“Kevin says the men who were captured, the ones Ottar killed, they were fuidir, farmers called up for the service they owe their lord,” Eoin said. “They are not regular men-at-arms, not real soldiers. My lord does not think it will be any great problem to brush them aside.”
Thorgrim nodded. Some may have been fuidir, but not all. The men he had fought were trained soldiers, and they were well led. But he was done with talk. “Very well, then,” he said. “Let us move on to Glendalough.”
This, apparently, was Ottar’s opinion as well. Thorgrim stood and looked up the shoreline toward Ottar’s camp and he saw the men there were already loading their gear back aboard their ships. Shields were mounted on the vessels’ shield racks and the banners that had earlier been waving at the ends of their long staffs were gone, rolled up and stowed away.
“Ottar is eager to get away from us,” Thorgrim said to his men, ignoring Kevin and the other Irishmen. “And I am eager to see he does not. Let us get back to our ships. I am already heartily sick of the land.”
Kevin mac Lugaed watched the last of the longships slip off the shore and turn in the stream, its oars like the wings of a swan. He felt varied and contradictory emotions swirling around him.
He loathed those ships, of course, despised the very sight of them, as did most Irishmen. At the same time, he could not help but marvel at their beauty and wonder at the mystery of them. He had a passing knowledge of boats, but the workings of a ship like that, the skills needed to cross an ocean in such a thing, were beyond his comprehension. He envied the Northmen and the mobility that their ships gave them. And he hated them for that and for a hundred other reasons.
“My lord,” said Niall mac Olchobar, standing at Kevin’s right hand. Niall was Kevin’s most trusted advisor, chiefly because he had been loyal to Kevin even when Kevin had been merely one of the Lords of Superior Testimony, and not ruler of all that part of Ireland called Cill Mhantáin.
For Kevin, it had been a bloody road that led him to where he was. He had seen quite a bit of ugly battle, as had any in his position, and he had developed his own personal fighting strategies. They mostly involved always appearing to be in the thick of the fight while actually remaining out of harm’s way.
If a leader was wounded, Kevin was the one who would selflessly carry him to safety. If a shield wall was forming up, Kevin remained behind it, ready to strike down any coward who ran, or step in wherever a man fell, though for all his shouting and brandishing weapons he never seemed to find the opportunity. Such little tricks he found did a great deal for both his reputation and his longevity.
So it had been at the great battle at Vík-ló. He watched as Lorcan mac Fáeláin, his former lord, former rí túaithe of Cill Mhantáin, was cut down in the fighting. He had watched Lorcan’s chief men, Senchan mac Ronan and Faelan, killed in earlier fights. He had witnessed many others killed as well. Indeed, so many had been killed in those days that when it was over Kevin found to his surprise that he was the most powerful man left standing in Cill Mhantáin.
Kevin mac Lugaed had a nose for opportunity, and following the fighting at Vík-ló the scent was strong indeed. He gathered up a handful of warriors and paid them silver from the various purses he had plundered in the aftermath of the fighting. With those men he spent the next few weeks consolidating power.
The task of establishing his authority was easy enough. The Northmen had killed just about anyone who might object to his doing so, and anyone still alive was quickly cowed by the sight of his growing and well-paid army. By the time Kevin settled himself in Lorcan’s former hall in the ringfort at Ráth Naoi, he was the rí túaithe, and there was no one left to challenge him.
“Yes, Niall?” Kevin asked. He was watching the Northmen’s ships as they pulled up river, a line of them moving against the stream. He had been right about the height of the water. Their ships would float for another six or seven miles before the river became too shallow for them to continue. And quite a lot could happen in six or seven miles.
“Lord, shall I get the men moving? Shall we prepare for our march?”
Kevin pulled himself from his reverie with a shake of his head. The morning might have been ugly indeed if he had not succeeded in keeping Ottar and Thorgrim apart, telling each what he wanted to hear about the other.
Thorgrim had always been reasonable, surprisingly reasonable for a heathen. Kevin had actually been able to do business with the man, to the benefit of them both. But Ottar was not like that. Ottar was completely insane in the most dangerous way.
Kevin had not quite appreciated the depth of his madness when he had first approached the man in his longphort south of the river mouth. Or perhaps he had appreciated it, and had ignored it, in hopes of making a profitable partnership. He had ignored the corpses of the men – traitors, Ottar had said – tied to stakes outside Ottar’s hall. He had ignored the bloody bruises of Ottar’s Irish slaves, the squalor in which Ottar and his followers lived.
But he could ignore the signs no longer. Even before Ottar had joined them at the Meeting of the Waters, Kevin received word of what he had done at the village at the river’s mouth. And he saw what Ottar had done to those unfortunates taken prisoner after the fighting. He should never have asked Ottar to join in the raid, he understood that now. The best he could do now was to make Ottar Thorgrim’s problem, not his.
“Yes, yes, Niall,” Kevin said, frowning at his own distraction. “Let’s get the men ready to march. I would like to move in an hour’s time.”
“A full hour, lord?” Niall looked surprised. “The ships will be way ahead of us by then, they’ll be lost to sight.” Niall had been with Kevin in his discussions with Ottar and Thorgrim. He understood the plan. The Northmen would advance up the river in their ships, the Irish would keep the river banks clear of any resistance. And after the surprise attack of the night before, no one doubted there would be resistance.
“Yes, the ships will be lost to sight,” Kevin agreed. “And so the heathens will not see us marching off to the north.”
“The north, lord?” Niall’s confusion was mounting.
“Yes, the north. Our plans have changed. There’s a way through these mountains to the north. We’ll take our men that way, make a wide circle around whoever these men are who attacked us. Come at Glendalough from the east.”
Niall hesitated but Kevin’s expression did not encourage comment. “Very well, lord, I’ll see the men ready to march in an hour’s time.” He turned and headed off, leaving Kevin alone on the river bank.
Once Niall had left him, Kevin allowed a hint of a smile to play across his lips. He was pleased. He knew that he could not control events as if he was ordering slaves here and there. Only a fool or one consumed by hubris could think otherwise. A man was lucky if he could control what he himself did; there was no certain way to make others do as you wished. Once you involved just one other person in your plans then control was lost, and Kevin’s plans involved hundreds.
No, he could not control things. He could just put the pieces in place, arrange them as best he could, see what happened, and then take his advantage from that. And so far things were working out better than he could ever have hoped.
Thorgrim and Ottar would never join forces, so they would never be a threat to him. It was far more likely they would kill one another. At the same time, whoever these bastards were who had attacked their camp – and Kevin had to guess it was men-at-arms from Glendalough – they would be far too occupied with the heathens to even noticed Kevin’s army taking a long march around to the north and west.
Thorgrim, Ottar, these whores’ sons from Glendalough, they could all kill one another here on the shores of the River Avonmore and leave Kevin mac Lugaed in peace to sack the monastic city. The hint of a smile blossomed into a genuine grin.
Chapter Twenty-Five
To the heedful comes seldom harm,
for none can find a more faithful friend
than the wealth of mother wit.
Hávamál
Colman mac Breandan sat at the table in his pavilion. The man standing on the other side of the table had finished his tale and now stood waiting for some response. He did not fidget. He was not the sort to fidget.
It was quiet as Colman thought about what the man had just said. He could hear the sounds of other men outside, quite a few men now; the men-at-arms and the bóaire and fuidir come back from the Meeting of the Waters, and the men-at-arms sent by Ruarc mac Brain whom Father Finnian had just that morning led into the dúnad. Not the two hundred Finnian had hoped for, but nearly that number, and good men, too. Good, well-trained and experienced fighting men.
Slaughtering the heathens would present little problem with such an army as that assembled. Or so Colman had thought when they had first marched into camp. Now he was not so certain.
For the past twenty minutes Colman had been listening to the tale of the fighting at the Meeting of Waters and what had come after. It made him angry at times, and also relieved, and curious as well. So much going on in so short a time.
“Nine longships, you said?” Colman asked at last.
“Yes, lord,” Aileran said.
Aileran was the only other soul in the pavilion. Failend had been sent away with Colman’s assurance he would deal with her at the proper time. Louis de Roumois had not even made an appearance. He was apparently conferring with Father Finnian rather than begging an audience with his proper superior, and that annoyed Coleman. He had expected Louis to show up eager to tell his tale, at which point Coleman would have sent him on his way like the miscreant boy he was. But Louis’s absence had denied Colman that little pleasure.
“Nine longships…” Colman muttered to himself as he worked out numbers. “Could be as many as four hundred of the sons of whores.”
“Yes, lord,” Aileran said.
“And the men with that traitorous bastard Kevin? At least a hundred?”
“Yes, lord.”
“We are outnumbered,” Colman said. It was an observation. There was no panic in his voice or in his heart. But there was concern. If the heathens were to overrun Glendalough he could lose a great deal. Not everything - he had land and holdings and interests spread all over that part of Ireland - but he could lose what he had in the monastic city. And he could lose his sinecure as commander of Glendalough’s defenses and the generous income that went with it. He could lose reputation.
“We are outnumbered, lord,” Aileran agreed, and he sounded even less concerned than Colman. “But the heathens seem determined to stick to the river and that will make it hard for them to attack. I don’t think this Kevin mac Lugaed is much of a threat. At Meeting of the Waters we were up against his men, mostly. They did not fight to any great effect. And Louis de Roumois, he’s a man who knows his business.”
Colman looked up sharp and Aileran made a throat-clearing sound. “Beg pardon, lord. I was just saying…”
“Yes, yes,” Colman said, waving his hand as if driving away some annoying insect. Aileran, like all the men in the dúnad, indeed like all of Glendalough was aware of the tension between Colman mac Breandan and the young Frank Louis de Roumois. Most imagined it was due to Louis’ being asked to take direct command of the troops. Others guessed at more intimate reasons.
It was clear to Colman that Aileran was trying to downplay Louis’s part in the fighting at Meeting of the Waters, his clever planning, his inspired use of untrained men. But Colman could hear the unspoken praise in his telling of the story.
“With the heathens so numerous here,” Colman continued, “I’m wondering if we shouldn’t go back to Glendalough, make our defenses there.”
Aileran, despite his apparent new-found respect for Louis de Roumois, was still Colman’s man, the most experienced soldier in Colman’s ad hoc army. And Colman was still in command of the defenses of Glendalough, whatever the priest Finnian might think. Before the arrival of Louis de Roumois, Colman had looked to Aileran for support, and he would continue to look to him when the Frank was gone. Which would hopefully be soon.
“Well, lord, I think there’s a better way than giving them the ground betwixt here and Glendalough,” Aileran said, his words coming slow and thoughtfully. “The heathens, like I said, are keeping to the water, taking their ships upriver as far as they are able, which will be damned far in this flooding. That might give us a better chance.”
Colman looked at Aileran and frowned. The words were coming from the man’s mouth, but Colman was pretty sure they had originated in Louis de Roumois’s head. But what of it? If the Frankish son of a bitch was indeed a good soldier, then Colman could use that to his advantage. Let Louis lead the men to victory. Any such victory, and the reputation and spoils that came with it, were easily enough usurped when all was done.
“Very well, then, we’ll do it your way,” Colman said. “Now, this assassin, the one who came for the Frankish whore’s son?”
“Yes, lord. It was like I told you,” Aileran replied.
“Tell me again.”
“Well, Captain Louis, he was sleeping off by himself, away from the men…” Aileran said, and Colman thought, You are a miserably bad liar, but he let it go.
“And this son of a bitch,” Aileran continued, “comes from I don’t know where. I heard them fighting and run over.”
“You’re sure it was the same man? The same Frankish bastard who showed up here a fortnight past?”
“Yes, lord,” Aileran said. “I’m sure of it. I had a good look at him at first light. After he was dead, lord.”
Son of a bitch, these lying dogs! Colman thought. He could picture the new-minted Frankish coins he had hidden in his home in Glendalough, the few he carried with him in his purse. Given to him as down payment for a job that needed doing, but then this whore’s son apparently decided to do the job himself. Or maybe he had been instructed to do it, to save the cost of paying Colman the balance of the fee when the job was done.
If this bastard was going to do it himself, why involve me at all? Colman wondered, but the answer was obvious enough to a man such as him, one used to manipulating others. If the killer failed they would have Colman as a back-up. If he was caught then Colman would have to help him or risk being implicated.
Damned Frankish curs, never to be trusted, Colman thought. He looked up at Aileran again.
“Brother Louis did not have the chance to speak with him?”
“No, lord. They were still going at it, hammer and tongs, when I cut the whore’s son down. He never spoke a word that I could hear.”
“Good,” Colman said. “Good.” He looked down at the table once again and turned the various considerations over in his mind. Was that bastard the only one, or were their others? Did it matter? He had been paid for a service, at least in part, and in truth it was a service he would have been happy to perform for free.
“Very well, Captain,” Colman said, looking up at Aileran again. “You did good work and I thank you.” He picked up the purse that was lying on the table, heard the Frankish silver clinking inside the soft leather bag. “Now, there is more I need of you.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Good is health if one can but keep it,
and to live a life without shame.
Hávamál
The river was growing shallow, but Thorgrim did not notice. He was tending to Starri, still wrapped in his fur nest in Sea Hammer’s stern.
They had stitched Starri’s wounds closed that morning, working on him while the men at the oars pulled the longship upstream against the current and Agnarr manned the steering board. Harald had offered to do the sewing, thinking himself skilled at that task, but Thorgrim had enough ugly scars on his body, made uglier by Harald’s handiwork with needle and thread, that he said he would do it himself.
He worked slowly, drawing the flesh together as best he could. Sometimes Starri flinched when the needle pierced his skin, sometimes he did not. When the wound on his chest was done they rolled him on his side and Thorg
rim stitched up his back, and then they laid him flat again. Thorgrim mixed broth with ale and made Starri drink. Starri opened his eyes and looked up at him. There was confusion there, and a faraway look.
“Night Wolf,” he said, the words barely a whisper. He said no more, but Thorgrim knew it was a question and he knew the answer Starri was seeking.
“You were wounded, Starri. But you are still among the living.”
Starri closed his eyes and nodded his head, just a bit, and then drifted off to sleep again.
“You did that well, father,” Harald said. He and Thorgrim were looking down at Starri’s seemingly shrunken form. “The stitching. But aren’t there herbs or poultices we could apply?”
Thorgrim shook his head. “I don’t know how those are made,” he said. “Those are the arts that women know. Me, the others here, we can stitch wounds and splint broken limbs. But real healing? That’s women’s knowledge.”
He looked up beyond the confines of the ship, larboard and starboard. The river was still wide here, four or five rods from bank to bank, and Thorgrim could see it was running above its normal confines, the water lapping over grassy fields rather than the pebbly or muddy banks that would normally form the river’s edge.
The reeds jutting up from the river bed were bending slightly under the pressure of the moving stream and his men leaned into the oars as they pulled against it. With the water high and the river wide, the current was not so bad here, but he wondered how long they would be able to stem it, and how long it would remain deep enough for their keels to pass over the bottom.
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