For a few seconds no one moved. All eyes were on the dog, which was all but torn apart. Then, as one, they turned and fled back across the field.
It was not an orderly retreat but a panicked route, a mindless, terror induced race for the dubious safety of the far tree line. They plunged through the grass, stumbled on unseen obstacles, pushed each other out of the way in their flight. When they reached the trees they continued on ten feet or so, until they were fully away from the open ground. Then they stopped, heaved for breath, let the trembling subside and the humiliation set in.
Donnel was the first to react, and his reaction surprised even him. He straightened, took a step forward and shoved the master of the hounds hard, sending him stumbling. “You stupid son of a bitch!” he hissed. “Your damned dogs were on the trail of a wolf or a bear or some damnable thing! Those were not the fin gall in there!”
The master of the hounds straightened and took on a defensive look. “You don’t know that. I seen men take on hounds. Man who’s quick with a sword, he can stand his ground against dogs. Those were my dogs was killed there!” That last he said as if just then realizing the great loss he had suffered, and his expression changed as he spoke the words.
Donnel turned away. He did not want to engage the man any more. “See here,” he said to the others, “back at the stream, when the hounds took off on this trail, I could see on the other side of the water that men had passed there. If the dogs didn’t take off after a wolf, then mayhap the fin gall fooled us. Anyway, we go back and we follow the trail across the stream.”
The others grunted their agreement. Donnel grabbed one of the torches and headed back into the woods, back the way they had come. He moved quickly down the trail, well blazed by the passage of the men and the half-wild dogs. He felt a sense of relief to be leaving behind whatever it was that killed the dogs, and a sense of dread to be leading the way back into the forest, with the fin gall waiting at the other end.
They came at last to the edge of the stream. Donnel held the torch aloft and examined the far side. He could see where the low growth had been trampled, branches broken or swept aside. He could even see the print of a leather shoe in the soft ground. He stepped closer to Patrick and the men-at-arms, who were right behind him. The master of the hounds and his men, now having nothing to do, were hanging toward the back of the column.
“Whatever trail the damned dogs were on, I say the fin gall went that way.” He spoke just above a whisper and pointed across the stream into the blackness of the woods. He swallowed hard, braced himself to say the rest of what he had to say in an even and commanding tone. “We go after them. Let us draw our weapons now. We don’t know how far off they are, how many or what shape they are in. My guess is half a dozen and I think they’ll be near dead with the sickness Morrigan gave them, but let’s be on our guard.”
The others just nodded. No one had anything to add. Donnel pulled his sword and the others did the same. The dog handlers had knives, and they drew those, though they looked even less certain about all of this than Donnel felt.
Donnel turned and stepped into the stream, cold water filling his shoe. Two steps and he was across and moving along the trail of the fin gall, which was as easy to follow as if it had been a road. These men were not trying to hide their escape, and Donnel hoped it was because they were too sick to do so. Had he been alone, he would have been able to move silently enough that he could have heard all the sounds of the forest, and his quarry as well. But, with the exception of Patrick, the stumbling fools behind him were making as much noise as an army on the march.
He held up his hand and the column stopped and he listened close. Nothing. There was no sound that he could hear, save for the soft gurgling of the stream they had left behind and the wind in the branches. He continued on, taking his steps slowly and softly, and the men behind him did the same, but it was a pointless gesture, with the shaking of the mail shirts and the various thumping and cracking and stumbling sounds they made.
Another five rods and Donnel held them up again. This was it. The end of the trail. He could see quite clearly where a dozen feet had trampled, kicked and shuffled the ground right up to a thick stand of trees, a natural shelter. It was not where men would go who meant to stagger on, it was where they would go if they were looking for concealment, a place to collapse, to let their bodies recover from some debilitating affliction.
Donnel turned again to the others. When he spoke, it was hardly louder than a breath. “They are in there, I’ll warrant,” he said. He held his sword in his right hand, the torch in his left, and with the sword he pointed at the trees. If the fin gall were not unconscious, the torches would have warned them of the Irishmen’s presence, but there was nothing for it. With luck they would be too sick to resist, forewarned or no.
“Softly, now,” he said and stepped off in the direction of the trees. The others followed behind, trying their best to move silently, though with little success. Donnel closed the distance quickly, sword and torch held in front of him. The sweat was slick on his palms but he had no way to wipe them, so he gripped the hilt of the sword and the handle of the torch harder still.
The underbrush was trampled going into the stand of trees, and Donnel was certain there would be a bit of open ground beyond, where the tall oaks had deprived any younger ones of light and stopped their springing up. He pictured in his mind what he would find; Thorgrim and half a dozen fin gall sprawled in the dirt and leaves, oblivious to everything. The Northmen would be outnumbered. If he and his men-at-arms moved fast, their enemies would be bound by the wrists before they were even fully awake.
At the edge of the trees he stopped, just for a second. He took a deep breath and uttered a quick prayer, then plunged in through the bracken, through the trees, into the hidden place beyond. And there it was, almost as he pictured it; the open ground, broken by roots and saplings, the leaves and dirt kicked up and trampled. But no men.
Donnel swung the torch around. No one. He could see where they had been lying on the ground, like animals bedding down. But there was no one there now.
He stepped further in and heard the rest follow. The other torches poked here and there, shedding light on the dark places. “Where are they, Donnel?” Patrick asked. He could see the signs of their having been there as well.
“I don’t know,” Donnel said, looking up from the ground at last, trying to see through the trees. “Do any of you see anything?” he asked the men in general. He was answered by a series of noncommittal grunts.
“Dogs were chasing a wolf, were they?” the master of the hounds said as he and his men came into the shelter of the trees. His tone was more than a little triumphant. “I reckon they know their business, and me mine.”
“Knew their business,” Donnel corrected. “The dogs knew their business. They’re all dead now.”
The master of the hounds squinted and frowned and was clearly about to make some unpleasant reply when one of the men-at-arms called out. It was one word, or perhaps not even a full word. It sounded to Donnel something like, “Here…” and then the night seemed to come apart around them.
Chapter Thirty-Six
My foes sought me out,
swinging their swords,
but I did not fall then.
Gisli Sursson’s Saga
Harald had had the good fortune, the damned good fortune, to fall to the ground with a root jabbing him in the back. At first it had made no difference. Indeed, he was not even aware of it. His body, sick, exhausted, drained from having purged itself for hours in every way a body could purge itself, passed into the dream world so completely that he appeared to have left the earthly one for good. And thus he remained for hours, mouth open, limbs flung out, root in his back.
As he lay there, motionless, his guts did epic battle with the forces of the cowbane, and though it was an enemy unknown, and an enemy to be feared, Harald was young and strong and in the end he prevailed. Not a complete and unqualified victory – he was
still weak and battered – but he had won and the cowbane was in retreat.
The sleep fell away, bit by bit, like snow cover in the rain, and as it did it revealed the root. He became aware of the pain and he moved a little, but that only made it worse. He grunted. He was far from well and his body cried out to sleep again, but the root, like an insistent, prodding finger, continued to jab.
He rolled onto his side, clear of the offending woody protrusion, and opened his eyes. It was dark and he had no idea where he was. He tried to walk his dulled thoughts back. The banquet. The nightmare stumble through the woods, the power of his father’s urging pushing him on when all he wanted to do was fall to the ground. He remembered now.
He pushed himself up on one arm. All around him, men were strewn on the ground like the victims of a battle, heaps of cloth and hair and furs. The light was meager in the stand of trees and he could see little beyond shapes, but he could hear breathing and see some slight motion among the heaps so he knew he was not the only one who had lived.
Father…? Harald thought. He looked around at the men on the ground, but could not identify any of them as Thorgrim. He pushed himself to a sitting position, then closed his eyes and clenched his teeth and let everything settle again. The worst of the poisoning had passed, but still the motion required to sit up left him sick and dizzy. He waited as his churning stomach calmed and the spinning in his head slowed to a stop.
As he waited, perfectly still, he let his ears take in the sounds of the night and pull them apart, the way his father had taught him to do while hunting and tracking in the forests of Norway. He heard the breathing of the men, the tree branches moving high up. Something moved through the dried leaves, something small, Harald could tell, but making a sound quite out of proportion to its size.
And then Harald’s ears picked out something that did not belong to the forest. He sat a little straighter and his eyes shot open, though he was only staring into the dark. He listened. There were feet moving toward them, trying and failing to be stealthy, and the only reason they were not more obvious was because they were still a far way off. He focused his mind and his hearing. More than a couple of men. He could hear a low, murmuring sound, like a brook, but he was fairly certain it was the men talking to one another in low tones.
Harald leapt to his feet, forgetting the condition he was in, but he did not forget it for long. His head whirled and a wave of nausea washed over him and he staggered back a few steps looking for his footing. He caught himself and once again remained still as his equilibrium returned. Then he moved slowly, careful to make no sound or any movement violent enough to start his head spinning again. He picked his way through the sleeping men around him. One or two he pushed over with his foot so he could see their faces. No Thorgrim.
He listened again and could hear the men coming closer. He looked out through the tangle of brush and the low branches. Far off he could see three tiny pricks of light, bobbing through the forest. Torches… he thought. That told him a few things. There were at least three men, but undoubtedly more. They were searching for something, and that thing was most likely the Norsemen who had escaped the camp. And they came in sufficient strength that they did not feel the need for stealth.
Harald made a circuit of all the men sleeping in the shelter of the trees and Thorgrim was not there. This both worried Harald and gave him hope. If men were approaching, then Thorgrim would no doubt have been the first to become aware of them. Not because he had his health, but because he was Thorgrim, and Harald had come to expect such things from his father. So perhaps Thorgrim had slipped away and had some trap ready for those coming toward them. Perhaps he would lead them away.
Why did he not wake me? Harald wondered. Let me know what he was about….
For whatever reason, Thorgrim had not shared his plans, and Harald knew that he had better make plans of his own. He crouched low and moved quickly to where Starri lay slumped on the ground. With his left hand he shook him gently, then shook him again. His right hand hovered above Starri’s mouth, and when Starri snapped awake, Harald’s hand clamped down fast so that Starri’s manic shout of alarm was muffled and all but silent.
“Starri, Starri, it’s me, Harald…” he whispered, and when he saw a look that passed for recognition on Starri’s face he took his hand off Starri’s mouth. In the best of times Starri never seemed to be entirely cognizant of his surroundings, and this was far from the best of times.
“Listen, Starri,” Harald continued, “there are men approaching. Hunting us, no doubt.”
At this, Starri looked around, and the familiar signs of agitation set in immediately, the jerking arms, fingers clasping and unclasping. He reached for his sword. They all had their weapons, all the Northmen, because, sick as they had been, they were no more likely to leave camp without their weapons than they were to leave without their arms or legs.
“Wait, wait!” Harald said, his whisper harsh and emphatic. “We don’t know how many they are, and we are few, and weak. They’ll have no problem following our trail. We’ll hide in the brush, let them come in, and then fall on them, take them by surprise.”
Starri looked at him.
“Do you understand my meaning?” Harald asked.
Starri nodded.
“Good. Wait here, I’ll rouse the others.” Harald moved quickly from man to man, waking each, explaining what was happening, ordering him to retreat into the brush, stand silent and ready, move when he moved. It took some doing to make the sick, exhausted, half dead men understand, but in the end each stood, let his head clear, and moved into the darkness of the tree line.
No one asked by what authority Harald was now giving orders. Indeed, Harald himself never thought to question why he had assumed command. He just did, and everyone obeyed. He was Harald Thorgrimson, son of Thorgrim Ulfsson. Son of the Night Wolf.
It took less than a minute for the men to stagger into the trees, conceal themselves and fall silent. Harald remained in the open, and when he looked around and could see no one, when he listened and could hear none of his own men, just their pursuers drawing closer, he ducked into the bit of wood where he had seen Starri go. If they were to hold fast and spring the trap at the right moment, Harald figured the berserker might need some steadying.
The darkness wrapped around them. Harald could smell Starri, just inches away, and could hear the soft sound of his tunic rustling with the jerking of his arms and legs.
“Steady…steady…move when I do…” Harald whispered.
The sound of the approaching men was clearly audible now, and the light from their torches licked and flickered into the stand of trees where they had been hiding. Harald shook his head in amazement. He could not believe how clumsy the Irish were, approaching an unseen enemy in this way.
If we were not all sick, these fools would already be dead men, he thought.
A foot came down on a twig and it cracked, loud, and everyone froze, the Irish and the Northmen. Silence. The branches overhead moved in the breeze and then the hunting party began its slow approach once more. The light spilled into the open place where the Norsemen had slept. Those spots where the leaves and dirt had been disturbed would be obvious to the most obtuse tracker, and Harald had to admit, as loud as their approach might be, whoever was following their trail was doing a good job.
Starri Deathless was quivering now and making the leaves around him shake and Harald hoped the sound would be mistaken for the wind. “Steady, now…” he said, the words merely a breath.
A man stepped into the ring of trees, not ten feet away from where Harald and Starri stood concealed. He held a torch in one hand, a sword in the other, though he did not hold the sword with the ease of one very familiar with its use. He wore a mail shirt. Starri was making tiny whimpering sounds now, and Harald did not know how much longer he could hold him back. Springing traps, he could see, was not the berserkers’ forte.
Others came in, torches in hand. They exchanged words and Harald was able to pick
out a few here and there. Something about dogs, and he thought one was asking the other where the men whom they had expected to find there had gone. They could see the Northmen had been sleeping there.
More men came in, six or seven all together, and they began to spread out, apparently searching for some clue as to where their prey had gone.
Ready, ready… Harald thought. He wanted them spread out, and he wanted to know how many they were facing. Two seconds more, one second…
With a scream Nordwall the Short burst from the tree line fifteen feet away, his hair and eyes wild, a battle ax held overhead. He looked like some kind of mad troll of ancient legend.
“Damn!” Harald shouted. A few seconds more and the moment would have been perfect, but there was no changing things now. “Go!” he shouted, his command rising up in volume and pitch until it had changed into a piercing war cry. He plunged forward out of the trees, but Starri was already clear of the brush and swinging his sword and ax.
Right ahead of him, Harald saw Nordwall make a shrieking, running attack on the man with the torch, the one who had first come into the stand of trees. That man took a panicked step back and Nordwall began a full- bodied stroke of the ax. Then Nordwall’s foot caught a root and he stumbled and from his left side another of the hunters lunged forward with his spear and caught Nordwall in the pit of his arm and drove the iron point in.
Nordwall was knocked sideways, the spurting blood visible in the light of the torch. His ax came down in a great arc but the force of the spear thrust had knocked him sideways. The blade met only air and Nordwall hit the ground, the spear like a ship’s mast standing straight out of him. He shrieked and clawed at the shaft, and his legs kicked pathetically as if he was still trying to run.
And that was all the attention Harald could spare for Nordwall as he sensed a motion on his right. He turned, sword up. A spear came at him, a man in mail trusting as if he was hunting boar. But Harald was no berserker, he was not blind with fighting rage, and with a deft turn of his wrist he used his sword to knock the spear aside.
Dubh-linn: A Novel of Viking Age Ireland (The Norsemen Saga Book 2) Page 29
