Horned Helmet

by Henry Treece

  Then the young hero, firm and unflinching,

  Stripped off his garments in sight of all men.

  Berserker rose he among all his warriors,

  Nor did his lips cry beneath hammer’s rain.

  Why should I shrink then, when nails pierce my bosom? Why should I bow, when he held his head high?

  Proud that he held me, rude and unworthy,

  Proud would I stand again, him for to die!

  Beorn was silent as Alphege finished. He thought of his own silly song about Snorre Pig, and was ashamed of it. He did not know what to say to this tall gentle priest. But suddenly Starkad spoke and said, ‘I was awake, Christman, and heard your poem. If you will not bear it ill, I would say that your words were worthy of a Jomsviking, sir. And that Christ of yours sounds like a true man. That much I will give him. If a simple wooden tree will say so much for him, then I go double and will say that if he stood here now, I would take his hand.’

  Alphege smiled down and nodded. ‘I think he does stand here, Jomsviking,’ he said. ‘And I think he would be glad to take your hand, as well.’

  They watched Starkad reach out, as though he saw the White-Christ, and they saw him clasp his hands together, as though another’s hand lay in his own. Then, smiling, he rolled over into the hay and shut his eyes.

  13 Blind Beacon

  Spring came, and summer, and then Beorn was helping the Blanchland men out on the white fells, fetching back the sheep before the winter closed in. Though he was older now, he had known more mealtimes than meals in the time since he left Iceland, and no one could say that he had grown into a big boy. But he was hard and willing, and before Christmas came, all men agreed that he was a good-hearted lad, though a little spoiled by the wild company he had kept.

  As for Starkad, he had come through that dark winter as well as he might, though five times he was closer to death than the shod foot is to earth. There was an iron in the man that kept him from faring forth, crippled and grey though he had become. Often he would sit for hours, stroking the horned helmet with his good left hand, and saying to himself, ‘Come spring, bright-helm, and we’ll be off with salt in the nostril! Aye, come the green bud and we’ll be away! ’

  Alphege heard him one day and said to Beorn in private, ‘ If things do not change, the Jomsviking will be away, in all truth - but not to the place where he thinks he is going.’

  Beorn was worried, and said, ‘ What can I do for him, master; what can I do? I owe him my very life.’ Alphege smiled and said, ‘ I think you have paid that debt, Beorn; but if you are set on doing more, then I advise that Starkad should be with someone who can tend him at all times; not with a stupid priest and a young lad, who mean well but have no skill when it comes to nursing a sick man.’

  Beorn said, ‘Where is there such a person, priest?’ Alphege said, ‘ Out on the fells, way up beyond the town and towards the sea-water, there is a widow-woman, called Katla. She is of your folk, or at least, her mother was, years ago; so she understands your ways. She is a lonely woman whose husband went into the sea five Yuletides ago when his smack turned turtle. I know she will be missing him again this Christmas. If she is willing, there is a cottage and a fire, beasts and a byre, up there on the fells, and none to share it with her. I will see her about it.’

  When they first went up the high fell to her house, and Beorn saw her standing in the doorway with the rush-fight behind her, for a strange moment he thought it was his mother, and his heart jumped into his throat and almost throttled him. But then he saw that she was a thin, pale-faced thing, who started away as though she was frightened of all men.

  The priest consoled her and said to the others, ‘You see, she has been so much alone that strangers are like wolves to her. But she will get over it, won’t you, my child?’

  Katla shrank by the wood wall and nodded, her tawny hair all over her face and shoulders and her dark Danish eyes staring through it, like a hare from a bush. But when she saw how truly sick Starkad was, her fear seemed to leave her, and she came forth and prepared supper for them, oat-cakes in meat broth, and barley-beer to wash it down.

  The priest saw them settled in, then he blessed the house on the fell and took his leave.

  Katla was a great hand with country remedies, and would spend whole days outside, gathering herbs and mashing them in a little copper cauldron she had. Starkad used to say to Beorn in secret, ‘ I declare, son, if I drank brewed dragon’s brains it could not taste worse! ’

  But, all the same, the baresark never refused what she gave him and, before a month had passed, he was twice the man the ship had made him - though only half the man he used to be. Now he could walk after a fashion, without aid, and could feed himself with his left hand - his right was always bound to his body to keep it from knocking against things and hurting itself. Katla often rubbed his right arm, and would shake her reddish hair and say hoarsely, ‘ Do not expect too much, master. If we can get some feeling into it, that is as much as may be. You are lucky to have an arm left at all, it seems to me, for the bone was broken in many places.’

  Once Starkad said, ‘ I used to be a fighter, woman, you may have heard. Shall I ever shake a sword with this hand again, do you consider? ’

  Katla said, ‘ If you shake a horn spoon, that will be all, master. Your sword-days are over, it seems to me.’ After she had said this, she ran away, as though afraid. And Starkad lay and stared blankly at the wood wall for two hours without speaking. Beorn came to him and said, ‘Do not take on so, father. Most men would be dead and stark by now. You are fortunate.’ Starkad answered, ‘Fortunate? A baresark with a horn spoon? ’

  Then he began to laugh and laugh till the cats ran away from the fire up a tree, and the sheep huddled together in the pen, bleating as though red-eyed Thor had come to take them for his supper. Beorn met Katla in the byre-yard and said to her hotly, ‘That was no way to speak to a warrior. You have set him back with this black prattle. You have put a knitting-needle through his heart, woman.’

  She went away and wept in the dairy; then Beorn was angry with himself for treating the kind woman so. He was growing tall at this time, and was beginning to feel like a man. This made him even angrier, that a grown man should talk so to a widow-woman who had given him shelter.

  He was so angry with himself that he went down to Blanchland at sunset and saw the headman there, who acted for the Earl at York.

  ‘Master,’ he said, ‘I am neither like lamb nor wolf,

  having no trade but watching Katla’s goats on the high fell. A young fellow needs work to do that will keep him on the hop. Have you a war-band in this town that I could join, and in this way earn my keep among you?’ The headman smiled gently and said, ‘We keep no war-band, son, for as you see, our place lies in this little hollow and few men can find it in the winter, with snow all over it. But if they did find it, no war-band could help us, for we are in no position to defend ourselves, living like ants in a bowl, on top of one another with no room to move.’

  Beorn said, ‘Then what do you do when the sea-wolves come, master?’

  The headman said, ‘We have our ways, son. If sea-folk come, a man in a coast-village lights a beacon to warn us. Katla sees the fire and runs down here to tell me; then we all go into the church, taking what cattle we can gather into the stockade there. So we wait till the pirates go away again. A few burned houses are good value for our lives, and, besides, no sea-folk have been here for ten years. As I say, Blanchland is not easy to find, not even for raiding Scottishmen, who do not live so far away and should know where we are.’ Beorn thought a space, then said, ‘Very well then, from this time, let me be your look-out man on the fells, to warn you if raiders come.’

  The headman smiled and nodded. ‘You have sharp eyes and are young enough to run briskly,’ he said. ‘ Good; from now on, you are the watch-dog of Blanchland, and you shall draw the yearly fee of three sacks of oatmeal. Are you content?’

  Beorn said that he was, and went back to the
house

  feeling that he was of some use in the world now. He came into Katla’s steading quietly, so as not to disturb Starkad if he was sleeping; but a great surprise awaited him - for Starkad was well awake, and was sitting beside Katla, holding her hand and sometimes smoothing her wild hair. She was smiling faintly at him, as though she was happy to have a man near her again, after her years of loneliness.

  Beorn was thunderstruck, for he had never seen Starkad as much as look at a woman before. He was also jealous, for he thought of the Jomsviking as his own man, his closest friend, his new father.

  Starkad smiled at Beorn in the doorway and called out, ‘Come and kiss us both, son. Katla and I have seen sense and are going to care for one another from this time on. We shall be man and wife, my son.’

  These words made Beorn’s mouth fall open, and he said, ‘No! Oh, no! ’ But Starkad nodded again and said, ‘Yes! Oh, yes! This good lady needs a husband, and I need a wife, to care for this broken old hulk of a body. So we shall get the priest to come up here soon and witness our handfast wedding. I cannot go into the church for it, because, to tell truth, son, I was never properly baptised, though, down at Miklagard, I often went to their Masses with the Emperor. But we Varangers in the royal guard were allowed special licence to go into church like proper Christians, so as to be near the person of the Emperor. The Greeks allowed us, in the prayers, to say “Odin” every time they said “Jesus Christ”; and to say “Freya” every time they said “Mary Mother”. So I am half a Christian, though not baptised, you see!’

  Beorn stood back and said angrily, ‘ So this is what you plot while I am away? I thought better of you, father.’

  Katla smiled sadly and said, ‘ Come to the table, son, and drink your broth. I have thickened it with oatmeal, because I know you like that. And there is a dried onion or two for you. I kept them specially.’

  Beorn glared at her and said, ‘Very well, I will eat my supper, but only because I am hungry after my walk to Blanchland and back, and not because you made it for me. And, let me tell you, woman, I am no son of yours, so do not call me by that name. Starkad has the right to call me that, but not you. From this time on, I shall look after your goats and watch for the warning-beacon on the hill; so I shall earn my keep like anyother thrall. And you will call me Beorn, and nothing else. Is that understood? ’

  Katla stood by the table and stared at him without answering. Tears .filled her eyes. Then she laid his supper and went away from the room. When she had gone, Starkad clutched the arm of his oak chair with his good left hand and screwed up his face so horribly that, if he had been strong again, Beorn would have been afraid. Then Starkad said, * Beorn, if I were well, I would take off my belt and thrash sense into your stupid hide. Katla has done for us both what no one else would do; she has given us a home and has put food into our worthless bellies. And now you speak to her as though she is a slave, and not your mother-to-be. You treat her as though she has robbed us, not fed us.’

  Beorn cried out, ‘ She is no mother of mine, Starkad! And she has robbed me, of you! ’

  Then he ran out without eating his broth, and spent that night among the fidgeting sheep in their cold pen.

  The next morning, Starkad called Beorn to him when Katla was in the dairy, churning butter, and took him by the arm with his left hand. His face was not grim now, but deathly grave.

  He said, ‘Beorn, I have spent a sleepless night thinking of you. As you know well enough, I love you, and call you my son. I shall never be grateful enough for the way you saved me from the water and tended me till we came to this house. But the past is the past; and that is something that not even a king can change.’

  Beorn said, ‘Are you denying me, then, at last, Starkad?’ He couldn’t bring himself to say ‘father’ just then.

  Starkad shook his head and said, ‘God forbid that, my son. No, but I am saying to you that, now, it seems, you have grown headstrong and brisk enough to fend for yourself. I am saying that if this place is too quiet for you, then you must do what many young hounds do, and go sniffing the hedgerows for yourself. No, do not start, I am not sending you away. I am only giving you leave to live as you please; to go roving if you wish, to find yourself the sort of place that suits you, since we can both see that this steading does not. I was never one for keeping a wolf in a cage, as they do in some places. I say: Let the wolf seek his own lair and be contented there.’

  Beorn was a proud boy at this time, and he did not answer. He set his face and nodded, though deep in his heart he was sorry it had come to this after all.

  Starkad said, ‘A young fellow, out to make his fortune, needs a sword and a helmet. You have the sword, and now you shall have the helmet. The horned helmet that was Gauk’s is yours, Beorn. If I had money to buy you a war-shirt, I would, and willingly. But you know that I own nothing but what I stand up in. Maybe you can sell your iron stag for a byrnie. You have my permission.’

  Beorn almost wept to think that he had already parted with the precious stag, but he did not dare tell Starkad that, for shame.

  Instead, he answered, * Be it as you say, Starkad. I will go away, and will find what I can find. One day, I will send the price of the helmet back to you here.’

  These words seemed to hurt the baresark more than anything else; but he swallowed his hurt and said, ‘There is only one thing - do not leave for another week. There is something I must do, and I shall need your help in doing it. Once it is done, then the wide world is yours to go a-viking in, with my blessing.’

  What Starkad wanted to do took a full week, and should, by right, have taken much more. But he had little enough time on his hands to spare, now that Beorn was set on leaving the steading on the high fell.

  A thrall set a pine trunk into the ground in the stackyard, so that it stood the height of a man, and a hand or two more. And Starkad had himself carried out there, in his chair, with his long sword in his left hand. So hour by hour he hacked at the stump, aiming his strokes this way and that, until force came back to his arm, the arm he had never used for weapon-play before. Beorn would stand, watching him, leaning at the byrefence, seeing how, little by little, the Jomsviking was learning his trade again.

  And when, at last, Starkad was satisfied that he had the mastery of the heavy blade, he called on the boy to come forward and hit at him with a stout blackthorn, as though they were in conflict together. Now Beorn hated to do this, fearing to hurt Starkad; but the man grew so angry at his refusal that in the end Beorn gave in.

  At first, many of his blows landed on Starkad’s shoulders; but, at last, Beorn found that try as he might he could not touch the baresark. And when this lesson was learned, Starkad ordered him to strike anywhere, up or down, so as to bring nimbleness back to his legs.

  Many a crack Beorn gave him on the shins using the viking leg-blow; then came the day when Starkad laughed in the newly-bright air, for the year had turned now. And on that day he waited until Beorn swiped out at his legs, judged the blow like a hawk watching a partridge, then brought down the long sword so fast that it was only a gleam of silver in the sunlight. The thick blackthorn staff fell in two halves at Beorn’s feet.

  Starkad put up his sword and came to him, smiling quietly. He placed his good arm round the boy’s shoulders and said, ‘Very well, lad, so this is the day you can count yourself a free rover. Now that I can manage my old trade this new way, there is nothing more to keep you here. Eat and sleep well this night, and tomorrow I will set you on your way, and may life use you well! ’

  When Starkad had gone into the house to slake his thirst with the last of the October ale, Beorn suddenly found himself weeping, and went quickly from the steading so that none of the thralls should see his weakness. It is one thing, he thought, to dream of freedom; but it is another to take it when it is offered.

  Now, all at once, he saw Starkad and even Katla in a new way, as all the world he had, as his own folk. And he saw this steading on the high fell as his only home. All else in the
world was unknown and unsure. Perhaps he would be going to his death, or at least to misery; whereas, up here on the hill, there were love and kindness and a hearth-fire to sit by. But he had spoken his word, and since he had journeyed with Jomsvikings, he had learned that, once a man does this, there is no going back.

  Up on a little hummock that the Blanchland-folk still called Grimshowe, under a wind-writhen hawthorn tree, Beorn sat down and let the twilight wrap itself round him like a thin cloak. And there, with the curlews crying and the sheeps’ sad bleating in his ears, he thought of all that had passed, and tried to guess at all to come. Some things that he thought brought tears to his eyes, and as dusk fell, he put his hands to his eyes to wipe the salt water away.

  It was while his face was covered so, that the distant beacon up above the coast flared a dull red for a while, and then died down again. It was the warning he had sworn to watch for, but which, in his own time of trouble, he never saw. If he had seen it, he would have raced like a wild deer down into Blanchland, to shout out from the church steps that the sea-rovers were on their way again. But such words were never said, and Beorn went back to the steading without knowing he had failed the folk who trusted him.

  14 New Guardian

  It was a good send-off meal of barley cakes, cow-meat, dried beans, and honey-ale. Katla lighted five white wax candles in his honour, though she had meant to give them to the church at Easter. Good pine logs crackled in the hearth, and that evening the steading was as warm as any home could be.