded their prey onto
the sled and had started to drag it back to where we stood.  Eirik seemed to be
debating with Bjarni on whether or not we should continue north.  The snow was
still floating by, and I longed for nothing more than the heat of a good fire
and the warmth of my bed.  I prayed Eirik had made his decision to stop.  I was
sure if he had decided to press on, I would break down.  I had stated before I
was not used to walking great distances, and now the journey seemed without
end.  You cannot throw an old man up and down the hills for very long before
there are consequences, and I began to feel the pain seeping into my very
bones.  I wondered how far we had come, and how long it would take if I began
walking back to reach the church.

Bjarni, perhaps out of compassion,
was still talking to Eirik and I noticed him steal a glance in my direction. 
Good.  Let him see me, weak and tired and ready for bed.  Let Eirik know why
this old bishop longed to stay by the safety of his fireplace.

Perhaps it was God’s will that Eirik
relented.  I think Bjarni took a bit of pity on me and convinced Eirik to stop
and rest for the night.  For all I knew, the other men may have been as tired
as I.

Eirik ordered the camp to be made
there on the edge of that impossibly huge ice plain, and the men began to
unload their packs.  Now I saw why some of the packs were so large.  Bundles of
sticks were packed inside, and the Vikings were highly skilled at the art of
making fire.  I watched in pure relief as a fire soon erupted seemingly out of
thin air thanks to the skill of these men.  The heat sizzled the frozen ground
around it, and the steam rose like a small fog around us.  The two men who had
gone to retrieve the deer were off to the side dressing it.  They were carving,
ripping, and tearing apart that animal until they stood in a pool of red and
shining entrails tapered out in all directions, like marks on a map.