Raider's Wake: A Novel of Viking Age Ireland (The Norsemen Saga Book 6)

by James L. Nelson

  He headed down the plank road, down the gentle sloping hill to the bank of the river. The ships and their tall masts were just visible in the fading light, and there was still a bustle of activity around them. Louis walked down along the shoreline, running his eyes over each of the vessels in turn, until at last he was forced to acknowledge he had no idea what he was looking at.

  Louis had seen ships all his life, ships moving up and down the wide Seine River and tied to the docks at Rouen, in Roumois, where he had been born and raised. He had seen the fat merchant ships and the Frankish warships and the sleek, fast ships of the Northmen who came to raid. But they all looked the same to him, and he never gave them any thought. When it came to horses, Louis understood every nuance and consideration, but one ship was the same as another to him.

  I will have to ask, he realized on his second pass by the idle vessels. Most of the men he could see by their appearance were Northmen and he knew it would be pointless to speak to any of them because they were unlikely to speak Irish or Frankish. But as he stood searching among the men working aboard the ships, another came down the plank road pushing a barrow loaded with sheepskins, and he had the look of an Irishman. Like the shipmasters who brought their merchant vessels to Dubh-linn, many of the local people had figured out there was money to be made in trading with the heathens, hate them though they might.

  “Excuse me, friend,” Louis said, using his most welcoming voice and stepping up to the man. “Could I ask you a question?”

  The man grunted and let the handles of the barrow go with evident relief. “Yes?” he asked.

  “I am new to Dubh-linn. I’m from Frankia, and I’m looking for passage back,” he said. “Are any of these ships bound off for Frankia, do you know?”

  The man looked at Louis, looked at the ships on the riverfront, looked back at Louis. He nodded. “Most of those are longships, filled with the murdering bastards who’ll be raiding the monasteries,” the man said.

  And stealing silver to pay you for the sheepskins? Louis thought, but he said nothing.

  “But some, the squat ones there, those are merchants,” the Irishman continued. “Most are bound for Wessex or Mercia. A few are bound for the eastern countries, or so I hear. A shipmaster named Brunhard. Frisian. He’d probably give you passage for silver. Don’t think there’s much he wouldn’t do for silver.”

  This was exactly what Louis had hoped to hear. “Where would I find this Brunhard?” he asked. The Irishman turned and nodded up the hill toward a large building that rose above the others. It looked like a church in the way it dominated the other buildings, but Louis doubted very much that it was a church.

  “The big hall there, that’s where they usually are of an evening. Brunhard and all the seamen.” The Irishman looked back at Louis and gave him a wicked grin. “Best of luck to you, dealing with that lot.”

  Louis thanked him and headed back up the plank road, back the way he had come. In the dark the hall seemed to glow from within and Louis imagined there was a great fire burning in the hearth. He had heard the din from the hall when he had first gone down to the waterfront, but now as he walked back that way it seemed much louder, the goings-on more raucous. But Louis was a soldier, and he was used to rough and bawdy scenes, and so he did not hesitate to push his way through the big oak door and into the Northmen’s lair.

  It was probably the biggest building in Dubh-linn, fifty feet long and thirty wide, the roof a good twenty feet overheard. As Louis had guessed there was a great fire blazing in the hearth on the floor and some creature—a sheep, he guessed—slowly turning on a spit over the flames.

  There were a few heavy oak tables arrayed around the place, earthen cups and wooden platters scattered over their tops, big men with beards, tunics, arm rings, adorned with weapons, sitting on benches, drinking, shouting, singing, arguing. Louis was no stranger to such scenes, and if they had been Frankish warriors, and not the detested fin gall, he might have joined in with pleasure.

  There were women as well, and Louis enjoyed women regardless of where they hailed from. In this case they seemed to be Irish, and most were scurrying around with more ale and mead and platters, attending the increasingly drunk men in the place. In other circumstances Louis might have sought out the company of one of them, but now he had more pressing concerns.

  He grabbed one of the women by the arm as she hurried past, not roughly, just enough to get her attention. She turned and looked at him. Blue eyes, black hair. Very pretty.

  “I am looking for a shipmaster named Brunhard,” he said, speaking loud to be heard over the din.

  The girl smiled, nodded her head. “There,” she said, pointing across the hall. Louis looked in that direction. There was a cluster of men around one table, seated on benches, cups in hand. But one man was seated on the table itself, his feet on the bench, like some lord on a dais, and he was clearly the object of everyone’s attention. He was talking loud and waving his hands as he told some animated tale.

  Louis could see that the men who listened were grinning. From across the hall he could not hear the words, and he suspected the man was not speaking a language he knew, but he did not have to understand to see that his audience was very amused by the tale and were hanging on every word. Then the man on the table paused, and then he said one more thing and the listeners on the bench roared with laughter, one actually falling from the bench and spilling his ale on the dirt floor as he fell.

  Just the sight of it made Louis smile as well. He turned to the girl. “The one on the table, that is Brunhard?”

  “Yes,” the girl said.

  Louis crossed the hall, skirting the fire, enveloped by the smell of roasting meat, and approached Brunhard’s table. Brunhard was drinking deep from a horn, parched no doubt by his performance. Even though he was sitting, Louis could tell he was not a tall man, but he was broad-shouldered, shaped like a small barrel. He had a thick beard, somewhere between yellow and brown in color, and it seemed like a solid thing, like it was carved from oak. He looked like a man who took great pleasure in life and found much that amused him.

  Louis was still several paces away when Brunhard noticed him. He looked straight at Louis, and even across the distance Louis could see the amused twinkle in the man’s eyes, the slight grin on his face, as if he already knew what Louis wanted, and intended to have some fun at the Frank’s expense. He raised his horn and shouted something, but he spoke the Norse tongue and Louis did not understand.

  Five feet away Louis stopped. By now all the big men on the bench, Brunhard’s court, were looking at him. The Irishman down by the ships had told him Brunhard was Frisian, and Louis knew enough of the language of that country, a neighbor of Frankia, that he could make himself understood.

  “You are Brunhard, the shipmaster?” Louis called out.

  Brunhard’s mouth formed a wry smile. His eyes never left Louis, but he said something in Norse and the men around him burst into laughter once again. Louis pressed his lips together. He had come hoping to get passage with this man, but now he wondered if he would end up killing him for his insults.

  “Forgive me, friend, forgive me!” Brunhard shouted, raising his hand to Louis. There was something entirely disarming, embracing, in the way the man spoke, as if with one sentence he could prove to be your dearest friend, the sort who could joke at your expense and somehow still not give offense. “We don’t see gentlemen as fine as you in here so often!”

  Louis nodded. He was actually a much finer gentleman than any of them might have guessed from his dress and his sword, but that was not something he wished to make known. He was second son to the late Hincmar, the Count of Roumois. Raised in wealth that these sorry bastards could only dream about, betrayed by his brother who feared Louis would try and take his place as count after their father’s death. Now bound back to Roumois to have his revenge.

  “You do your friends here an injustice,” Louis replied. “Sure they are fine gentlemen, one and all.”

  “Ha
! You are quick of tongue, I can see that!” Brunhard said, all but shouting the words in his exuberance, and to be heard over the noise of the hall. “But see here,” he continued. “You can speak the Frisian tongue, after a fashion, but you do not sound like a Frisian. You sound like a Frankish whoremonger.”

  “I am Frankish,” Louis said with a shallow bow, “and my pastimes are my own affair.” There was not much love between Franks and Frisians. Louis knew he had to tread carefully if he wished to get the passage he desired. “I am told you are the finest shipmaster in all of Frisia, and that I might look to you to buy passage back to my native land.”

  Brunhard laughed again, but there was no malice in it, just genuine amusement, as if he was enjoying their exchange. “You’re a lying dog, I know it! None of the sheep biters in Dubh-linn would say that of me, though it happens to be the truth. Now, why would I help a Frankish dog like you?”

  “Because I can pay you. There is no other reason,” Louis said.

  “Ha! You are right about that!” Brunhard roared. “I would do nothing for a Frank, save for silver. In truth, I would do nothing for any man unless he paid me. If you were a woman there might be room to negotiate, but you are not, so it must be silver. Now…what is your name?”

  “Louis.”

  “Now, Louis the Frank,” Brunhard said, “I will agree to take twenty pieces of silver and in exchange I will bring you to Frisia, where I am bound, and from there you may make your own way home. Is that agreed?”

  “Yes, that is agreed,” Louis said.

  “Good!” Brunhard roared, and Louis wondered if the man ever spoke at any volume below a shout. “Now, Louis the Frank, you will buy me and my friends here more ale, as a gesture of your good will!”

  Brunhard was smiling as he said it, but his eyes met Louis’s and Louis could see there was more than bonhomie behind the words. Here was a test, Brunhard probing to see how far Louis might be pushed. Louis had known plenty like Brunhard. Wolves. Show fear and they tear you apart.

  “No,” Louis said. He rested his hand on the hilt of his sword. “I pay for passage, not ale.”

  “What?” Brunhard said, his voice thick with mock outrage. “You are so cheap you won’t buy ale for your friends?”

  “I am happy to buy ale for my friends,” Louis said, his voice even and considerably less loud than Brunhard’s. “But I see no friends here, just a fat Frisian whore’s son.”

  The Frisian nodded and he held Louis’s eyes and the two of them stared at one another as the rest waited for the reaction, whatever it might be. And when it came, Louis was not too terribly surprised.

  Brunhard laughed.

  “Well said, you Frankish swine!” he said. “You buy your ale and I’ll buy my ale, and when you give me the silver for your passage I’ll buy more ale still! You there!” Brunhard called to one of the serving girls. “Ale for the Frank here! Come, drink with us, Louis, and we will drink to a swift and profitable voyage.”

  Louis nodded and dropped his hand from the hilt of his sword. He cared not in the least for Brunhard’s profits, but a swift voyage was something to which he would gladly raise a cup.

  Chapter Six

  I have travelled on the sea-god’s steed

  a long and turbulent wave-path…

  Egil’s Saga

  Dubh-linn…Thorgrim thought, looking out over the water between himself and the distant shoreline, the flashes of white on the ragged blue surface of the sea. This sorry bastard must have sailed from Dubh-linn…

  The sun was just past the midday mark, the day all but cloudless. The distant sail, gray and bellied out from the yard, stood out sharp against the blue sky and deeper blue of the sea. The ship beneath plunged along, tossing up wake that seemed like tiny shards of silver at that distance, a mile or so to the northeast of Sea Hammer.

  It was Starri Deathless who had seen the ship first, of course, Starri with the sharpest eyes among all of them. He had been at the masthead since the first glimmer of light had appeared in the east, not long after they had got underway. With the sun just above the horizon he could see nothing to the eastward, but the ship had appeared to the north, making its way east, toward the rising sun. She had been under oars, and only Starri could have seen so tiny and distant a shape.

  The vessel was several miles off when Starri first called down from aloft. The four ships in Thorgrim’s fleet were in a fairly tight group, also driving along under the power of their oars, the morning breeze having yet to fill in.

  Sea Hammer had the lead, and astern of her, not more than half a cable away, was Blood Hawk, Sea Hammer’s near sister. Blood Hawk’s first master, Bersi Jorundarson, had been cut down at Glendalough. Now she was commanded by Godi Unundarson, who had been at Thorgrim’s side for many fights now. Godi was quiet but he was smart and bold and loyal. The men respected him, and if there were any who did not, they knew to keep that to themselves.

  Off Blood Hawk’s stern and a little behind was Dragon, a bit smaller than the two leading ships. Nearly all of Dragon’s former crew had also been killed at Glendalough. They had died fighting, and Thorgrim had no doubt they were now feasting in Odin’s corpse hall.

  Thorgrim had given command of that ship to a man named Fostolf, who had been one of Ottar’s men but had chosen to stay in Vík-ló and swear loyalty to Thorgrim. They had been enemies once, his men and Ottar’s, but now they would fight side by side, and old animosities had to be left in the past. Thorgrim figured the best way to show that he was sincere in that belief was to give one of Ottar’s men command of a ship.

  Aghen had told him that Fostolf was a good man, one who had come to despise Ottar once he saw what sort of a man Otter really was. Aghen thought Fostolf could be trusted with command of a ship, and, after coming to know the man, Thorgrim agreed. Fostolf was not a young man; Thorgrim guessed he had seen only ten fewer winters than he himself had. He did not seem a rash and heedless fool, and Thorgrim was so far pleased with the way he managed himself and his crew.

  Last in line was Fox, the smallest of the longships. She was commanded by Thorodd Bollason who, like Godi, had been with Thorgrim for some time now, and had fought many battles at his side. Thorodd was younger than Godi, and more intemperate, more prone to being impetuous. That was not necessarily a bad thing; he was like a dog straining at the leash, which was fine as long as the leash held.

  Still, before Glendalough, Thorgrim would not have trusted Thorodd with a command. After Glendalough, he had so few men left that he felt he had no choice.

  He considered giving Fox to Harald. Harald was respected and he was a good seaman and was proving to be more clever than Thorgrim had ever given him credit for. But he was young, and to give command to one’s own son when he was one of the youngest of all the ships’ crews would not have sat well with the men. Being a leader did not mean being free to do whatever he wished. Ottar had found that out when his men had turned their backs on him.

  Now Harald was coming aft, moving easily on the rolling deck. “See here, Father,” he said, stepping up onto the small after deck where Thorgrim stood gripping the tiller. “Dragon has fallen off a bit and Fox is following her. You can see they’re moving like their asses are on fire.”

  Thorgrim grunted and nodded to the tiller. Harald took hold of the thick oak bar so that Thorgrim could turn his attention to the other ships. He leaned over the larboard side, looked astern. And he saw Harald was right.

  All of them, Thorgrim’s four ships and this vessel they were chasing, had been driving under oars in the calm of the early morning, and all had set sail as soon as the breeze had filled in from the northeast. The breeze had continued to blow, and now the ships were plunging along, sails straining against the ropes that reinforced the wool cloth, bows rising and coming down in a welter of spray. It was a beautiful thing.

  The chase had been going on for hours already. The ship, Thorgrim was certain, had come from Dubh-linn, one of the large and growing number of knarrs, wide, heavy-built merchant
vessels that were calling on the longphort, bringing goods from the east and trading for leather and sheepskins and dried fish and wool cloth and any of the many things that Irish merchants wished to bring to the markets beyond the horizon. As such, it would make a fat prize.

  Or so Thorgrim hoped. If the ship was from Wessex, or Frisia or Frankia, as so many of those merchantmen were, he would have no concerns about plundering it. If they were Northmen, that might be a different situation. But in any event, they had to catch the vessel first.

  The merchantman had not seen Thorgrim’s ships at first, since he did not have Starri Deathless and his hawk’s sight, and because the rising sun was in his eyes. When he did spot them he turned north, moving as directly away from the four ships in pursuit as he could. It was too late for him to get back to Dubh-linn where he might hope to find some sanctuary among the other merchants; Thorgrim’s ships would cut him off before he made it. So now his only choice was to remain on the lawless sea, run to the north and try and shake off the wolf pack on his heels.

  “They’re moving faster already,” Thorgrim said, looking at Dragon and Fox. All of the vessels had the wind coming over their starboard bows, their yards hauled around as fore and aft as they could go, the windward clews hauled tight to the end of a massive pole called a beitass, thrust out over the starboard side. On such a point of sail the ships bucked and rolled and kicked like wild horses. But still the merchant ship kept out of their grasp.

  He bent over, looked forward under the edge of Sea Hammer’s straining sail. The knarr’s sails stood out against the green shore beyond it, the big headland that jutted out to the north of Dubh-linn and formed a wide bay into which ran the Liffey, with the longphort on its banks.