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

by James L. Nelson

  Louis found Merulf sulking by the bow of Galilee. “Brunhard told you what we have in mind, what your part will be?” he asked.

  “Yes,” Merulf said. “Can’t say I’m much in favor of it. Didn’t intend to be fighting heathens when I come on as master of this ship.”

  “You won’t be fighting heathens. I will. Me and these other men. You just do your part, see to the ship, and by nightfall you’ll be a considerably richer man.”

  Merulf only grunted at that, so Louis left him and stepped over to where the slaves, the chosen men, were sitting on the sand, still chained to one another.

  “Listen to me,” he said and the forty men looked in his direction. He spoke in Irish because Brunhard and Áed were not there to hear him, and because it did not matter anymore. He would be free by nightfall or he would be dead, and it did not matter who knew what languages he could speak.

  “You’re all warriors, fighting men,” he said. “That’s what Conandil told me. We are going out to sea now, where the heathens are lurking like wolves. The heathens who sold you into bondage. They’ll attack our ship, but they will not think it’s filled with armed warriors. When they come aboard, on my command, you’ll grab up your spears and we’ll kill them all. Some of you might die, but you’ll die like men. If we’re victorious, then Brunhard had promised you your freedom.”

  Nearly all of the speech, rousing as it was, was nonsense and Louis suspected that the Irishmen in chains knew it. But it probably did not matter. Faced with heathens launching a mad attack against them, these men would fight rather than be cut down like sheep sent to slaughter. They probably understood that Brunhard would not give them their freedom no matter what they did, but the outside chance that he might was motivation enough.

  And later, when she had the chance to move quietly among them, Conandil would explain their real purpose, the plan beyond the plan. And that would most certainly motivate them.

  Louis turned back to the ship. Merulf was still standing sullen by the bow. “Merulf!” he called. “We can get underway now, whenever you are ready.”

  Merulf shouted a few orders. His men retrieved the ropes and anchors that held the ship fast and then climbed aboard. Merulf told Louis to get the slaves heaving the ship out into the surf, which they did. Then they waded out, waist deep, and climbed aboard, an awkward trick with their necks chained one to the other. Finally Louis and Conandil waded out, and Louis helped Conandil aboard, then climbed over the sheer strake himself and made his way aft.

  The night was still dark, no hint of dawn, but the great spread of stars overhead gave off light enough for the men aboard to do what needed doing. The sailors passed the oars to the slaves, now seated on the thwarts, and they thrust the blades out through the oarports. Merulf took a step forward and shouted, “Back your oars!” He spoke Irish, but his pronunciation was so bad that Louis guessed that the rowing commands were the full extent of his fluency. Merulf, Louis suspected, had worked with Brunhard before, and was accustomed to the Frisian’s clever plan to make his Irish slaves row themselves across the sea.

  But those few words of Irish were all that Merulf needed. The oars came down and were thrust forward and Galilee moved slowly away from the beach. Three more strokes like that and then the ship was spun in her length and they headed bow-first out into the dark water.

  Conandil, Merulf, the helmsman, the after end of Galilee, they were no more than dark and barely distinguished shapes to Louis. The rest of the ship forward was all but lost in the dark, and beyond that there was nothing at all. But Merulf did not seem concerned about rowing through the darkness, and Louis recalled that night before, when they had run up on the beach, there had been no threatening rocks or shoals in the waters offshore.

  Merulf drove his ship seaward, calling in his crude Irish for the rowers to keep pulling, giving commands to the helmsman to do this and that, things Louis did not understand. He felt the motion of the ship change, just a bit, as it moved into deeper water, but beyond that he had no idea of what was going on.

  For some time they pulled through the dark in that manner, Merulf keeping the Irish rowers at a steady though undemanding pace, the ship forging ahead with an easy rocking and pitching motion. The air was filled with the scent of brine and a hint of grass and earth from the land, not so far off. And soon Louis became aware of the growing light, realized he could see nearly to the Galilee’s bow and could make out the rolling water over the side.

  Merulf called forward to his sailors. “Cast off the starboard gaskets and we’ll hoist the yard cockbilled, about halfway to the masthead.” The words were meaningless to Louis, but apparently not to the ship’s men, who moved to comply. They did not move fast, or with any great enthusiasm, no more pleased about any of this than Merulf was. But they did move.

  Some of the men took a heavy rope down from a cleat and laid it out straight, others reached up and untied a thinner line that was lashed around the yard. A few moments later they grabbed onto the heavy rope and pulled and the yard rose up the mast, then rose again as they continued to haul. When it was partway up they dipped the larboard end down and around the shrouds, then let it go when it was square to the ship’s centerline. Another line was hauled on, and rather than setting neatly horizontal, the yard was now tilted at an odd angle, and half the sail was hanging limp and flapping in the light breeze. It looked as if some great misfortune had taken place.

  Perfect, Louis thought.

  It was lighter now, the sky to the east growing gray, the men pulling at the oars entirely visible from the afterdeck. “Merulf,” Louis said. “We must distribute the weapons and I must have a chance to drill the men in what we’ll be doing. I don’t need long, but if we’re to avoid being slaughtered I’ll need some time for this. Now, before we’re visible to any heathens who may be lurking.”

  Merulf grunted, which Louis realized was most of the man’s communications. But it seemed an affirmative grunt, so Louis walked the length of the ship to the foredeck and addressed Brunhard’s men who were loitering there, the sailors and archers and the few others more skilled in weapons.

  “I need you men to hand out the spears,” he said. “Set them on the bottom of the ship, one by each of the men at the oars.” As they shuffled to obey, Louis walked back aft, addressing the rowers in Irish. “The sailors will be putting spears next to you. Don’t take your hands off the oars. Make a move for a spear before I tell you and you’ll be cut down where you sit.”

  The men at the oars looked up at him, never pausing in their rhythmic stroke, their faces without expression, but Louis was confident that they understood.

  Merulf’s men seemed less confident in the slaves’ good behavior. Louis could see the caution and wariness with which they handed out the spears, while the archers stood with arrows nocked ready to drop any Irishman who made a move for a weapon. But the Irish understood how futile such a gesture would be, and they kept their hands on the oars as the spears were placed out of sight beside them.

  Louis switched back to his rough Frisian and addressed Brunhard’s men once more. “You men know what we intend. One of the heathens is still chasing us, and we mean to turn things around and capture him instead. He’ll see a helpless-looking merchant ship and he’ll attack. When he comes alongside, he’ll see a small crew and a gang of slaves chained at the oars. The timing is the crucial thing. I’ve fought many fights like this, and I’m still alive, so if you want to stay alive as well, listen to me. We must let the heathens get aboard; we must not let them think we have any fight in us. Let them drop their guard and then we attack.”

  Brunhard’s men and Merulf’s did not seem any more enthusiastic, but they gave desultory nods so Louis knew at least they had been listening. Now he could only hope they would obey as well. He turned to Merulf. “Could you tell the slaves to stop rowing?” he asked.

  Merulf give a harsh order and the men at the oars brought the blades up from the sea and rested their arms on the looms, holding the oars above th
e water. Louis ran his eyes along the lines of men on the thwarts. Galilee had ten rowing benches per side. To accommodate forty men they had double-manned each oar and the small merchantman looked crammed with rowers. Louis hoped that would not make the Northmen suspicious. He had no idea how odd it might look to them. But Brunhard and Merulf knew of such things and they had said nothing, so he guessed it would be all right.

  He told the rowers pretty much what he had told Brunhard’s men. They had to wait for the precise moment, the moment on which Louis would decide, and then they were to snatch up their spears and drive them into the heathens.

  “Only throw your spear if you have no other means of killing one of them,” Louis said. “When you throw your spear you disarm yourself. Use them to impale the bastards.”

  From the starboard side a man spoke up, his voice belligerent. “How can we fight if we’re in chains?” he demanded. One of Merulf’s sailors took two steps toward him, rope end raised, but Louis called for the man to stop.

  “It will be no easy thing, fighting with the chains on, I know that,” Louis said. “But you know why Brunhard insists they remain. You must do the best you can, or the heathens will cut you down like dogs.”

  This was met with a muttered response, which Louis ignored. “Now, when I shout ‘weapons,’” he continued, “that is when you snatch up your spears, rise and fight. We’ll drill with that move now.”

  For some time after, as the sun came closer to the horizon, they ran through the steps they would take to spring their trap on the heathens. The Irishmen at the oars took up the stroke until Louis called for them to cease rowing. He explained that the heathens would then come alongside, and the men on Galilee would wait for them to come. He told them how the heathens would jump aboard, unsure of what was happening, wondering if the men of Galilee would fight back.

  “Weapons!” Louis shouted, and at that signal the Irish whipped the spears out from under the benches, leapt to their feet and thrust at the imaginary enemy. It was awkward at first, but they tried it again and again and the movement became faster, more fluid, as the slaves became accustomed to the action and learned how to work together so their chains did not inhibit them.

  The sun had broken free of the horizon, the sky clear once again, by the time Louis was as satisfied as he was likely to be. In truth, he could have spent an entire day drilling the men and still not have been completely satisfied, but this would have to do. And he could see that Conandil had chosen well; the Irish slaves were indeed warriors, men used to handling weapons. They were men who could be trusted to fight to the death, even as the heathens came screaming over the rails.

  He turned to Merulf who was standing behind him and off to one side. “I think they’re ready,” he said. “Ready as they are going to get.”

  “Well, that’s a damned good thing to hear,” Merulf said in his grunting tone. “‘Cause that heathen son of a bitch is not more than a couple miles astern and he’s running right up our arse.”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  There we felled three

  skillful helmet-trees

  of rare renown.

  The Saga of the People of Laxardal

  Louis stepped to Galilee’s side, looked astern. Sure enough, about two miles behind them he could make out the grayish white rectangle of a sail, set to the light offshore breeze. It might have been the heathen or it might have been the Holy Ghost for all Louis could tell, but if Merulf said it was the heathen, then he was most likely right.

  He watched the distant ship for some time. Behind him, he heard Merulf step forward and call out the order to row, the Irish words barely discernable through his Frisian accent. And then came the creak of the oars in the oarports, the steady swish of the blades through the water. Merulf called for them to pull easy. They were not trying to escape, only to look like they were.

  Louis turned back to Merulf and nodded past the bow. “Do you see anything of Brunhard and his other ships?” he asked.

  “No,” Merulf said, giving full vent to his irritation and resentment. “Just us. Just us and this murdering bastard in our wake.”

  “But only one murdering bastard?” Louis asked. “You see only the one heathen ship astern?”

  “Yes, just the one,” Merulf said bitterly. “That’s how we know God’s blessing is upon us.”

  Louis ignored the master’s sarcasm. “The men must not be thirsty for this fight,” he said. “They’ve been drilling for some time. Can I have my slave give them water now?”

  Merulf considered that and apparently could find no objection, so he nodded and looked away. Louis called Conandil to him. “See each of the men get a dipper-full of water. Understand?”

  Conandil nodded and gave a shallow curtsey and headed off forward to where the water barrel and dipper stood. Soon she was moving back and forth between the barrel and the seated, rowing men, tipping water into their mouths as they rowed, whispering a few words with each drink given.

  Louis’s eyes moved from Merulf to Brunhard’s other men, but none of them seemed to be paying any attention to the Irish slave girl. And that was good. Because the words she was saying sotto voce to the slaves were most certainly not for the Frisians’ ears.

  He ran his eyes up the Galilee’s mast. The sail hanging limp and crooked gave a credible impression of a ship in distress, or so he thought. He looked astern once again. The longship seemed closer now, but he could not be certain.

  “When the heathen has drawn nearer,” Louis said to Merulf, “we should see that the rowers do a poorer job of their task. Row a little clumsier. That will make us look even more unprepared.”

  Merulf gave a grunt of a laugh and spat over this side. “I don’t know how these sorry creatures could look any clumsier, but I’ll see what I can do.”

  The sun rose and the ships crawled on over the gently rolling sea and it dawned on Louis that this was not going to end quickly, that this chase might go on for some time. After the morning drilling with weapons, the excitement of seeing the enemy in their wake, Louis had been ready for the fight to commence, and had lost sight of something he had come to understand: sometimes things happened very slowly at sea.

  Louis de Roumois had been a horse soldier, head of a troop of mounted warriors. They had used their speed to counter incursions by the Northmen in the River Seine that ran through Frankia to the sea. He was used to plunging into battle in an instant, to seeing a threat and moving to counter it at the speed of a running horse. He was not accustomed to such things as wind and tide and current imposing their will on his movements and it drove him to distraction.

  He sat and drew his sword and pulled a stone from the pouch he wore on his belt and began to run it along the blade. The men at the oars continued their slow pull. The breeze off the land died away and a stronger breeze filled in from the sea, but Galilee’s sail only flapped like a broken wing and looked more pathetic still.

  Merulf stepped over to where Louis was seated. He had been looking astern, Louis noticed, but Louis made a point of not asking him about the heathen ship. But he knew Merulf would tell him anyway.

  “The Northmen, they’re making use of this sea breeze, moving right along,” he said. “They’ll be up with us soon enough.” Much of the bitterness was gone from his voice, and in its place was something that sounded more like concern. Fear, maybe.

  Louis stood and sheathed his sword. “Let me take a look,” he said. He stepped aft, leaned on the shear strake and looked astern. The longship was indeed closer, a bit more than a half a mile away, heeling in the breeze, the white foam around its bow visible even from that distance. Louis felt a stirring of passion, like that moment when a woman he hoped to bed begins to remove clothing. Here was some real excitement in the offing. He was ready. To fight, to win, to die, whatever it was, he was ready.

  “Good,” he said, straightening. “Good. Let’s get on with this and spill some heathen blood.” Merulf nodded and Louis sensed the shift in power aboard the ship. When they h
ad been sailing, Merulf was the master; it was his ship entirely. Louis was nothing, not even a mariner.

  But it was different now. Soon, very soon, this would not be a ship. It would be a battleground, a killing field. It would be Louis’s world. Not Merulf’s. It would be a world that Merulf did not know and apparently did not care for. And already Louis could see that the Frisian master was yielding to him.

  Good, Louis thought.

  “Everything should be ready, but I’ll see again,” Louis said. He stepped forward, past the cluster of sailors and bowmen aft, down the center of the ship between the double-banked oars, the men pulling with an easy stroke. The Irishmen kept their eyes down, as they had learned to do, but Louis could see something new on their faces. A hint of defiance, an eagerness for the coming fight.

  His eyes moved to the deck and the spears resting there. They were not easy to see, the wooden shafts against the wooden deck, and Louis was counting on the heathens not spotting them until it was too late.

  He continued toward the bow, eyes moving larboard and starboard, looking at the men and the weapons. Forward of the rowing benches there was another cluster of sailors keeping watchful eyes on the slaves. Conandil was there too, sitting off to the side, trying to look as inconspicuous as possible.

  “The slaves have had water and what they need?” he asked her, his voice harsh, a master addressing a slave.

  “Yes, master,” Conandil said. Louis still did not know if any of the sailors spoke Irish at all, but he made certain that if they did his words would cause no alarm.

  He turned quickly and strode aft again, and once more looked astern. The enemy was a quarter of a mile astern and closing the distance fast, the sail full, if not straining.

  Louis turned to Merulf. “I want the rowers to row faster, but do a bad job of it. Will you give me leave to instruct them?”

  Merulf nodded. Louis stepped forward. “The heathens are coming up fast,” he said in a voice that could be heard all the way to the bow. “We must look as if we are panicked. I’ll need you to row faster, but foul your oars on occasion, seem as if you have no skills. We do not want the enemy to think there’s any fight in us. Go!”