TLV - 03 - The Sign of the Raven (3 page)

Her launching was a merry day, when men had come from far around to attend the Thing in Nidharos. Mass had been heard, and now folk crowded the riverbank; it was awash with color, spears blinked under the pale sky and thin hurrying clouds. Harald and his guardsmen stood at the slip.

"Do you name her," he said to Thora.

The tall woman smiled, and took a cup of wine which a priest had blessed to replace the old heathen sacrifices. As she poured it over the bow, she cried: "Let your name be
Fafnir,
and hasten you to eat our foes."

The ropes were loosed, the wedges knocked free, and the craft slid down the greased way and splashed into the river. Briefly, she rocked, and men held their breaths; then, as they saw she rode steadily, they lifted a cheer.

Harald sprang aboard from the bank, a long leap. His great frame decked in red and green, folk would have thought him twenty years younger than he was. He raised the gilt dragon head and held it fast. Ulf the marshal was among the carpenters who nailed it in place.

Thjodholf made a verse:

"I saw the vessel striding

seaward from the river.

Girl, did you see the golden

galley 'neath the houses?

Fiercely flashed her mane

when the firedrake hastened outward;

hot with gold, her hewn-out

head was rearing haughty."

With shouts and laughter, the carles brought what else was needful, the ship was rigged and her crew stormed aboard for the first trial. Harald meant to sail her out of the fjord mouth and see how she behaved in unsheltered waters. He took the steering oar himself, his crew dipped blades, and swiftly the
Fafnir
glided forth as Thjodholf chanted:

"Soon upon a Saturday

struck the king the awning;

broadside to, the boat was

bespied by waiting maidens.

Westward from these waters

wends the new-launched longship

as our gallant oarsmen

eat the miles before them.

"Craftily the king's

own carles swing slender oar blades;

women see a wonder

walking on the billows;

much it joys the maidens,

men to see thus faring;

let them never learn

that lean black oars

were storm-snapped.

"Onward, then, and eager

is our keel now leaping,

surging through the sea

with seven tens of oar shafts.

It's like seeing eagles'

open wings, when Northmen

drive the hammered dragon

down to surf and hailstorm."

He turned a face of laughter to the king. "Am I giving them the stroke well enough, my lord?" he asked.

"Aye . . . more than well." Harald stared before him. "And she goes like an angel. Now let Svein Estridhsson await us!"

3

Haakon Ivarsson had settled down as jarl in the Uplands, where he soon made himself the friend of all the people. They looked more to him for judgment and leadership than to the king, who had never been liked in these shires. Haakon lived lavishly, with more feasts than any jarl before him, but managed his affairs so well that he grew rich regardless. Between him and his wife Ragnhild was a close love, in spite of many quarrels; they had four living children by now.

Though he and the king often disagreed, and sometimes thwarted each other at the Things, there had been no fresh break between them. Each was an honored guest at the rare times he sought the other's home, and Haakon had sailed on many of the raids in Denmark.

This summer, word went through the land that Svein had accepted Harald's challenge and would meet him in August near the Gota mouth for a sea fight to settle their differences. When Ragnhild heard that, her lip lifted and she said: "It'll be a wonder if he comes. Most likely he'll slink away as he did before."

"No," replied Haakon thoughtfully. "Svein is a strange man, his soul is full of kinks, but he's not a coward. That is, he does know fear, but he can master it . . . which takes more bravery than to be a witless berserker."

"You've often spoken well of him," said Ragnhild, "but I've never yet understood why. He drove you from Denmark."

"No, he only warned me that his kin would take vengeance for Asmund's death if I stayed. He himself was always a good friend to me, apart from some hasty words now and then. He saved my life when I had to flee Norway." Haakon sighed. "And now old Finn Arnason is with him. Odd to think of bearing shield against Finn. My earliest memory of him is of sitting on his knee while he told me a story."

"Bitterest of all to carry that shield on behalf of a king who robbed and bullied and murdered your own folk."

"Say no more." Haakon's voice was sharp. "I've given oaths."

He had reached the full ripeness of his manhood, tall and powerful, soft on his feet, the handsome unlined face and curly yellow hair giving him somewhat of a boyish look. Ragnhild was young enough yet to remain fair in spite of childbearing and work. When they rode out together, they were a goodly couple.

But this time Haakon went alone. He summoned the Upland levies and prepared to take them down to Oslo, where he had gathered a fleet. There was complaint among the yeomen at having to go just when hay harvest neared; Haakon thought that Svein must have planned this when he set the time of battle, but could only obey.

After he was mounted, Ragnhild came to him with her children about her. "Must you leave so early?" she asked.

"I want to be waiting for the king," he answered. "It shall not be said I hung back. He distrusts me enough, thinks I have too much strength, and from his own standpoint he is right."

She looked up at him. This they had talked about many times before. He did not plan rebellion, but he wanted might to withstand the royal power.

"Go with God," she said, handing him a beaker of mead. He swallowed it at a gulp, leaned over, and kissed her. The taste of the honey was on his lips.

"I'll bring you home a chest of Danish gold," he said cheerfully.

"Bring yourself," she replied. "That will be all I want."

He drew in his reins till the horse reared, swept his hat in a wave, and galloped out to where the men waited. His voice drifted back, a boy's shout:,

"hey! Off we go! Give us a song!" And the tune he himself struck up was neither hymn nor war verse but a bouncing bawdy ballad from Oslo's alehouses.

Ragnhild stared after the army till the steep dales hid them. Then she returned to her work.

II

How They Fought at the River Niss

1

As King Harald went south along Norway's coast, and the shire levies joined him, his fleet became a mighty one. The whole sea power of his land was met. From his own
Fafnir,
with gold-flashing head and tail, down to the lowliest tarred fisher boat, helmets and weapons glittered and shields banged on the sides. To larboard rose the tall shores of Norway, but to starboard the water held ships and ships and ships, as far as a man could see.

Standing at the steering oar, Harald looked with pride on his crew. They were youthful; his old followers now commanded vessels of their own. Even Magnus was captain in one dragon, with a warrior of experience to counsel him. Here he had the pick of the new generation, young gamecocks in some ways strange to him. They were more vain, more mannerly, more afraid of hellfire to come than men of his age; but they seemed also more reckless and quarrelsome, touchy about a small point of honor, not rooted in some ancient garth but given
over to the splendid unrest of the royal service. The brown faces were smooth, unlined, still scant of beard but with heavy locks falling to their shoulders; life had not yet scarred and battered them, they were all mindless leaping flame. He felt a wan envy. So had he been, once.

"Well . . . what of it?" he asked himself. He could still flatten any of those pups, and he had the dearly bought wisdom of years, and he was the king. After this summer's work, he would be the king of two realms, and then . . .

As they turned east into the Skaggerak, a wind sprang up against them, and clouds lifted darkly behind it. Thora went over to the side and faced forward, tasting its chill. She had not let her man escape his promise to take her along this year, and the voyage had seemed a wide-eyed drunkenness to her. Now the wind pressed her gown flat to the high breasts and long legs, a stray lock broke away from the ruddy coils of her hair and floated bannerlike; her eyes were half closed and a smile dwelt on her face.

"I think it blows up to a gale," she said.

"Aye." Thjodholf, the only one of Harald's nearer friends aboard, scowled. "It could be a stiff one, too."

"The more sport," she laughed.

"The more work," said Harald. Wind squealed in the rigging, and the
Fafnir
began to roll heavily. "Down mast! Out oars! Stand by to bail!"

The sea was rising, murky, streaked with foam. Scud whipped into his nostrils. As the ship entered a trough, a great wrinkled wave marched past her, overtopping the bulwarks. Clouds sheeted across the sky; ahead lay darkness and rattling thunder.

Harald gripped the oar, feeling it strain against him, a thrum as of living muscles. The prow dug into a surge, foam spouted up with the dragon head shaking above. Men cursed as their garments were suddenly drenched.

Now the light was changing, a weird hard brass yellow which seemed to fill the rushing air. Ships climbed for the sky and swooped toward hell, the water was black and steel gray and tattered white. Overhead the lightning began a crazy blink, flashed across miles from cloud to cloud, and thunder rolled.

Harald felt the wind stand into his mouth like an iron bar. Somehow he filled his lungs and bawled his orders: "Row! Row, you bastards, or you'll not see land again! Ease on the starboard . . . hard alee
...
get her bow to the seas or we'll be swamped!"

There came a swift rain. From afar they saw it rushing down, pocking the enraged waves, and then it was on the fleet. Blindness whirled over them in a thousand sharp lances. The lightning leaped through a howling dark, thunder banged in heaven; ha, Thor drove his goat car to war yonder! Its wheels cracked the vault of cloud, and the sky fell down in a fury of hailstones.

The ship staggered. A wave smashed across the sides, the hull flurried in bitter waters. Harald felt her groan and roll sluggish. "Bail! Bail her out, for Christ's sake! Are you lame?" The wind hooted and whistled. Fire was in the sky and doomsday below.

The booming of thunder shivered Harald's teeth in his jaws.

In a short, blinding whiteness of lightning, he saw Thora. She clung to the racked mast with both hands, knees bent to the pitch and yaw of the ship, standing up and laughing—laughing! The hailstones skittered between the thwarts, they had cut her cheek, her dress was whipped into rags and her hair full of rain. Then darkness clamped down again.

The ship mounted a wave as if she would be flung into heaven. She poised on its crest, while scud and rain and hail drove across her, and in another flash Harald saw an outlying island. He slammed the helm over and threw his weight upon it. There was shelter, could they live to reach it.

Down she went, a dive which caught at his throat, and the sea ramped above her. Wind yammered between earth and sky. He heard, through the thunder, how waves snarled and strakes moaned.

Shaking herself, the dragon rose again, slipped down the side of a billow, bucked like a wild horse, and bit the water in twain. The sea shouted, tossing her from hand to hand, climbed aboard and sucked at men's legs. Thunder beat drums as the wind chanted the Devil's Mass. Hoo, Thor was angry, . . .
Crack
went his hammer, and fire spurted as it struck!

The island loomed near, dimly seen through the rain, and Harald cried orders to the crew. "Larboard, get her to larboard!" Surf was piled mountainous on the windward side. He heard it ripping chunks out of the world.

"Now . . .
around . . . break your backs,
you louse-bitten rascals!" Waves burst over the starboard rail, one after another, until only the dragon's head and tail rose streaming from them. Harald lost his footing, the gale snatched at him and the sea rolled hungrily; he caught at a thwart, pulled himself back, and got the tiller again.