‘Everything?’ I asked.
‘Oh, of course, Norsemen bathe fully clothed,’ she mocked, ‘in case the water is cold.’
‘Norsemen don’t bathe at all,’ I said, which was not true. We washed our faces and combed our hair in the mornings and liked to clean our hands before eating. We bathed too, when young English girls were not standing there with their eyes set like a pair of scales to weigh the goods. Cynethryth’s eyes rolled.
‘Don’t rush me, woman,’ I said. Under those eyes my fingers fumbled awkwardly and might as well have belonged to someone else for all the control I had over them. ‘Now look the other way,’ I said.
‘I will if you will,’ she replied, one eyebrow arching mischievously, and suddenly my breath snagged in my chest like a fish in a withy trap.
Because Cynethryth was getting undressed.
CHAPTER FOUR
I PRETENDED NOT TO HEAR THE WHISTLES AND WHOOPS AS I LEFT my clothes and brynja in a crumpled heap on the sand and walked naked as a bairn to the water’s edge. I knew the whistles were not aimed at me, for Cynethryth was naked too, or near enough. The short linen under the kirtle she wore lost its colour when touched by water, revealing the dark patch of hair at her groin. Her nipples were sharpened points pushing against the linen and I dared one last lingering look before ditching into the water. I came up quickly, shaking my long hair like a hound and blowing snot from my nose.
‘It’s colder than it looks,’ I said. Cynethryth swam easily, rolling on to her back and floating as I had seen the seals do in play.
‘When I was a girl my father told me that the Romans built great stone pools and filled them with water that always stayed hot. They bathed in hot water every day. Can you imagine that?’
‘How did they keep the water hot?’ I asked sceptically.
‘They built chambers beneath the pools and lit fires and the hot air from the fires travelled through these chambers, heating the water above.’ For a moment I thought Cynethryth was teasing me, but the tight line of her lips told me she was not.
‘Then it’s no wonder the Romans lost their empire and that their city was burnt to ash,’ I said, ‘if they were too busy washing their skins to save them.’ I imagined crowds of men lazing in huge stone baths in some hot land, scrubbing each other’s backs whilst wild-eyed warriors pillaged and burnt their homes and raped their women. ‘Fools,’ I muttered, scooping a handful of sand from the seabed to scrub beneath my arms. ‘Warm water makes a man soft,’ I said with a shiver, then dived under again. When I surfaced and looked round all I could see of Cynethryth were her feet sploshing and churning the sea in her wake. I called out but she could not hear me above the surf and the seals’ keening and her own splashing, so I kicked my legs and clawed the water and followed her.
When we stopped I was exhausted. I had not known that swimming could leak a man’s strength like a cut vein, and whilst I had lost my respect for the Romans, my admiration for fish had grown. We were not very far out, but we had swum past Serpent, raising jeers from Bjorn and Bjarni, back on board, and around a small outcrop where the water sucked and plunged. Just beyond it a small, sheltered cove looked a good place to catch our breath.
‘You . . . should . . . rest,’ I managed to call, timing the words so that I only swallowed half the ocean’s water and not enough to sink myself, for I was always a poor swimmer. I was relieved to see Cynethryth already swimming for the cove with long, lithesome strokes. I confess I quickened my own flailing, hoping to catch another glimpse of that secret hoard hidden beneath her kirtle. Then I remembered my own nakedness.
She sat on the sand hugging her knees and shaking her hair free as I reached the beach, which was less than a spear’s throw from end to end. I lay in the surf with my face turned towards the dawn sun, feigning contentment when in truth I was too embarrassed to stand up. The sand beneath my hand shuddered suddenly and I flinched, catching sight of a flat fish as it darted away in a cloudy swirl. White gulls tumbled and shrieked in the pale blue above, reminding us that we were intruders in this quiet cove.
‘Even you must be clean by now,’ Cynethryth called.
‘You were right,’ I shouted over my shoulder. ‘Some of this dirt has been with me a long time. It’s as stubborn as Bram Bear.’ I began to scrub, startled a moment later by hands on my shoulders. I looked up into Cynethryth’s eyes, swallowing hard, then took the hand she offered and stood to face her. Neither of us spoke. The gulls called and the waves supped at the shore. Then she led me to a patch of grass and sea aster on whose fleshy leaves and flowers a hundred black and orange butterflies rested. They muddled into the air like wind-whipped blossom. Cynethryth’s eyes, emerald green, endless and unbound in the first blush of the day, roved across my body like a dragon ship on the whale road. Her fingers brushed my cheek and beard as though her skin and mine had never touched and I trembled. We closed our eyes then, letting other senses rise, and my soul began to drift like a boat cut free of its mooring. Then Cynethryth’s fingers wrapped the crown of my head and I leant towards her and our mouths touched. A shiver licked my spine and I realized my excitement was blatant, but there was nothing I could do about it now. Her lips parted and our tongues touched and I tasted her and some deep part of me cursed because it knew that sweet taste had Gleipnir-bound me to this woman.
I felt ridiculous standing there with my stiffness pointing at Cynethryth’s belly and so I pushed her down to the sand and she did not complain but lifted off her kirtle, exposing her small breasts. Her nipples were dark and hard-looking as acorns. Then she lay back and I entered her and because she was wet it was easy and she gasped, pushing her hips up hungrily. My hunger ruled me then. Cynethryth scarcely made a sound other than her breath, which was hot against my neck as I pushed deeper into her, our tongues ravenous. I knew I would be embarrassed afterwards, but I did not care. My heart hammered and every sinew strained to entwine with Cynethryth. With a shout of pleasure twisted with pain I shot inside her, my body quivering wildly, and she cried out, throwing back her head, and I bit her white throat.
Afterwards, I rolled over on to the sand and Cynethryth lay on her side, running her hand across my chest through the sweat that had churned white with salt. I stared up at the sky, grinning like a witless fool, aware once more of the gulls and the bees and the seals in the next bay. I assumed Cynethryth was as content as I was to lie in the wash of that new dawn, but eventually I turned to look at her and saw a tear dart into her hair.
‘What is it?’ I asked, suddenly afraid that I had done something wrong. Had she not pulled me into her? My memory conjured the face of a Welsh girl amongst the ruins of Caer Dyffryn, and my stomach twisted painfully. ‘What’s wrong, Cynethryth? Did I mistake you?’ Hot blood flooded my cheeks.
She sat up and reached for her kirtle, slipping it over her head as she stood. I stood too, feeling as coarse as a beast and yet vulnerable with my manhood still heavy and my clothes back in the next bay. I held her shoulders and asked again what was the matter. She chewed her bottom lip and looked about to speak, but then her eyes widened, the black holes in them swelling wildly at something over my shoulder.
‘What . . . ?’ I turned towards the sea and my chest thundered like two shieldwalls crashing together. Fjord-Elk had come.
CHAPTER FIVE
for several heartbeats we stood silent, watching the dragon ship plough the smooth sea, a good arrow shot from the shore. Though you could hardly call it a dragon ship now. The snarling figurehead was gone and in its place sat a cross, showing that those aboard were in thrall to the White Christ. Her graceful clinkered hull creamed the ocean effortlessly. The long spruce oars dipped raggedly by Norseman standards but well enough in this sleeping sea to bring her on. My fists were knots, my teeth clenched against the rising fury of hard memories. When I had last seen that ship I had been trussed like a boar by Ealdred’s men on the Wessex shore, and as Fjord-Elk sailed away Ealdred’s champion Mauger had signalled to my captors to slit my throat. Tho
se feckless goat suckers would have killed Cynethryth too for standing by me.
‘Meinfretr,’ I muttered. That rocky outcrop which separated us from the others might also prevent them seeing Fjord-Elk in time to spring the trap. There was the chance that when she did come into view the Norsemen would not recognize her, because her sail was not up and there was a cross at her prow. For a moment I agonized. I’ve always swum like a stone. It would take me too long to claw my way back round to the beach. But I had no boots either and so running over the jagged prominence would not be easy.
‘Can you swim back, Cynethryth?’ I asked. She blinked slowly, spilling a tear which settled on her lip, shivering. She nodded and I cursed the luck that had brought Fjord-Elk now when all I wanted was standing before me. I searched Cynethryth’s face for one lingering moment, then turned and ran to the rocks and began to climb. The lower rocks, which were submerged at high tide, were treacherous with slick brown leaves and I fell more than once, cutting my knees and hands. I ran and jumped and scrambled over skin-tearing barnacles and crunching mussels. I splashed through sun-warmed pools where things that looked like blood clots lurked, and I must have looked like a wild animal, naked, my dark hair and its raven’s wing trailing. And as I ran I felt the grin spread on my face and that grin became a snarl, a wolf’s snarl, because the worm Ealdred had come and we would be unleashed to the kill. I jumped the last cleft, landing heavily on a smooth rock, then leapt down to the sand to see the Norsemen in a great, seething knot. They were fully armed with shields and mail and standing before Sigurd who, with his shining helmet and huge spear, could have been mighty Týr himself.
The men turned to me and more than a few of them laughed at my nakedness, but Sigurd did not laugh. ‘You look like a mountain troll, Raven,’ he growled, his top lip hitched, baring his white teeth.
‘I came as fast as I could, lord,’ I panted, wincing because my feet felt as though they were on fire. I glanced down to see that they were torn and bloody. Then Floki’s cousin Halldor winked at me and I instinctively glanced back at the rocks and saw a narrow high-up ledge from which Halldor must have spied Fjord-Elk in time to warn the others. I grimaced because from there there was every chance he would have had a good view of the cove, too.
‘Now we repay the ormstunga!’ Sigurd bawled, and I thought calling Ealdred a serpent tongue was an insult to snakes, as the knot of men broke apart and I ran down to the shoreline where my clothes lay a spear’s length from being stolen by the rising tide. But the water would be too deep to wade out to Serpent. In mail and helmets we would sink like rocks. Then the Norse-men were running past me, crashing into the surf.
‘Here, lad,’ Penda said, handing me my shield and helmet, which I had left further up the beach. ‘I’d wager you don’t want to miss this.’
‘That wager would not make you rich,’ I said, hopping as I pulled on my breeks. Penda bent and picked up my brynja and I wriggled into it like an eel. I glanced across to see that Sigurd had thrown one end of a shorter rope over one of Serpent’s mooring ropes and yanked it down, enabling his men to pull themselves along it without fear of drowning. Out they went, hungry for blood, and I could see Bjorn and Bjarni standing at Serpent’s bow yawping for them to move faster. Father Egfrith stood a few feet away in the surf, hurling prayers to the White Christ between imploring Sigurd to resist his bloodlust and seek peace terms.
‘But for the love of God get the book, Sigurd! You must get the book!’ the monk shrieked, his eyes wide and a strange look on his weasel face that could have been terror or elation.
Svein the Red stopped at the waterline and turned to me, a savage grin breaking his huge red beard. ‘Hurry, Raven,’ he said, then turned and lumbered splashing into the sea.
‘So what happened?’ Penda said, looking me in the eye and scratching the scar on his face. He was mailed and battle-ready and I could not believe he was asking me such a thing at such a time. ‘Did you plough the girl?’
I looked out past the breakers but could not yet see Cynethryth this side of the rocky outcrop. Penda and I were the last. Even old Asgot was halfway along Serpent’s mooring rope, moving as quickly as any of the younger men.
‘Time to go, Penda,’ I said. He batted a hand at me and plunged into the sea and in a heartbeat I was behind him, half wading, half hauling myself along. Sigurd’s Wolfpack readied Serpent, fixing the beast Jörmungand at her prow and shields along her sheer strake, and slotting the spruce oars through their ports.
‘A screw and a fight all in one day!’ Bjarni called, hauling me up and over the sheer strake with the use of a short boarding rope. ‘Sounds like Valhöll, hey, Raven.’
‘I missed breakfast,’ I gnarled, making him laugh, then took to my row bench, the chest in which I kept all I owned, and gripped my oar, which Svein had readied for me. I turned to look for Cynethryth but could not see her as Olaf gave one sharp ‘Hey!’ for us to pull the first stroke.
Then we rowed. We knew we were counting on surprise and surprise meant silence. So we watched Olaf, who had set himself at Serpent’s stern, plunging his fist over and over rather than calling out the time. Knut moved the tiller, turning the ship so that we hugged the coast and would emerge from the bay at the last possible moment, like a hawk out of the sun.
It always feels good to row. We would complain eventually of course, but for the first hour or two, when your strength is up and the rhythm is set, rowing is a joy, at least for me. Two oars may look the same to a man’s eyes, but they are not the same. You come to know your own oar as you know your own arms and legs. By touch alone your calloused hands know your oar from a hundred others, just as they would know your lover’s tits or arse. There is always comfort in familiarity.
Sigurd and Black Floki readied the grappling hooks and gathered together thirty or more spears, which we had taken from our enemies in the last weeks. I had never fought in a sea battle before, but I knew what would happen. We would throw spears and hand-axes into Fjord-Elk to clear her deck, then hurl the grappling hooks and heave on the ropes so that the hooks would bite into her sheer strake and the ships would crash together, making a floating fighting platform. A cautious jarl might continue to hurl missiles, spears, even stones, until the issue was settled. Not Sigurd. I watched him as the battle-trembling began in my legs and snaked upwards. The jarl’s face was hard as stone, his eyes black as storm clouds below the helmet’s rim. His left hand rested on his sword’s pommel and his right gripped two great spears. If you’d told me that Óðin Spear-Shaker had come down from Asgard and entered the jarl’s body, intent on making a slaughter to drown the world in blood, I would have believed you.
Yes, I knew what would happen in my first sea battle, just as I knew what Sigurd was seeing in his mind’s eye. Ealdred’s men had probably never fought at sea and they would not be ready for a fight now. We would board Fjord-Elk and then the real butchering would begin. And afterwards, when we had killed them all, Sigurd would claim three prizes, all equally valuable in their own way. First, Sigurd would have Ealdred’s head on the end of his spear. Then he would take Ealdred’s own personal treasure chest for himself, including the holy gospel book of Saint Jerome. Last, Sigurd would win back Fjord-Elk, which was as fine a ship as was ever made to cross the grey sea.
‘The gods are smiling on us, Raven,’ Svein growled behind me.
I was nervous now. Edgy enough to fear that I might piss my breeks. We had almost reached the end of the out-jutting rocks and would come into Ealdred’s view at any moment. I hoped Cynethryth was sticking close to the submerged rocks so that we would not ride over her.
‘How do you know, Svein?’ I asked. ‘That the gods are with us?’ Our oars dipped and rose as one, the drops barely having time to fall from the blades before those blades fell again into the sun-gilded sea.
‘There’s no wind, lad. Even a fart’s worth of wind makes it impossible to lash to another ship and fight. My uncle Bothvar was drowned when his jarl, Ragnvald, tried the same thing in a
swell.’ He sucked in a great breath. ‘They grappled their enemy’s boat and their enemy, a man named Moldof, even helped to lash them good and tight so that they could get on with the fighting. Perhaps Njörd was drunk that day and belched. Anyway, both dragons were swept off and wrecked on the lee shore. No man survived. Bothvar’s father saw it all from the cliffs.’ The oars sploshed and Serpent skimmed across the sea like a water snake. ‘We have no wind and the sea is calm,’ Svein said. ‘Yes, the gods are with us.’ I did not have to see Svein’s face to know the smile that was on it. I whispered a prayer to Óðin asking him to lend me courage and stop the shivering that was deepening now, eating into my muscles, turning my bowels to water and filling my guts with ice.
I looked back at the beach and was relieved to see Cynethryth emerging from the low breakers. She stood in her sopping kirtle beside Father Egfrith and even at that distance I could see the short gown clinging to her breasts and I was glad that Egfrith was a Christ slave and, so far as I had seen, had no interest in women. I could not see her face but I remembered it well enough. Her scent was still on me like a spell, the only thing convincing me that we had just lain together and that it was not some dream sent by Freyja goddess of love, who weeps tears of red gold.
‘There they are, the sheep piss drinking whoresons!’ Sigurd bellowed, striding forward in sheer craving, like Fenrir straining at his chain. I could not look behind me easily but I could imagine the terror-struck faces of Fjord-Elk’s crew as they read the weave and weft of their doom. ‘Kill them all!’ Sigurd yelled, spittle lacing his beard in the red morning light. ‘But leave the turd Ealdred for me. I’ll take the head of any man who touches him.’ I looked over to Penda. He stood at the mast step, feet apart, sword and shield ready, a thin smile on his scarred face. He was not trusted to row yet. Normally you could not take your place on a fine dragon ship such as Serpent unless you could row hard and well enough to carry a ship off the ocean’s edge, and fight like a demon, too. It was unlikely that Penda could row well. He had spent the first day aboard puking his guts into the waves. But the man could fight and Sigurd knew it. Penda was a born killer, a warrior of rare skill, and to Sigurd’s mind this made up for the rowing. Besides, even though we had lost many, with all who remained on one ship there were more men than row benches.
Raven: Sons of Thunder Page 5
