Two Ravens (4 page)

The work of Hrafnfell had shaped every day of his past. Now his life was featureless as the open ocean. It daunted him; yet he yearned toward it, wondering. He put his arms behind his head and lay back in the stern of the ship. Overhead the stars turned in their wheel.

FOR SEVERAL DAYS THEY SAILED down past a string of islands, keeping to windward. As they passed, a long plume of smoke rose from the crest of one island. To the south more smoke appeared. Bjarni stood in the stern to watch. The chart put Sigurd Gormsson’s stronghold somewhere in the clutter of islands whose green tops jutted up along the southern horizon. The sailing there was difficult; the chart was muddled. But he thought the smoke would bring him a pilot.

All the rest of the day, as they sailed south along the island chain, columns of smoke signaled their passage on ahead of them. In the late afternoon, a big longship rowed out of the south. Bjarni put the steerboard over.

The longship flew over the sea. She was three times the length of
Swan,
and her black oars swept the sea like wings.

“Hail, ship!”

Bjarni made a horn of his hands. “This is
Swan
,
”
he shouted, “and I am Bjarni Hoskuldsson, from Iceland— I look for Sigurd Gormsson.”

The great longship drew even with them. All along Swan, the Icelanders sighed and gaped at the stranger.

“Hoskuld’s son?” called a man on the big ship. He was dressed all in black, but his long hair and his beard were grey, like fox fur. “Would that be Hoskuld the Ganger ?”

“Yes,” Bjarni answered. “He says that you and he were friends in the old days.”

Now only a few ells separated the ships. The man in black looked quizzical. “How do you know who I am?”

“You knew Hoskuld. Aren’t you Sigurd Gormsson? He sent me here to join you.”

Sigurd’s lips stretched in an unpleasant smile. “Did he, now? Just you, or the whole kennel there?”

“They go with me. And the ship.”

“The ship!” Sigurd laughed, and set his ship’s crew to laughing. “She looks like a dirty little fishing boat to me. Likely she stinks of fish.”

Ulf started up; Bjarni put his foot on his brother’s shoulder and pushed him down again. He said, across the water, “She’s a trim little ship, she will sail closer to the wind than that hulk of yours.”

Sigurd laughed again, and his crew laughed. “Well, come inshore and let me measure you. I have some need of men, I may take you in.”

The Icelanders rowed
Swan
after the longship toward a hump-backed island whose green slopes ran down to meet the water. On the shore there were buildings, some hardly more than sties, but others were great halls with carved wooden doors, and windows in the thatched roofs. Sigurd’s sleek longship led the Icelanders around the northern end of the island, and a cove opened up before them. In the quiet water six or eight ships rocked at their anchors; two others were drawn up on the beach.

Sigurd bade them anchor in the cove. The men on Swan gawked at the island and the other ships, shouting and pointing their fingers. Bjarni and his brothers rowed the little boat in to the shore.

A hall dominated the slope over the cove. To one side of it was a big Christian temple with a cross on the gable, and many other smaller buildings were scattered around on the green grass. Boardwalks, lifted up above the ground on piles, connected the doors.

Sigurd met the Hoskuldssons on the shore, three or four other men waiting at his beck nearby. When Bjarni came up the beach toward him, Sigurd squared his shoulders and put his hands on his belt.

“Yes, you are Hoskuld’s son, you are the image of him.”

They shook hands. Sigurd led him to the high side of the beach, where the boardwalk began, and they climbed the rattling wooden planks toward the hall. Bjarni walked beside Sigurd, with his brothers following after. Sigurd pointed to the other buildings scattered around the meadow on either side of the boardwalk.

“I have my own forge, you see. My own mill. My own church. I am no pirate; here, my men have wives and children, some even farm. It is the Bishop who is the pirate—him I mean to fight.”

Ahead of them two dark-haired women waited on the threshold of the hall. Sigurd nodded to them. “These are my wives.”

Besides two wives he had children ranging from grown sons to babies. Bjarni saw that Ulf’s eyes fell on one of the older daughters.

“So you wish to enter my service,” Sigurd said. He took Bjarni into the hall and up to the High Seat before the hearth. “Can you fight ? You don’t carry any weapons. I suppose you want me to arm you as well.”

“I am not asking to serve you.” Bjarni sat down on the bench on Sigurd’s right. He looked around him at the hall, which was twice as large as Hrafnfell’s, and so wide there were three rows of wooden pillars to hold up the roofbeams. The broad benches down the sides of the room were covered with hides and blankets; men slept there. He turned to Sigurd again.

“I don’t want to serve anybody, now that I am free of my father. I will help you, if we can come to an agreement. I’m a good sailor, and I can fight.”

“You didn’t listen to me, outside. I am no pirate. I rule here. We have order here. You serve me, or you don’t stay here.”

Bjarni raised his shoulders in a shrug. Rather than lift up his eyes to Sigurd in the High Seat, he studied the hall, and the people going in and out; Ulf had already sat down with Sigurd’s blond daughter on the far side of the hearth.

“I don’t serve anybody,” Bjarni said. “I will go on, if you want it so. How long has it been since you saw Iceland?”

“I am no Icelander.”

“I am.”

Sigurd grunted in his throat. A serving man brought each of them a cup. Bjarni’s was of wood but Sigurd’s cup was of red gold.

“I also have my own brewhouse,” he said.

Bjarni tasted the beer. “This is very good.” He drank it all, and the servant brought him more.

“Hoskuld the Walker,” Sigurd said. “I recall something else about Hoskuld, which is that he ate of the horse. Are you a Christian?”

“Everyone is Christian in Iceland. We are all baptized.”

“By the law, yes. In the heart is another matter. Everyone knows that. Do you sacrifice to Christ?”

“No, I am Thor’s man.”

Sigurd canted forward over the table, so that Bjarni had to look at him. He said, “You shall have to be a Christian to serve me. I will not let the Bishop claim I am harboring pagans.”

“I can see that we don’t agree on anything,” Bjarni said. “I keep the law, but I have no interest in Christ, or any hanged god, for that matter.”

“Yes, you are Hoskuld’s son. He might have been one of my chief men, but instead he went back to drying fish and milking goats and a straw death in Iceland.”

Bjarni drank a third cup of the thick foamy beer. He and Sigurd spoke of the voyage from Iceland. All the while, men came in and went out of the hall. They were richly dressed, and all of them carried some weapon, most of them more than one.

“Hoskuld was a good fighter,” Sigurd said. “Something might be made of you, although you seem milder than he. Stay on awhile, I will convince you that your fortunes lie with me.”

“I will stay,” Bjarni said, “until you convince me otherwise.”

At that Sigurd laughed again.

The men of
Swan
brought their sea-chests into a small sleeping booth near the water and made their beds there. When the sun set, they went to the hall.

Now it was thick with men. Two big casks of beer were open by the door, and the men came and dunked their drinking cups and strode off, their sleeves dripping. At the table Sigurd was talking to some other men, and there were people bent over chess-games. Along the side of the hearth a boy cranked a roast on the spit.

Sigurd’s fair daughter came to them. Smiling, she took them through the crowd to a bench where they might sit, and she and another girl brought them bread and cheese to eat. Ulf tried to speak to her; he caught at her skirt, but she whisked it away, laughing at him. She was back in a moment and sat down beside him.

Andres and Jon sat crouched together on the bench. “This is a thieves’ den,” Andres said, between his teeth. “Keep your hand on your pennies.”

Bjarni wondered if Andres had ever owned a penny. Most of the Icelanders had already drifted away through Sigurd’s men toward the beer kegs. Kristjan stood near a wooden pillar, his dark eyes moving. His mother’s eyes were blue. Bjarni stirred; he went away from his brothers, around the hearth.

Being taller than most of the men he could see what went on. He strolled around the hall, watching Sigurd’s men talking and gaming. The blond girl had given him a cup; he filled it with beer. Presently he found an empty place on a bench before the hearth and sat down. He meant not to think of Hiyke, but he did.

“That is my place,” a loud voice said.

Beside him was a burly man with blue and red feathers in his beard. All the men nearby quieted, turning to watch. Sigurd was watching, his elbows braced on the table.

“That is my place,” the feathered man said again, and kicked at Bjarni’s leg.

Bjarni moved his leg out of the way. “Is that so,” he said. “Then you may have it when I get up.”

“I said it is my place!”

The feathered man lunged at him. Bjarni jumped to his feet and drove his fist into the man’s broad belly. A yell went up from the other men watching. The burly man swung his arm roundabout at Bjarni’s head, and Bjarni hit him again just below the ribs. The man fell.

Surprised, Bjarni backed away; he had not expected to win so easily. At the High Seat, Sigurd was standing, his hand raised. All the men in the hall waited for his words. Sigurd spread his lips in his ugly smile.

“Here is Lyr fallen, does he have no friends to help him?”

“I’m Lyr’s friend,” a voice bawled, from the other side of the hearth, and a red-haired man strode through the crowd toward Bjarni.

Bjarni stepped backward, away from Lyr, and turned to put his back to the hearth. He glanced once at Sigurd, beaming in his place at the High Seat. The red-headed man charged, his arms milling.

Bjarni knocked his first blows out of the way; the redheaded man tripped him, and they fell. The red-headed man sank his teeth into Bjarni’s shoulder. Bjarni hit him twice in the head. His hand turned numb but the redhead, dazed, opened his jaws, and Bjarni threw him off. He lurched up onto his knees.

Already another man was coming at him from the crowd. Behind the solid wall of men, Ulf shouted. Bjarni called, “Stay back!” He jumped to his feet to meet the man coming toward him.

That was a small man, but tough and fast, who hit him twice before Bjarni knocked him into the mob. Then a bald man charged him too exuberantly, and Bjarni stepped off at the right moment and tripped him into the fire. Blood was running down Bjarni’s cheek from a cut in his eyebrow; he sobbed for breath. Another man was circling toward him, crouched like a wrestler.

Bjarni moved away from him, trying to gain his breath. The fire heated his back. He could not escape from this. It was Sigurd who was directing it. He strode into the wrestler, wishing it were Sigurd, and they exchanged some blows and Sigurd’s man fell.

The yelling of the mob rang in his ears. He pawed at the cut over his eye and the blood got into the eye and half-blinded him. Another man was edging toward him, wary, his arms up over his face.

“I hope you will not hold this against me,” Bjarni said. He swung at the man’s head and missed.

The man dodged to the left. He grinned, showing gapped teeth. “I will forgive hundreds of those,” he said.

“Then you won’t mind this one.” Bjarni wheeled his right arm again at the man’s jaw.

Sigurd’s man dodged to the left again, and Bjarni met him with his left fist, straight in the pit of his gut. The man sat down hard, his eyes filming over. Already his replacement was elbowing out of the crowd.

Bjarni swayed on his feet; his fists hurt, and his eye was full of blood. He knew he would go down soon. He hated Sigurd for this; he would never join Sigurd now. The next man came at him all in a rush, shouting, and butted him in the stomach, and Bjarni got him by the belt and threw him back against the hearth.

He had lost count. His breath sawed in and out of his throat. The man facing him now was as tall as he was, almost as brawny, and fresh as new milk. They stood foot to foot pounding each other on the chest and shoulders. Bjarni slipped and went to one knee and a fist smashed into the side of his head. His eyes lost their power to see. He found himself on his feet again, his arms pumping. Through a red mist he saw the other big man go down.

Still there was another. He could scarcely lift his arms. He fell again and staggered up and fell without a hand laid on him. The cheers of Sigurd’s men resounded over him. He could not move. A black sleep took him.

WHEN HE CAME BACK to himself he was lying on a bench in the sleeping booth where his crew was quartered. The morning sun shone in the window. Ulf and his brothers were sitting around him. Ulf brought him a bucket of water to wash in.

“Why didn’t you lie down when you saw what the game was?”