The Oathsworn Series Books 1 to 3

by Robert Low

  Others had heard tales from freshly made Norse Christmen, who had gone there and swum across a river called Jordan, tying a knot in the bushes on the far side to prove they were true travellers for the White Christ. The tales were of carpets that flew and how the White Christ turned water into wine, or made a flatbread and a herring feed an army.

  Brother John told us of the incredible number of snakes there, the heat and how the people who ruled it, the Abbasid Arabs, were now the very worst of infidel pagans.

  ‘Worse than us, eh?’ grinned Kvasir.

  ‘Just so,’ answered Brother John soberly. ‘For you at least can be called to see the error and embrace the true God, while these believe in their Mahomet and will kill rather than convert to the true faith.’

  ‘Kill rather than die,’ Sighvat pointed out and Brother John nodded sadly.

  ‘It is to the eternal shame of good Christians that these heathens are in control of the holiest of places.’

  ‘Yet,’ Radoslav pointed out, ‘they have no quarrel with Christmen, I have heard, even though the soldiers of Miklagard are making war on them. They even tolerate the Jewishmen, though that is less trouble-free, for they were ever a hard people to rule. Even the Old Romans never managed it completely.’

  ‘True,’ admitted Brother John and sighed. ‘Omnia mutantor, nos et mutamur in illis – times change and so must we.’

  Finn grunted appreciatively. ‘The Old Romans never ruled us, either. Maybe we can get together with these Jewishmen and give Starkad a smack. If they are like the Jew-men of the Khazars, I know they can fight well enough. They did at Sarkel.’

  ‘Easier to get one of those flying rugs, I am thinking,’ Sighvat said, stroking the head of one of the two remaining ravens, both of which had become almost too tame to be of use. It was unnerving to see Sighvat with one on either shoulder, like some Odin fetch.

  ‘I am hoping we run into Starkad without having to sail to Serkland,’ I pointed out and Amund agreed, saying it was the snakes there that bothered him most. Brother John patted his shoulder.

  ‘That is not a worry at all,’ he declared, ‘for am I not come from the land where all snakes were banished by the blessed Patrick? No snake will bother us, for it knows where my feet have trod.’

  ‘In any case,’ Sighvat added, ‘I have deer antler to hand.’

  Now Brother John looked bemused, so Sighvat told him how a deer cannot get with young until it has eaten a snake and so rush to hunt them whenever they see one. Which is why snakes, in their turn, will run from deer, so that deer horn is a talisman against them and even burning the shavings in a fire will kill serpents with the very smell.

  Brother John nodded and I could see him tuck that away, like the find of a new and strange feather, or shell on the beach. Other Christ priests – Martin, for sure – would have made the sign of the cross to ward off evil and called Sighvat a heathen devil.

  The next day we sweated against a bad wind, so that it took a long, hard sail to finally snug up in the harbour at Larnaca. I approached warily, tacking in almost against an unfavourable wind, so that it could be used to sweep us out if there was any sign that Starkad was there.

  The town was a sprawl of white buildings, Christ churches and a considerable fortress on a hill, while the crescent curve of the sanded bay was studded with tiny fishing boats, all brightly painted and with eyes on the prow, which we had come to note was a Greek warding sign. Behind was what we now realised was the look of all the islands here: grey rock and dust, spattered with grey-green shrubs.

  ‘Pleasant spot,’ Kvasir noted, rubbing his hand and scenting the air, which was laced with the subtle wafts of cooking. ‘I smell drink,’ he added.

  ‘I would curb your thirst,’ Finn growled and nodded to where people were gathering, at once curious and afraid. From the fortress, winding down the short road to the quayside, came a snake of armed men, spears glittering, led by a man on a horse.

  Men muttered and looked to their weapons, but I smiled and pointed to the curled-up cat sleeping under a strung fishing net on the beach.

  ‘There will be no battle here today,’ I said and Sighvat chuckled and nodded. The rest just looked bemused, but Sighvat had remembered. See many strange things in battle. But you never see a cat on a battlefield.

  I had a brief flash of Skarti’s fever-racked face as he shivered in the shieldwall before the pocked-walls of Sarkel, telling me this in ague-stammers after we had both seen, like an Odin sign, a bird fly into that dusty hell of arrows and blood, perching on a siege tower to sing.

  Minutes later, Skarti had an arrow in his throat and never spoke again, so it had been a bad omen for him and maybe he had known it.

  Now I hoped he read the omens true. I had considered the chances of Starkad putting in here and discounted them; he had sent a boatload of men with a letter and would want to avoid being sucked into the quest, would want to sail hard and fast for Serkland and find his monk. I offered prayers to Odin that it would take him time to find out the lie I had told him, time I needed to rob him of this prize that would bring him rushing to us on ground we chose.

  Yet here were soldiers, snaking their way down to the quayside, people parting to let them through. They formed up neatly in two ranks with their studded leather coats and metal helmets, round shields and spears.

  The officer was splendid, in that armour of little metal leaves over leather that they call lamellar and a splendid helmet made to look like it was fashioned from the tusks of a boar, surmounted by a falling wash of horsehair plume.

  ‘You could beat them all with an empty waterskin,’ growled Finn and spat over the side. ‘These are half-soldiers.’

  He was right: half-soldiers, called-out men who were tradesmen most of the time, but issued battle-gear when need or ceremony demanded. I felt easier, until I saw another group, this time a huddle of servants and one of the carrying-seats we knew well from the Great City. I realised, suddenly, that the knees were out of my breeks, my tunic salt-streaked and stained.

  The carrying chair halted and a figure got out, rearranging the folds of his white robes. He was bald save for tufts of grey hair sticking from the sides of his head and clean-shaven but for a wispy lick of beard. That and his flap of ears made him look like a goat, but the officer saluted him smartly enough.

  I had ordered Finn and others into what battle-gear we had, so that they made some appearance, grim being better than ragged. I slid into mail, greasy against almost-bare skin and borrowed a pair of better breeks from Amund, who then had mine, which were shorter in the leg on him. He stood behind the others on deck to hide his shame.

  So I stepped ashore, flanked by mailed men, trying to look like a jarl while the bright sun beat down and the waves slapped. Goat Face stepped forward, glanced around and gave a slight nod.

  I nodded back and he rattled off in Greek. I knew the tongue, though could not write it then, but he spoke so fast that I had to hold up a hand, to slow him down. That stunned him a little, for it seemed an imperious gesture, though I had meant no such thing. Even as he blinked, I realised that he had been asking which one was the leader here, never imagining it could be the most boyish of them all. By cutting him off in midflow, I had announced myself and with some force.

  ‘Speak slowly, please. I am Orm Ruriksson, trader out of the Great City, and this is my ship, Volchok.’

  He raised an eyebrow, cleared his throat and said – slowly – that he was Constantine, the Kephale of Larnaca, which title I knew meant something like a governor.

  The officer removed his helmet, revealing a moon-face and sweat-plastered thinning hair, to present himself, with a nod of the head, as Nikos Tagardis. He was kentarchos here, a chief of several hundred men – though if they were all like the ones sweating and shifting behind him, it wasn’t much of a command.

  They were, it turned out, delighted and relieved to have us, for it seemed that the last time they had been visited by Varangi there had been more trouble about it. Constant
ine remounted his carrying chair and led a little procession of us away from the sea and into the town.

  Behind, I could hear the noise change as the people surged forward and the Oathsworn clattered off the boat, Finn already booming out his few words of Greek. I hoped Radoslav and Brother John did as I had requested and sold only enough cargo to pay what we would owe.

  The town was a deceit from the shore, since most of it lurked, sleepy and hidden, in a hollow between the scrub-covered hills and the sea. But it had a huddle of white houses and crooked alleys, a score of wells and several Christ temples, at least one of which had been a temple to a goddess of the Greeks before that. It even had a theatre, though I did not know what that was then.

  There was also an area I knew was called a forum, which seemed to be a big square surrounded by columns, like a row of trees. It had a big, white building on one side of it, which turned out to be a bathhouse.

  We marched up to it and went in – the rich Greeks liked to trade in a bathhouse and I came to enjoy it more than I did then. Inside, wine was served and my ‘guards’ scowled outside, given only watered ale. Then we spoke of this and that – and previous visitors.

  ‘It was five years ago now,’ said Tagardis, telling of the last visit of my ‘countrymen’. ‘They raided along the coast, but always managed to escape before I arrived with my troops.’

  An escape for you, I thought as I smiled and nodded, for if they had decided to stand and fight, you would not be looking so plump and pleased now.

  ‘In the end,’ he said, looking at me levelly, ‘they got themselves so drunk on pilfered wine that they ran aground and could not easily escape. Those we did not kill languish in our prison to this day.’

  Hitting me on the side of the head would have been a more subtle threat. I lost my smile at that and the Kephale cleared his throat as he saw my face.

  ‘Of course,’ he smoothed, ‘Trader … Ruriksson, is it? Yes. Ruriksson. Yes. He has much more peaceful and profitable reasons for visiting our island, I am certain. What cargo do you carry?’

  He was pleased with the cloth, less so with the spices, which I had suspected would be the case – the best prices for them came the further away from their origin and Cyprus was just this side of too close.

  Then I announced my intention of visiting the Archbishop Honorius and the ears went up like questing hounds, for I had made it sound like I was dropping in on an old friend.

  ‘You know our Archbishop?’ the Kephale asked smoothly, lifting his cold-sweating cup.

  ‘I am paying my respects to him, from Choniates in the Great City,’ I answered casually. ‘I have a letter for him.’

  ‘Architos Choniates?’ asked Tagardis, pausing with cup to lip.

  I nodded, pretended to savour the wine with my eyes closed. Under my lashes, I saw the pair of them exchange knowing looks.

  ‘My commander will no doubt wish to have you presented to him, if you will. Later this evening?’ said Tagardis. ‘The Archbishop will also be there.’

  This was new. I thought he was the commander and said as much.

  He smiled and shook his head. ‘A compliment which I accept gratefully, my friend,’ he said, all teeth and smiles and lies. ‘But I am garrison commander in Larnaca only. The commander of the island’s forces is a general, Leo Balantes.’

  That smacked me in the forehead, though I tried to cover it by coughing on the wine, which was one of those deep-thinking moments my men praised me for; all Greeks think barbarians like us cannot drink wine, or appreciate it when we do. They smiled indulgently.

  Leo Balantes, the one rumoured to have tried to riot the Basileus out of his throne the year before. So this was what had happened to him: a threadbare command at the arse-edge of what a Greek would consider civilisation, surrounded by sea-raiders and infidels.

  I remembered that he was a sword-brother of John Tzimisces, the general they called Red Boots and the one currently commanding the Basileus’s armies at Antioch. That favour had at least prevented Leo from being blinded, the Great City’s preferred method of dealing with awkward commanders.

  We met in a simple room at the top of that solid-square fortress, dining on what seemed to be soldier’s fare – fine for me, though the Kephale and the Archbishop hardly ate. Balantes was square-faced and running to jowl, with forearms like hams and iron-grey hair and eyebrows, the latter as long as spider’s legs.

  He requested the letter, even though it was addressed to Honorius. It seemed, even to me, that we were conspirators, confirmed as Archbishop Honorius, a dried-up stick of a man with too many rings and a face like a ravaged hawk, started to explain the situation and began by looking right and left for hidden listeners. It was almost comical, but the implications of it made me sweat.

  ‘The … package … that you have to deliver to Choniates,’ the Archbishop said, while insects looped through the open shutters and died in a blaze of glory on the sconces, ‘is in the church of the Archangel Michael in Kato Lefkara. It was left in the charge of monks there, to be delivered here.’

  ‘What is it?’ I asked.

  Balantes wiped his mouth with the back of one hand and said, ‘No business of yours. Yours is simply to get it and take it to your master who will take it to Choniates. Where is this Starkad I was told of anyway?’

  ‘Delayed,’ I replied. ‘He has other business.’

  ‘I have heard of his other business – some renegade apostate monk,’ growled Balantes, scowling. ‘I also know you wolves were paid enough for him to put that aside until this task was done.’

  ‘I am here to do it,’ I replied with as mead-honey a grin as I could pour out, spreading my hands to embrace them all. ‘Simply get me the package and I will set sail at once.’

  Now Balantes looked embarrassed.

  ‘Not quite so simple,’ Tagardis said, hesitantly, looking to his chief and back to me. ‘There was … a problem.’

  And he saga-told it all out, like a bad drunk hoiking up too much mead over his neighbours.

  The island had been once jointly ruled by the Great City and the Arabs, which arrangement Nikephoras Phocas had ended by making it clear if the Arabs didn’t pack up their tents and leave, he would kick their burnous-covered arses into the sea. Most had gone. Some had not and one, who called himself Farouk, had taken to raiding from the inland hills.

  ‘Unfortunately, he has grown quite strong,’ Tagardis said. ‘Now he has actually captured the town of Lefkara – Kato Lefkara is a village a little way beyond it and we have had no news from that quarter for several months.’

  ‘How strong has he grown?’ I asked, seeing from which quarter the wind was blowing.

  ‘A hundred or so Saracens,’ Balantes grunted, using the Greek word for them, Sarakenoi. I learned later that this properly referred to the Arabs of the deserts in Serkland, but had come to be used for them all.

  Tearing more mutton on to his plate, he added: ‘The troops I have here outnumber him three to one, so he will not attack. However, he can’t get off, nor can he get help, for my ships are better.’

  ‘I have seen your men,’ I replied, ‘and your ships would only need to stay afloat to be better against a man who has none at all.’

  I watched Tagardis’ lips tighten, then went on, ‘What do you expect from me? I have less than a dozen men.’

  ‘I thought you Varangii counted yourself worth ten of any enemy,’ snapped Tagardis.

  ‘Romanoi, for sure,’ I answered, which was foolish, since there is never anything to be gained from insulting your hosts – but I was young then and enjoyed such things.

  There was a sliding sound as Tagardis pushed his chair back and half rose, face flaming. The Archbishop fanned the air; the Kephale started to bluster.

  Balantes slapped the table with a hand hard as the flat of a blade. There was silence. The General spat gristle and scowled at me. ‘I do not know you and though you look like a boy barely into chin hair, I do you the courtesy of allowing that this Starkad gave you c
ommand because you have talent for one so young. You seem witted enough. If you had more men, could you gain this church and the prize in it?’

  ‘Not if they are the men I have seen,’ I replied. ‘And how do you know this Farouk does not already have your prize?’

  ‘It is well hidden and small,’ the Archbishop declared. ‘It is a leather cylinder, the length of your forearm and slightly fatter than a scroll-case. I will tell you where it is when all is decided.’

  I had no idea what a scroll-case looked like, but still had a fair idea of what to look for. ‘And the men?’

  ‘What say you to fifty Danes?’

  I gaped like a fresh-stunned fish, recovered and managed to grin. ‘If they are the ones who have been in your prison for the last five years, I would say “farewell fifty Danes” and run like wolves were chewing at my backside. They are as likely to rip both of us a second bung hole as fight a Serklander called Farouk.’

  Balantes chuckled. ‘That is your problem.’

  ‘No,’ I said, ‘for fifty angry and armed Danes, I am thinking, are worse to you than all the Farouks on this island.’

  Balantes leaned both meaty arms on the table. ‘For the last five years they have been breaking stones to repair the fortress,’ he said flatly. ‘There is no hope for them, no chance to get off this island other than the one they take now. If they decide to turn renegade, they will have the Sarakenoi and me to fight and there will be no place for them to go.

  ‘They can rampage all they like, steal what they can, but they will be opposed at every turn and die for every mouthful of bread. They may gain riches, but will have nowhere to spend it. There is no way off this island.’

  This last he almost spat at me and I saw then that he was as much a prisoner here as they – which, it seemed to me, made them more Odin-lucky than he.

  I considered it and the more I did the more it seemed as attractive as Loki’s daughter, Hel, her whose bedhangings were Glimmering Misfortune.