The Frank grunted and tried to yank the blade out, but my arm was in the straps and the axe head was stuck. With a roar the giant almost lifted me off Serpent’s deck, my bones rattling as he tried to wrench the axe free, then in frustration he hurled me, shield, axe and all, against Serpent’s hull. I landed with a clatter, the wind knocked out of me. The shield was too unwieldy with the axe in it, so I slipped my arm from the straps and clambered to my feet, aware that I had not so far given much of an account of myself in front of my jarl. My friends were still yelling encouragement, their faces red with fury and blood-hunger, for they bristled to tear into this huge Frank who was surely going to finish me now.
‘Kill him, Raven,’ Sigurd said, a steel-hard edge to his voice, his blue eyes burning into me. ‘Kill him now.’
I felt Cynethryth watching too and suddenly I knew I would rather die there and then on the end of the Frank’s spear than be beaten around the deck like a flea-bitten dog for all to see.
‘Your mother must have screwed a bull to spawn you,’ I said to the Frank, removing my helmet and laying it on the deck. My left eye was streaming, making it difficult to see, and blood ran into my beard. My hair was lank with sweat and my saliva as thick as frogspawn. ‘I have never seen such an ugly beast,’ I went on, grinning at the Frank. ‘I saw your father grazing in a field yesterday and he was even more ugly than you.’ I did not know if the Frank could understand me, but he knew I was insulting him all the same and his lip curled as his grip tightened on the spear. ‘My friend Svein will enjoy using your skull to drink from,’ I said, unpinning the brooch at my right shoulder and letting my cloak fall to the deck. Then I threw my sword at the Frank’s feet and the Norsemen groaned or yelled at me, but I just stood there, the breeze sending Cynethryth’s raven feather floating in front of my face as Serpent’s oarsmen pulled her down the river.
The Frank’s face twisted with disgust and loathing, his long moustache quivering and his eyes ripe with shock as he realized I had cheated him out of his saga story. The truth that he had made that jump, knowing he wove his own death, only to face not a warrior but a gutless worm who would not fight him was too much for such a man.
‘Fight him, lad!’ Olaf yelled.
‘This is shame, Raven,’ Svein growled in warning. ‘Fight him.’
I threw my arms wide, inviting that great spear, and I felt Sigurd’s eyes boring into me. Then the Frank screamed a curse and lunged and I twisted to the right and the blade scraped the mail along my ribs and I flew at him, smashing my right fist into the left side of his unprotected throat. He staggered back, then clubbed me with the spear, sending me reeling.
‘Hit him again!’ Olaf shouted. ‘Hurry!’
But I did not hit him again. I stood in front of Black Floki, watching the Frank and waiting.
‘Fight him!’ Svein bellowed.
Then the Frank’s eyes rolled and his huge body began to convulse. Spittle flew from his mouth. He raised a fluttering hand to his neck in confusion and disbelief and his fingers found something there.
‘Thór’s hairy arse,’ Svein said, shaking his red head.
‘A Loki trick if I ever saw one,’ Olaf agreed, seeing the brooch pin more than half buried in the Frank’s neck. The giant yanked the pin from his flesh and a fountain of dark blood came with it, pumping out then in a rhythm twice that of Serpent’s oars hitting the water. But still the Frank somehow kept his feet.
‘Finish him, Raven,’ Sigurd commanded.
‘Here,’ Floki said, handing me his wicked long knife. I nodded, taking the knife, then walked up to the Frank, who was now leaning against the sheer strake, still unaccepting of his end.
‘I am Raven,’ I said, and he spat in my face. Then I stuck the knife up into his guts, beneath the iron fish scales of his armour, and I sawed the deadly sharp blade across and heard a gush of escaping air from below. Hot guts poured over my hand and thumped on to the deck, and I smelled his shit and piss. ‘I am your death,’ I said, looking into the Frank’s eyes as the light in them faded. Then, even though it would mean losing his fine arms, I pushed him over the side. His glistening purple gut rope followed and he splashed into the river, his white face staring up at the sky.
‘I’ll clean it,’ I said to Floki, gesturing at his knife.
‘Do it well,’ he said with a grim nod, fetching down his oar from the oar tree and going to his bench. The rest of us took our oars and joined the others rowing, for the Franks were coming hard again now, lashed by Bishop Borgon’s tongue no doubt, and we had no wish to tangle with them again. Kalf was already rowing, even with the arrow still in his shoulder, but Halldor was lying by the mast step, his brynja sheeted in blood and his face half hanging off. Cynric, one of the Wessexmen, lay trembling beside him, his throat ripped open by a Frankish spear, and others had gashed faces and wounds to their upper bodies; the sight of them all was a harsh reminder of the danger posed by the emperor’s high-sided ship.
It did not take us long to catch up with the three Dane ships and we looked across at their crews, their thin arms all bone and sinew at the oars, their straggly hair and unkempt beards giving them the desperate look of starved animals. But they were rowing well and I felt proud of them, for I had shared a little of their suffering and knew what they had been through in that rotten longhouse that was now smoke on some breeze and a pile of cooling ashes. I was rowing well too, the trembling that had filled me draining away with each stroke and being replaced by sheer exhilaration that filled my stomach like hot iron. For I had survived a fight that should have been my doom. I had faced a great and brave warrior and sent him to the afterlife and I silently thanked the All-Father and Loki, too, knowing that it must have been one of those gods who gave me the low cunning idea of using the brooch pin as a weapon.
‘I’m disappointed in you, Raven,’ Svein the Red called from the port side, his huge arms making light work of the rowing.
‘That overgrown troll would have squashed me if I’d fought him fairly,’ I said in my own defence, to some murmurs of agreement.
‘Ja, I know that,’ Svein replied, ‘but I thought you were going to give me his head so I could drink from his skull. Olaf said that’s what you told the Frank.’ The Norsemen laughed even with the Frank ships ploughing downriver after us.
‘I’m sorry, my friend. I’ll get you another one,’ I said. ‘Bigger.’
‘Any bigger and we could stick oars through the eye holes and row the thing,’ Olaf said. ‘Now shut your mead holes and row.’
The river narrowed and for a while its willow-lined banks were less than half a bow-shot apart as we pushed hard on Fjord-Elk’s stern, riding this breathless gush, our oars dragging the churning, spumy water past. Ulf and Gunnar behind him lifted their oars and began to wriggle out of their brynjas and I thought to do the same, for it was hard work rowing in mail. Besides, I did not think the Frank ships would catch us in this stretch of river even if we all stopped rowing. But Olaf, still rowing himself, yelled at them to get their blades back in the water.
‘No one takes off his brynja until I say he can,’ he added. ‘What do you think those riders were doing whilst we were butting heads with that tub back there? They were riding, weren’t they, Ulf, you witless wonder! And by now they’ll have told half the captains of Frankia to slip their moorings and prepare us a warm welcome.’
So we rowed, sweating in leather and heavy mail, and it was not long before Olaf was proved right. Hearth smoke, brown against the grey sky, told us we were nearing a large village or town, even before we saw the long jetty with its breakwater protecting twenty or more craft from the current. Three of those craft belonged to the emperor from the looks of their fighting platforms and near identical builds, and two of them were already brimming with spearmen as we approached. Olaf, Bram, Svein and Penda took their oars to Serpent’s bow in order to fend them off, though luckily this time we slipped past, a few arrows thumping against the hull. However, it was clear they saw Serpent and Fjord-Elk as the
richest prizes for they turned their bows downriver and joined the chase, ignoring the three smaller Dane ships in their wake who were now stuck between them and the five Frank vessels behind them. Townsfolk lined the quay, cheering the emperor’s soldiers and clamouring for our doom.
We were getting tired. The third imperial ship had cast off now and these three new enemies were fresh to their oars, which made up for their vessels’ being slower than ours, even with our holds crammed with heavy silver. None of us spoke, each man lost in his own pain, shoulders and arms burning, chest as tight as Serpent’s halyard. We ploughed the coils of the river, mindless of the occasional arrows shot from both banks, which clattered amongst us or lodged in the deck and hull, and I summoned Cynethryth’s face to my mind, because I had not seen her properly for days, now she stayed in the shelter by the hold.
‘Bastards are like dogs . . . that don’t know when to stop chasing their own tails,’ Penda muttered through gritted teeth some hours later. His was the bench in front of mine and the deck around that bench was dark with sweat.
‘Bishop Borgon knows . . . how much of his emperor’s silver . . . sits in our hold,’ I replied, gasping for breath. ‘He’ll chase us . . . off the edge of the world.’
By dusk it was clear that before chasing us off the edge of the world the Franks intended to drive us out to the open sea, which could not have been too far away by then, because gulls wailed somewhere above in the orange sky and the fields on either side had given way to marshland and mudflats where geese bickered and birds waded. The water had become brackish too and the rowing had become a little easier, as though the river here was tidal in our favour, being sucked out to the estuary.
The river curved round to the west and we passed a ruined, scorch-marked fortress on the south bank, which reminded us that we were not these Franks’ only enemies. Then to our surprise our pursuers fell back, even letting the Danes pass with only a flurry of arrows to sting them as they went. I was amazed that the Danes were still rowing and could only think that their sleek ships were even more well made than they appeared, cutting through the water like arrows through the air.
‘They’ve had enough!’ Gunnar shouted, raising coarse cheers from parched Norse and English throats. We eased off the oars, our rhythm slowing to half speed as we dared to hope that we had at last escaped Bishop Borgon and the blue cloaks. My screaming heart began to slow and I took the chance to drink from the water skin by my feet. Then we came round the next bend, where the river narrowed again, and saw two small fortifications facing each other from either bank. They were squat wooden buildings built atop foundations of worked stone sunk deep into the flood plain, and both were crowned with a rampart and palisade. Men with bows were scuttling up ladders on to these ramparts, their captains’ yells percussive across the water between the slap and plunge of our oars.
‘Get ready for rain, lads,’ Olaf warned, meaning that we could expect a shower of arrows. Then we heard a thunderous, bone-crushing sound, a grinding noise the like of which I had never heard before. Facing Serpent’s stern I could not twist round fully to see what was making it, but I could see Knut’s face, which was enough to sink my heart.
‘Sigurd!’ Knut yelled. ‘You need to see this.’ Many of us lifted our oars and turned to look. The forts were open on their river sides, which had seemed strange until now. Now, with utter horror, I realized what those buildings were for and I saw the source of that terrible noise that sounded like an iron dragon grinding its teeth. Emerging from the water on both banks was a huge chain, rusty and dripping and forged of links as big as your fist. Inside the forts men turned great windlasses, drawing in the chain so that it would soon stretch taut across the river. When it did we would be trapped.
‘Row hard, men!’ Sigurd shouted, hurrying back to his row bench and gripping his oar. ‘Harder than you have ever rowed!’
‘But Sigurd, there’s no time!’ Olaf exclaimed. ‘That chain will be up. It’ll crush us to kindling.’
‘Hold your tongue and row, Uncle,’ Sigurd yelled, pulling with his enormous strength. ‘And be ready when I give the word!’ And though I agreed with Uncle and didn’t think I was the only one, I worked my oar as though Óðin himself was choosing men to fill the benches on his own dragon ship, because Sigurd was my jarl and I believed the gods loved him. The blood pounded in my head. My world closed in around me, but through the mind-fog I heard Sigurd bawling orders from his bench and I readied myself. I heard arrows too, whopping into the water beyond Serpent’s prow, and I knew it would be any moment now.
‘Move!’ Sigurd bellowed. I pulled in my oar, letting it clatter to the deck, then grunting with effort I picked up my row bench, my sea chest full of silver and arms, and together with the others I half ran, half stumbled in my brynja to Serpent’s stern, into the press of men, as arrows thwacked off the hull and bounced off our mail. Serpent’s bow lifted, Jörmungand leaping into the twilight sky. The terrible thumping scrape of the chain against Serpent’s belly filled the world. Those nearest the mast step were flung towards us, spilling their heavy chests. Then, as soon as the momentum was spent, Sigurd roared again and we lumbered forward, tripping on discarded oars and thumping into each other, hurrying to the bow as Serpent’s stern now surged up and she slid down off the chain.
‘Thór’s teeth, we did it,’ Olaf said, wide-eyed. No sooner were we over than we looked back to watch Fjord-Elk follow our lead and we winced to see her prow leap and hear the scrape of the chain across her hull. But she made it too and we cheered Bragi the Egg and his crew. Now it was the Danes’ turn.
‘They’re small and light enough,’ Penda said hopefully as we returned to our places, puffing like bellows.
‘But they don’t have the weight on board to lift the bows over,’ I said, putting my oar back through its port and waiting for Olaf to order the first stroke.
‘Those skinny-arsed lads have done it!’ Bram Bear cheered.
‘Not bad for Danes,’ round-faced Hastein offered with a grin. And then the second Dane ship was over and we all cheered again and yelled insults at the Franks watching from the riverbanks. But then we were silenced by a splintering crack that ripped across the water like the voice of doom. The third Dane ship had looked to be over but lacked the momentum to slide all the way down and had come to rest with the chain beneath its hull, just rearward of the mast. That crack was the ship’s back breaking and the cries from the men on board told us that they were all done for.
‘Poor bastards,’ Wiglaf said, shaking his head. The Dane ship was in two pieces now and both were spilling screaming men into the fast-flowing river.
‘Why don’t they go back for them?’ Yrsa Pig-nose asked. ‘Why don’t the others go back?’
‘That’s why,’ Osk replied, pointing to the chain leading into one of the forts. It was slack again now, meaning that the Franks were sinking the chain so that their own ships could pass. Meanwhile, another Frank ship was launching from the bank, meaning we now had a whole fleet after us.
‘Hey!’ Olaf called and we plunged the oars into the river and began to row again. Sigurd pulled on his oar, his back bulging and his sweat-soaked golden hair stuck to his brynja. That chain should have stopped us. Then the Franks would have killed us. But Sigurd had come up with an outrageous plan and it had worked, and I shook my head at the sheer brazen impudence of it. I have since heard men talk of our escape that day and attribute it to themselves or others. Some of these are lies woven by men who talk a good saga tale – men who have heard of Sigurd’s Fellowship and steal their stories the way rats steal scraps from a king’s table. But maybe some other men have tried the same thing, and maybe many of them even now lie with the crabs.
The smaller Frankish boats stopped only to spear the drowning Danes and that was terrible to see, for those brave men deserved better deaths than that after what they had been through. But all we could do was row, which by now was backbreakingly hard. We were exhausted and Sigurd must have been tempted to fight
the Franks whilst we still had enough strength to lift our swords. But he also knew that our enemies would surround us, hurling their missiles from all sides, and it would be a desperately hard fight. So we rowed, the sun having rolled into the west and now sinking fast. Even as the light drained from the world and the first stars glinted through tears in the high clouds, we rowed. And we prayed we would make it to the sea.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
THAT NIGHT WAS DARK ENOUGH TO BRING WITH IT THE RISK OF running aground on a sandbank or rock, but light enough for Knut to be able to keep Serpent near the middle of the river where the danger was less. At any other time I would have happily exchanged places with him, working the tiller instead of breaking my back at the oar, but not that night. He could keep it and good luck to him, I thought, watching his face, which was as tight as a cat’s arsehole, his brow heavy with the great burden of steering us down that gloom-filled course towards the sea.
We were in a daze, rowing as though the rhythm was as deep a part of us as our heartbeat or our breathing. We did not talk, having no strength for words, but simply pulled the oars, muscle and bone imitating the movement our eyes saw in the body in front. You would not have thought it possible to go on like that, but it was possible. What’s more, the Franks were still coming too. With our oars’ up stroke we could hear theirs chopping the river somewhere in the darkness behind us.
Dawn brought mist. It rose from the water and curled out along the marsh and mudflats above which lapwings streaked and dragonflies hung, blurs of colour against the reedy grass. We were half dead at our benches. Serpent was a ship of draugr men, the corpse-pale undead hauling our oars as relentlessly as the coming of Ragnarök. But whereas the gods’ doom still lay in the fog of the future, ours would be upon us before the sun was fully risen.
Raven: Sons of Thunder Page 28
