Kings and Pawns

by James L. Nelson

“Not a big army, no great force,” Thorgrim continued. “Maybe two hundred men, like Ofeig said, maybe a few less. Horses. But not many.”

  “So, nothing for us to worry ourselves about?” Starri asked.

  “As soon as we stop worrying, we’re dead,” Thorgrim said. “But this doesn’t look like an army we can’t beat.”

  “Good,” Starri said. “Then we wait for them here, and when they attack us we’ll crush them like the serpents they are.”

  In the dark Thorgrim smiled. Starri was a berserker, imbued with fighting madness that made him crave battle as if it were all that sustained him. It led him to take actions that more prudent men might shun. It also made him forget that such decisions as when and where to fight were not his to make.

  “If it were mine to say, I would stay here and let you kill them all single-handed when they came,” Thorgrim said. He put his hands on the cool, hard-packed dirt and pushed himself to his feet, awake enough now to stifle the groan growing in his throat. Starri stood as well, in that way of his that seemed more as if he was unfolding his lanky body.

  “But it’s not mine to say. I’ll call a meeting of the lead men,” Thorgrim said, though he knew the words were not true. It was his to say. He was the leader of these men, Lord Thorgrim, and what he said, they did. He would have it no other way.

  At the same time, he wanted to show respect for the men who followed him. Jorund had joined with Thorgrim at Loch Garman, putting himself, his four ships and near two hundred men under Thorgrim’s command. He deserved a say in what they would do next. So did Godi and Harald, who had been with Thorgrim through so much, as well as the captains of the other ships.

  “Very well, Night Wolf, do as you wish,” Starri said, acquiescence which Thorgrim found surprising.

  “That’s very…reasonable of you, Starri.”

  In the dawn light he saw Starri shrug. “It’s no matter,” he said. “The others will just do as you say whether you ask for their opinions or not. And whatever you say always seems to lead to fighting. Enough fighting even for me.”

  It was still dark when Failend woke, the heavy furs under which she slept pressing her down into the straw pallet that made little crackling noises when she moved. She did not sense Thorgrim’s presence in the bed with her. She reached out her hand, sliding it between the fur and the rough linen that covered the straw, but she could not feel him there. She rolled over and felt in the other direction. He was not there either.

  Wolf dream…she thought. She had seen the dark mood coming on Thorgrim the night before, the furrowed brow and the downturned mouth, the expression that looked like barely contained and inexplicable rage. She had seen that before, on a few occasions since she had known him. She knew what the heathens thought it was, that his soul took on the form of a wolf and roamed the dark.

  Under the fur she made the sign of the cross.

  Failend did not believe such things. She did not believe what the pagans believed. But she also knew that there were many strange things out there, that God was not alone in His works in man’s world, that Satan also had a hand in what happened in the night. She did not like to think that Thorgrim was a tool of Satan. But again, she had been raised to believe that all the heathens were.

  Then another thought came to her. Maybe he’s sharing a bed with another woman. That notion gave her more pause than the idea of the wolf dream. In part because it was more plausible. And like the idea of Thorgrim’s soul turning into a wolf, it was not the first time the thought had crossed her mind.

  “Who would he be sharing his bed with?” she asked herself in a whisper. There were women among the captives they had taken when they took the monastery, but they were the wives of the men who worked there, tradesmen or laborers or fishermen. The women were ugly, near toothless, hands and faces leathered, bodies misshapen and stooped from years of labor and childbirth.

  “He would have none of them,” Failend said, once more speaking softly but out loud, and in her mind added, Not when he could have me.

  The wives of the working men were the only women at the monastery; there were no others. There had been nuns, apparently, judging from the garments they had found in one of the dormitories, but those women were gone by the time the heathens had arrived.

  Every time that Failend wondered if Thorgrim was sharing another woman’s bed, it led to the same string of thoughts. She figured he would not lie with another woman because there were no other women with whom he might want to couple. He would not be faithful because he loved her, or because he felt any loyalty toward her, but simply because she was the only desirable woman to be had.

  “You don’t know that,” she said. And that was true. She didn’t know, had no real notion of what Thorgrim Night Wolf thought or felt. She never spoke to him about those things. The very idea of talking to him about love and faithfulness seemed absurd.

  Thorgrim loved Harald. He had apparently loved his late wife. He had three other children: a son named Odd and two daughters, Hild and Hallbera. He had told Failend a little about them, and she had the impression he loved them too, though he had not been in their company for several years now.

  She did not know if Thorgrim loved anyone else.

  “Well, it’s not as if you’re in love with him, either,” she said, and then she closed her eyes and began to cry.

  Chapter Two

  It grew up, and well throve;

  learned to tame oxen, make a plough,

  houses build, and barns construct,

  make carts, and the plough drive.

  The Poetic Edda

  Odd Thorgrimson stood poised, alert, muscles taut, sure of what would come next and ready for it. The ground was soft and he worked his toes into the dirt so that his feet would not slip when it was time for him to make his move. He was crouched low, his arms out on either side.

  The enemy was close, no more than twenty feet away. Not enemy…opponent, Odd thought. He had no quarrel with the one he faced off with, no enmity, though he knew the other felt differently on that point.

  Odd was outmatched, there was no question. The other was faster and outweighed Odd by a considerable amount. More powerful than Odd could ever hope to be. But he was angry, grunting with rage, and Odd was not, and that, Odd knew, was a significant advantage.

  The crowd had been murmuring just seconds before, but now they were silent, anticipating the coming violence. Wagers were being made, Odd knew it, but it did not bother him. He hoped some had bet against him so that they would learn what a mistake that was.

  Then, in an instant, the waiting was over and the combat begun. It was not Odd who initiated it, it was the other, digging his feet into the earth and launching himself forward in snarling, frothy rage, four hundred pounds of anger hurtling toward Odd, who stood his ground and waited.

  It’s just a pig, just a pig, Odd thought as he tensed his legs and watched the massive animal bearing down on him. It had no teeth or claws to speak of, but if it managed to slam itself into Odd at full speed—a thing it was trying very hard to do—then it could knock him flat or break bones or both. And once Odd was down, the boar would be in charge. But he had been doing this for years, and so far no hog had ever got the better of him, and only a few times had one even come close.

  Ten feet, then five. Odd put his right hand straight out. It was all timing and sureness of foot now. The pig was not dumb. Once it came to understand that Odd had plans, plans to render it into some edible form, which the hog felt would not be to its advantage, then it had become enraged, the battle joined.

  Two feet. Odd’s hand came down hard on the pig’s head and he leapt as straight up as he could. He felt his toes dig in and not slip and he felt a wave of relief even as the hog passed under him.

  He landed on the far side of the pig and staggered, off balance, just for a step. The jump was the most dangerous moment, the place where he had nearly been bested by earlier hogs, but this next moment was the second most dangerous. Maybe third. Either way, he had
to keep his footing, to turn and be ready before the hog was. And the hog, for all its size, was very quick.

  Odd spun around, crouching again as he did, and the hog spun around as well, furious, grunting, unsure where its quarry had gone.

  You’re not the smartest I’ve faced, are you? Odd thought. He wondered if the onlookers would notice, if they would think this contest not so impressive as the earlier ones. Then the pig spotted him and launched into its second charge.

  The pig’s speed built, and Odd saw the next few seconds unfold in his mind, just the way it would happen if it happened right. He would not try that same trick again, in case the hog had figured it out. He didn’t know if a hog was capable of such a thing, but reckoned it was not worth the risk to find out.

  Again his right hand went out, ready to connect with the pig’s head, when suddenly the pig did the unexpected. Just as Odd’s hand brushed the tough hide, the pig swerved, and rather than coming straight on, it swung the great bulk of its body right into Odd’s crouching form.

  The impact sent Odd sprawling back and he was aware of the roar from the onlookers and his mind was filled with the half-formed thought that he had to get clear, had to regain his feet and his orientation before the huge animal was on him.

  He hit the ground with his shoulder and rolled, and as he rolled he swung his legs around and let the last bit of momentum carry him back onto his feet. He came up facing the pig and he thanked the gods, because the boar had also found his footing and was charging again. The roar from the crowd, which had not stopped, grew louder still as the outcome seemed more in doubt. Odd wondered who they were cheering for. Most were for him, he was certain. Nearly certain. His wife and children, for sure, and at least a majority of the others.

  It took the hog all of three seconds to reach Odd, but that was time enough. Odd guessed the beast would swerve again, since that had worked so well the first time, and he guessed it would swerve in the same direction for the same reason. Odd, therefore, dodged in the other direction, just as the hog swerved the way it had before, and this time its great flank met only air.

  Odd leapt again. He launched off his right foot, left leg up, and came down on the hog’s back as if he were mounting a horse. The hog screamed in rage and kicked its back legs and Odd felt the bristles on its back poking through his linen trousers. He leaned forward and put his arm around the hog’s neck, hanging tight as the hog twisted and kicked and thrashed its head. He got a grip on the animal’s jaw and pulled even as he slipped off the hog’s back, twisting its head and toppling it over on its side.

  A fathom of thin rope hung doubled around Odd’s neck. He whipped it off and straddled the hog again as the animal squealed and bucked and tried to regain its feet. He grabbed the animal’s two front legs and whipped the rope around them, low down, near the feet. It was a practiced move, one that his arms and hands did with no conscious thought. He pulled the end of the rope between the animal’s legs, once, twice, cinching the loops tight, then grabbed for a hind leg next. The boar was kicking frantically now, its hind legs flailing with its front legs bound, but Odd managed to catch one in mid-flail and he lashed it quick with the tail end of the rope.

  He paused for a second, took a deep breath, and then jumped to his feet, smiling wide. The cheers doubled and he saw men and women smiling at him and raising fists and he smiled back and bowed deep. There was laughter now, and shouts of “Well done!” and “Odd wins again!” Odd saw silver armbands and brooches being passed hand to hand, the winners’ wagers being paid, and he noted who was paying whom, and who had bet against him.

  Odd’s wife, Signy, broke from the crowd and ran towards him. The beads that hung in a bight between the brooches on her dress bounced and the keys and scissors and knife that hung from thin chains from her right brooch jingled like little bells. Her yellow hair and her smile seemed to glow in the summer’s early morning sun. In her arms she held Hallbera, their daughter, three months old and quite confused by the goings on.

  Signy shifted the baby to one side, put her free arm around Odd’s neck, kissed him. She whispered in his ear, “That one nearly had you, old man.”

  Odd grinned. “Not close, not even close.”

  He felt arms around his legs, cries of “Papa, papa!” The other little ones, Ornolf and Thorgrid, were holding him tight, proud of Papa, pleased that he had not been crushed to death by the hog.

  Vermund Jurundsson approached next, a big smile on his weathered face, gaps where several of his teeth once stood. “Well done, Odd, well done, as usual!” Vermund was the overseer of Odd’s farm, the one who helped Odd in the laborious task of seeing every one of a thousand tasks done and done correctly. Vermund had been born to farming, was intimate with every aspect of the work. He had done it all and he was not shy about jumping in with both hands and working still. It was why Odd paid him well and valued him so.

  “Signy thinks the hog nearly killed me this time,” Odd said.

  The three of them turned reflexively and looked at the pig. It had stopped thrashing and was lying still now, breathing hard. The men who would do the work that followed Odd’s subduing the animal, killing, gutting, bleeding and butchering it, stood off to the side as the crowd dispersed. It was not as if anyone on the farm had not seen animals slaughtered many times, but still it seemed as if a bit of discretion was called for. The pig had been a good sport, after all.

  “That beastie get the best of you?” Vermund said. “Never in life! You’re still young and quick! Get to be my age, maybe, but you’ve got too much experience now to lose to a hog!”

  Odd did have experience, that was true. Pigs were something of a luxury in that country; few men raised them and they were food for the better sort. Odd had raised his first pigs five years back, soon after taking over the farm. The first time he had tried to butcher a hog it had not gone well when the hog decided to not placidly accept its fate. It had turned into a wrestling match, Odd versus the pig, and that had ended as a great entertainment for all of Odd’s people. Enough so that the contest of Odd versus pig had become a regular event, generally played out once or twice a year, whenever a boar was ready to be butchered.

  There were easier ways to subdue and bind a pig, but none so amusing, and it was not long before Odd felt obligated to put on the show, it being so popular among the folk.

  Vermund slapped Odd on the back. “Your name will be Odd Pig-binder!” he said.

  Odd smiled, an obligatory smile. “I hope we can come up with better than that,” he said, his tone cheerful, Vermund’s words like a dagger in the gut.

  My father is Thorgrim Night Wolf, he thought, my brother is known as Harald Broadarm. I am Odd Pig-binder.

  “Tell me, Vermund,” Signy chimed in, she alone aware of Odd’s discomfort. “How goes the haymaking in the south field?”

  “Cut down, my lady, all but the southeast corner. But still too wet to bale. Another day or two such as this and we’ll be quite ready.”

  “And the flock?” Odd said.

  “Galti just come down from the hills for more victuals and he says all is well. Two ewes lost to a wolf, but the boys hunted the thing down and killed it.”

  Odd nodded. In the spring the farm’s flock of sheep, a considerable flock, along with the milch cows and bulls, were driven up into the hills where the grazing was good. A dozen of Odd’s men went with them as sheep herders, and a handful of women as well. They lived in a small house there called a shielding, and tended the animals while the weather was good.

  The pigs remained behind, where they were transformed into bacon and salt pork.

  “I’ll join you with the haying, Vermund,” Odd said. “I just have to see to a few things first.”

  Vermund nodded, made his goodbyes. Little Ornolf and Thorgrid had moved on to other pursuits, leaving Odd’s legs free.

  “May I walk with you, husband?” Signy asked.

  “Of course, wife, of course,” Odd said. He stepped off across the fields of low grass that rin
ged the farmhouse and the outbuildings, moderating his pace in consideration of his wife whose legs were not as long as his and who was carrying their youngest child.

  He breathed deep. The air was good, just warming up as the sun rose higher, a tinge of salt water from the deep fiord that formed the southern boundary of his land. When his father had given him the farm as a wedding present six years earlier it had been a good place, a good fertile land, a small farmhouse and well-built outbuildings: a barn, a byre, a stable with half a dozen stalls.

  In the years since, Odd had turned it into something much more substantial than that. He had expanded the barn and the byre to accommodate his growing herds. He had hired good men and women and bought strong slaves and made them work hard, and encouraged them by working hard himself. He was a clever man and had learned many things from his father, both about farming and selling produce in the most advantageous way and about leading men, and all those things served him well.

  And Odd had one other advantage. When Thorgrim and Harald had gone off a’viking with Odd’s grandfather, Ornolf the Restless, Thorgrim had asked Odd to look after his farm as well. There was an overseer, a man named Skafti who Thorgrim trusted with the daily running of the place, but Thorgrim asked that Odd take the overall responsibility. Any profit that the farm made was to be put back into improvements and generous payment to the people who worked Thorgrim’s land. Anything surplus beyond that was to go to Odd for his trouble.

  And there was quite a bit of surplus. Thorgrim had built up his farm over the years, acquiring as much of the land around as he could. He had a long hall and quite a few other buildings, and fields and herds of sheep and cows, flocks of chickens, and pigs as well. With Thorgrim gone the household was free from the great expense of hosting banquets for neighbors and men of consequence passing through, and that meant more silver all around.

  The summer before, Odd had made his latest and grandest improvement to his own farm, one that brought it nearly to the level of Thorgrim’s own. He had built a proper longhouse, a great, towering timber structure with walls of turf and stone. The original farmhouse had become the entrance hall to the new home, and to it Odd had added a great hall one hundred and twenty feet long with a stone fire pit running down the middle. At the far end of the hall was the main room with its own fire pit, a place where the family might gather when there was no call to use the great space of the main hall. Two smaller rooms came off the back of the hall, one for storing food and sundry household goods, the other a latrine to be used when the harsh weather made using the outhouses less inviting.