“These are bad odds,” Dyrfinna muttered to herself, looking over the line of Danes.
The Danes pushed forward, keeping in line, moving toward the sword friends.
Dyrfinna turned toward the oncoming warriors, bringing her shield down off her back and took her place in front with Ostryg. “Put the girl behind us,” she said. “Get her out of sight, quickly.”
The girl flung herself down behind a fallen log. Gefjun stood over her, bow and arrows at the ready, watching the oncoming Danes with steely eyes.
“Can you use a sword?” Dyrfinna asked the girl over her shoulder.
“Yes.” The girl’s voice was quiet. “I am ready to fight.”
“Give her a weapon,” Dyrfinna said, but Gefjun was already handing her a dagger.
“Don’t be afraid,” Gefjun said. “Now you can inflict pain on every one of them. For every hurt they gave you, give them two.”
Skeggi and Ostryg took their places on either side of Dyrfinna.
The Danes slowed, seeing the small group of friends. One of them laughed low in his throat.
“We’re looking for a girl,” said a warrior with long blonde hair and a long blonde beard. On his shield was painted the ugliest cross-eyed face, green with warts, with a tongue lolling from between two rows of sharp, red teeth.
“Oh, no,” the girl whispered, her voice trembling.
“I’m the girl you’re looking for,” said Dyrfinna, twirling her sword. “I’m a girl who likes to kill people like you. Come on up, let’s get acquainted.”
The blonde laughed, showing his teeth. “Don’t be an idiot. Nobody needs to die today. Especially you.” He looked her up and down in a way that made Skeggi’s hand tighten on his sword.
Dyrfinna went steely-faced. “Come a little closer and say that again.” She placed her sword in the guard position.
“You’re adorable, but you’re not the girl I’m looking for.” The blonde leered at her. “In fact, I know you had her with you. I could see you talking your stupid talk ahead of us, listened to all your inane chatter.”
“Oooh, Mr. Hotpants used a big word,” Ostryg mocked.
The blonde laughed. It was a fake laugh.
“Hey, boys,” Ostryg said, raising his lance. “Would any of you like to run up against my spear? I want to see how sharp it is.”
“Give the girl to us. You don’t have to die for her. We’ll leave you alone if you give her to us.”
“Are you serious?” Gefjun spat.
“Of course I’m serious. All I want is the girl. Nothing else.”
“No no no no no no no,” whispered the girl from behind the log, an endless soft series of no.
Dyrfinna was looking back and forth from the Danes to the swordfriends. And then she said something that chilled Skeggi to his very soul.
She turned back and looked at Gefjun. “We need to hand the girl over.”
“What!”
Skeggi felt his jaw drop. “Are you crazy?” he yelled at Dyrfinna.
“Look at that group of fighters in front of us,” she said, her words steel. “Fifteen men against us five. They have good armor. Do we have fancy armor like they do? Extra swords? Spears?”
“I don’t care!”
“We will not survive if we fight them,” Dyrfinna said harshly. “I’m going to give up the girl. Then they’ll be on our way, and we’ll be on ours.”
“No.” Gefjun brought up her bow, an arrow nocked on it. “If you think I’m going to stand here and hand over the girl, you are a stupid idiot. I can’t believe you!”
“Put down the bow,” Dyrfinna said. “Put it down.” She turned her back on the Danes to face Gefjun.
And then, her face lowered and hidden from the Danes behind her, she mouthed words at Gefjun. Trust me.
Gefjun went white in shock. Then she burst into tears and lowered her bow. “I really hate you. I hate you. You idiot.”
Dyrfinna faced the Danes. “Come on. Come and get the girl.”
“I’m not going to let you,” Skeggi said.
“Yeah, you are,” Dyrfinna said bitterly. “Come up and get your girl, you stupid Danes, before my own friends kill me.”
Skeggi stared at her. “You make me sick.”
Here came the blonde and six of his friends, sauntering up. “Smart move, babe,” the blonde said. “You wouldn’t have stood a chance against us.”
“Kiss my arse,” Dyrfinna snapped as he walked up alongside of her.
“I’ll do you one better.” Smiling, the blonde wrapped an arm around Dyrfinna’s waist and yanked her against his body. “Well, well, look at that scowl. You girls really need to smile more—”
Suddenly he froze, eyes wide. He jerked.
And blood gushed out of his mouth.
“Thanks. Now I have a reason to.” Dyrfinna shoved the blonde Dane away, a bloody dagger in her hand.
10
The Barb of the Arrow
The blonde’s body was still falling when Dyrfinna’s sword flashed, taking out two more of the Danes with one angry sweep.
“Kill them now, kill them all now!” Dyrfinna screamed, thrusting her dagger into the next Dane and blocking his strike with her sword. With the shrill cry of a battle hawk, she leapt in at the nearest person to her, swinging with her sword. The crash of metal.
Six men fell in Dyrfinna’s swift attack—and now the rest of the Danes came running up.
“Thanks for helping even out the odds,” Dyrfinna cried, swinging her sword at the oncomers. “Now instead of three to one, it’s two to one.” Her sword struck sparks on a Dane’s sword.
“Eleven left!” Gefjun crouched low and sent well-aimed arrows into the oncoming enemy. One man fell, screaming, an arrow sticking out of the eyehole in his helmet. “Ten left!” she shouted.
Skeggi was fighting with his two swords—one to cut, one to block—against a very large and sweating Dane. He was slicing down at Skeggi with his axe and Skeggi was trying very hard to block his blows. He was terrible at defending himself against axe attacks.
But suddenly, the head of a spear burst through the attacker’s chest. The Dane fell, revealing Ostryg standing behind him. “Grab that axe and come on!” Ostryg said, trying to yank the spear out of the man’s back, but he had to stop and block an attack from two Danes with the sword he held in his other hand.
“Nine! Eight!” Gefjun called from the back as another attacker fell at Dyrfinna’s hands.
Gefjun and Ostryg began singing together, building song magic to protect their friends and make their attacks stronger.
Skeggi grabbed up the axe as a Dane came for him, sword flashing. He raised the axe barely in time to block his attacker, but as he stepped back, he tripped and fell hard against the ground. Not again! Skeggi rolled away as the Dane stabbed a sword into the ground mere inches from his side. He swung his axe hard, burying it in the Dane’s leg, then yanked it free and scrambled back. The Dane crashed to the ground with a scream.
Ostryg had pulled his spear out of the dead man and was now sweeping wide circles around him with that deadly instrument. He sang power into his strikes until the spear glowed with it. Danes tumbled back.
Gefjun’s bow sang. Another scream. “Seven!”
Now both sides were almost equally matched. Skeggi swung his axe with a roar. He leapt forward, hewing at his opponent.
Suddenly Gefjun screamed and stumbled forward, her leg crumpling under her. A bright blot of blood. Skeggi’s knees went weak to see an arrow sticking out of her leg.
The girl got up, grabbed Gefjun’s bow, grabbed her arrows, and began to fire.
Gefjun, grasping her leg, her voice strained, shouted, “Six! Five!”
Dyrfinna sprang at Skeggi’s attacker and cut him down with a single stroke. She stepped back from the man as he kicked out his life on the ground, looking around her, sword upraised.
“Four!” Gefjun cried.
But those remaining four lay all wounded on the ground, groaning in pain.
The girl, cold-eyed, jumped to the top of the fallen log and shot four arrows. With each twang of the bowstring, the groans of the wounded ceased.
Skeggi blew out his cheeks and let the axe and sword fall from his hands.
“Thanks for taking care of the wounded for me,” Gefjun gasped, her leg stretched out in front of her, the arrow sticking out of the front of it. “Damn.”
Skeggi took one look at the arrow and whimpered, “Oh, eternal maker.” His knees went weak.
“Don’t look if it makes you squidgy,” Ostryg said, turning him around.
“Arrows are bad,” Skeggi said woozily. “They are very bad.”
“Go and strip the armor from the dead,” Dyrfinna said, passing him as she walked to Gefjun. “Get their weapons and belongings. They don’t need them any more.”
“Good work with the arrows—I mean with the shooting,” Skeggi said to the girl. “Oh. I need to sit down.”
“What’s the matter with him?” asked the girl. Arrows clattered as she set down Gefjun’s quiver.
“He witnessed an arrow being removed last year,” Gefjun said, taking out her work knife and looking at the arrow. A fine sheen of sweat covered her face and neck now. “You can’t pull the arrow out because those barbs tear through your entrance wound. So you have to push the arrow through, cut off the head of the arrow, and only then you can pull it out. Don’t let him look, whatever you do.” She opened up her bag of herbs and bandages and started flicking through her supplies.
Skeggi started stripping the fighters of their armor and taking their swords. Gefjun said, “Can one of you help me push the arrow through my leg?”
“Hey, Skeggi, put down that sword,” Ostryg said, though suddenly his voice sounded so far away. “Let me just take that.” Skeggi felt Ostryg take the sword he was holding out of his hand. Strangely, Skeggi felt as if his friend were receding far, far away.
A moment later—it seemed like a moment—Skeggi opened his eyes and was surprised to be on the ground. He turned his head, and there was Gefjun with a big bandage wrapped around her leg, stained with blood on both ends, and she was fanning herself with the leather flap that closed her medical case, flapping it open and shut at her.
Something was nibbling gently through his hair. There was a little pip pip sound from next to his ear, and then his little owl bent sideways into view, the pupils of her eyes growing huge and black when she looked at him.
He grinned woozily. “Hi, Smoke.”
“Don’t say the word arrow to him,” Ostryg said, and they laughed. “Hey, I’m glad you’re awake again. Here’s your sword back. I didn’t want you to fall on it when you fainted dead away just now.”
Skeggi woozily got back to his feet, accepting the sword from Ostryg. Dyrfinna was nearby, looking haggard, as if she couldn’t stand the sight of him passed out on the ground.
Once he got up, Dyrfinna exhaled harshly and looked away. “We need to continue to our objective. Are you all right?” she asked the girl.
“Am I all right?” the girl asked in a disbelieving voice. She got to her feet. “Am I all right?” she asked, walking to Dyrfinna.
And then the girl smacked Dyrfinna right in the face.
“That’s for offering to hand me over to the enemy,” the girl snapped. “But yes, now that you have killed them off, I’m better now.”
“Um. Glad to hear it,” Dyrfinna said, rubbing her face ruefully.
“Finna, you gotta admit that you kind of earned that,” Ostryg said.
Dyrfinna just shrugged. “We’re very close to the mead-hall now,” she said. “We need to continue on. Gefjun, we need to find a way to bring you with us that won’t cause you pain.”
She laughed. “Oh, right. Like that’s really going to happen. You’re going to have to drag me.”
“Nobody’s going to drag you,” Ostryg said. “Get on my back, pumpkin girl. I’ll carry you everywhere.”
“Oh, you’re turning me on,” Gefjun said, fanning herself with one hand. “Ugh, I can’t stop sweating. This leg hurts like a bastard.”
“Can’t you heal yourself?” the girl asked.
“I’m a healer, not a resurrectionist,” Gefjun said as Ostryg knelt down in front of her. She pulled herself up on one leg, but still cried out in pain. “You can’t just heal someone with magic,” she said, wiping away the sweat running down her face. “Honestly, I hardly have strength enough to stand, much less knit tissue together.”
“It all uses energy,” Ostryg said, helping Gefjun wrap her arms around his neck, then standing. “And even then, healing magic takes time. What we sang over her leg, while Skeggi was passed out over there, helps a little to ease the pain and slow the bleeding. The magic just helps the body along faster.”
“Thank you for explaining that,” Gefjun mumbled, her face slumped into his neck. “I’m going to take a little nappy. Night-night.”
Skeggi joined the others, carrying an armful of armor and clothes. “Who wants a little plunder?”
Dyrfinna pulled on the smallest mail shirt, though it was still big on her. “Armor over armor. Let them try and shoot me now.”
The girl pulled on a pair of soft-soled leather boots. She hauled a shirt off one man, a pair of pants from another, and a dark red woolen cloak from the blonde, to replace the cast-off clothing she wore. “Nice brooch,” the girl said, unpinning the brooch from the dead blonde’s front. “Too bad you don’t need it any more.” Then she spit on him.
“I can appreciate that,” Skeggi said.
“This scum was Iron Skull’s friend,” the girl explained as she pulled the blonde’s sword out of its scabbard. “I could tell you many things about him, all of them bad.” She took his sword in both hands, then slammed the point down through his chest so it stood upright. “But he’s not worth it. So much for him,” she added, kicking him in the head. It flopped, one of his eyes opening halfway.
Dyrfinna was generally pretty unflappable. But even her eyes were big. “Let’s go,” she said to the girl. “And if we run into Iron Skull, I want you to strike the blow that sends him to his grave.”
The small group, now wearing armor and carrying plenty of weapons, plunged into the forest, racing to Thora’s house. They were a motley band, wearing the Dane’s clothes and armor, and Gefjun was either passed out or asleep, piggybacking on Ostryg’s back.
They went quietly from the place where the Danes lay dead, traveling as fast as they could, praying that nobody had seen them.
But somebody had.
She pulled herself up from the ground where she’d been hiding, spying on the attack and the outcome. Like a flitting shadow, she followed the group of sword-friends, pausing a moment by the dead blonde with the sword sticking out of his chest. She shook her head ruefully, then yanked out the sword and wiped it off on the grass. She pulled the belt with his scabbard off, put it around her waist, stuck the sword in it, and hurried after the group.
11
The Old Mead Hall
The sword-friends and the girl made good time through the forest, despite Ostryg carrying Gefjun piggy-back. Skeggi kept looking over his shoulder for Danes, and kept looking at his owl, but she had fallen asleep on his shoulder. He had hoped that she could stay vigilant for them, but at the same time he hated to wake her up. She was such a sweet little thing. Once in a while Smoke’s head would come up and her eyes would open, and she’d swivel her head and look around her, her pupils going big, then small. Then her eyes would slowly slide shut, and she’d snuggle down into her feathers, her little body would relax and feel a little heavier on his shoulder, her sides rising and falling softly.
The girl gazed at the owl, enraptured, but she didn’t speak as they walked through the forest.
“I need to stop for a while,” Skeggi said. “Too much fighting and running for me this morning.”
“There’s still a war on,” Dyrfinna said, sword in hand, scouting around for attackers.
“It must be nice to be not human,” Skeggi
muttered, sitting down and digging what was left of his bread out of his pocket.
Amazingly, Dyrfinna, the goddess of war, looked upset. “Thanks,” she said. “I appreciate that. But I’m not a cold, unfeeling stone. Not like some.” She turned her back on him.
He started to put down his bread, then thought the better of it and took a big bite. “Look. I’m sorry. It’s been a long day.”
“It’s been a long day for everybody, just in case you hadn’t noticed,” Dyrfinna snapped, not looking at him. “And I’m not cold and unfeeling. You can’t call me that. It’s not even true.”
She just got up and walked a little distance off, angrily swinging her sword.
“Women are weird,” Ostryg said, sitting beside him.
Skeggi shrugged glumly, not really wanting to go into all that. “You have a woman,” he pointed out.
“Yeah, but she’s somewhat sane and not at all unhinged. Also she’s kind of hot.”
“I need you to stop,” Skeggi said. “Just stop. Right now. I don’t want to hear it.”
“Fine. Fine.”
Everybody walked on in silence for a while.
Just then Dyrfinna said, “Here we are.”
There stood the old mead hall. It had been abandoned years ago when the previous king had been killed there and the place burned by Vikings from Orkland. Once Queen Saehildr had grown up, she had eventually claimed the place, but by that time it had fallen into disrepair. She’d had the roof repaired and the place cleaned up, but it retained only a shadow of its former glory.
The rush of the sea came more clearly here, and Skeggi smelled the good salt wind. His heart lifted. The light among the trees grew as they approached the cliff, where the dark trees vanished and there was only ocean and rugged islands far beyond, the everlasting roar of the waves, and the cry of the cormorants and gulls and other sea birds that nested on the cliffs or rode the wild wind over the waves.
“The whale-road,” Skeggi murmured to himself, as he gazed out into the ocean. He wanted to put the phrase in a poem, and a rhythm offered itself in his mind, so he stood quietly, listening to it, trying to bring words to it to fit the rhythm.
A Whisper of Smoke Page 6
