The sea met the trench and inched its way along. The sandy walls began to fall away, but not too drastically, and men jumped in with shovels to clear it once again. Foot by foot the water swirled up the trench and then into the hole in which Blood Hawk sat, and up along Blood Hawk’s round, shallow bilge. And then, almost imperceptibly, Blood Hawk moved.
“She swims!” Harald shouted, trying and failing to contain his enthusiasm. “Take up the tension on the ropes!”
The men on the ropes pulled, but not too hard, because it was clear that more water was needed before the ship was truly free of the land’s grip. So they waited some time more, and now and again they tugged, and finally their tug was met with a significant shift from the now-floating ship.
“Haul away! Haul away!” Harald shouted and the men leaned into the ropes and pulled, and none harder than Harald himself. The young man had stripped down to his leggings and Thorgrim could see the muscles stand out on his arms and back and chest and he wondered if the day had finally come that his son was more than his equal in strength.
Lines of men dug feet into the soft sand, and Blood Hawk began to move. A foot, then another, then five feet she eased out of the hole they had dug and into the channel that led to the sea. She was halfway back to the water when she hung up again.
“Quick, you men with shovels, start digging!” Harald called, but Thorgrim stepped up and held up a hand.
“Hold up there,” he said. “Take a rest.” He looked at Harald. “The water is still coming in,” he said. “We’ll be fine.”
And they were. For ten minutes the men sat in the warm sand heaving for breath and just about the time they were breathing normally again Blood Hawk once again lifted off the bottom. Then the men were on their feet and pulling once more, wading out into the shallow water as they heaved on the tow ropes. The tide was still rising when Blood Hawk was finally floating free, back in the sea where she belonged.
Thorgrim and Harald climbed aboard. With the deck planks gone they had an unobstructed view of the bilge strakes and any places where water was coming in along the seams. There were a few such places, but not many, not enough to cause concern.
“We’ll keep an eye on those,” Thorgrim said. “Give them a day to take up, and if they’re still leaking we’ll see about getting some caulking in there.”
Thorgrim had become pretty adept at caulking by then, having spent days pounding whatever he could into the gaps in Sea Hammer planks. When he had done all he could do in that regard, they heaved the ship out until she was floating again and watched as the water seeped in despite all their efforts.
“Well, she’s leaking still, but slow enough that we should be able to throw the water out as fast as it comes in,” Thorgrim announced. They hauled Sea Hammer back onto the beach. Blood Hawk, whose mast, yard and sundry other gear had been restored, was brought near, as was the merchantman that had belonged to the late Brunhard the Frisian slaver. And then once again they waited.
High tide the following day came soon after dawn; the air was still, the seas an oily calm, as ideal conditions as they might ever hope the gods to give. As the water rose around Sea Hammer and lifted the partially tight hull off the sand, the men once again heaved her into the sea, right between Blood Hawk, positioned on her starboard side, and the merchantman to larboard. Between the two ships, hanging off their sides and resting on the sandy bottom, were four of the heaviest cables they had, the shrouds that had once held Sea Hammer’s mast upright.
“Good, good,” Thorgrim said, as Sea Hammer drifted further from the shore and those men who had been pushing on the hull now clambered over the bow. There was nothing left on the beach save for a blackened fire pit and sundry bits of broken wood too small to be of any use. Everything else had been piled aboard the three ships.
“Very well now, heave!” Thorgrim shouted and the men aboard Blood Hawk and the merchant ship leaned into the repurposed shrouds, pulling the slack from them, drawing them up tight against Sea Hammer’s bottom and drawing the ships snug against Sea Hammer’s sides. Along Sea Hammer’s centerline, the Irishmen stood with buckets, helmets, any sort of container they could find, and once the seeping water rose to a depth they could scoop, they filled their buckets and helmets and dumped the water over the side.
Thorgrim was standing on Sea Hammer’s afterdeck. Fifteen feet away, on his right hand, Godi was standing aboard Blood Hawk, and fifteen feet to his left was Harald aboard the merchant ship. Sea Hammer, like a wounded man on a stretcher, was now supported by those two ships, while on their seaward sides the mostly intact vessels had oars run out and double-manned.
“Very well!” Thorgrim shouted. “Back your oars!”
With commendable coordination, the rowers leaned back, dipped their oar blades into the water, then pushed forward, making sternway, backing the three ships away from the beach and into deeper water. Fifty feet from the line where sea met shore Thorgrim ordered the larboard oars to hold, the starboard to pull, and the strange three-ship lash-up slowly turned its collective bow south.
“Pull!” Thorgrim shouted and together the oars on both sides pulled and the three ships began to make headway, parallel to the shore. It was as strange a thing as Thorgrim had ever seen, and it reminded him of one of those water bugs that moved with its long, gangly legs along the surface of a pond. But it seemed to be working. They were making way. The straining ropes between the ships were supporting Sea Hammer, and the Irishmen on bailing duty were able to fling the water out as fast as it came in.
Maybe…
They crawled slowly south along the coast, and soon after, the wide delta at the mouth of the River Slaney opened up on their starboard side. This was now familiar country to Thorgrim. He had spent a day and a half in the curach with a small crew exploring the waters and taking note of the various sandbars lurking like assassins beneath the surface. They had explored the land on the far shore, finding the most suitable for their makeshift shipyard, and pushed up the river, noting useful stands of trees and places they might catch fish, and saw a few small ringforts whose occupants would not be delighted to find Northmen coming ashore so close by.
“Godi, Harald, let’s bear off to starboard a bit,” Thorgrim called. He pulled his tiller toward him and the other men did likewise, and the three ships turned their bows slowly toward the shore.
“Starri, up aloft with you,” Thorgrim called next. Starri was aboard Blood Hawk since Sea Hammer’s mast was down and lying across the deck of the merchant ship, and now he raced aloft and settled himself in.
“Sandbar a little off the starboard bow, Night Wolf!” he called. “We’ll miss it on this heading.”
And so it went, the three ships winding their way through the sandbars, touching once, but with so little force that they were able to back off with ease and continue on. As they crossed the shallow water they could see, a mile to the north, dozens of people on the beach and the dunes watching their progress: the people of the monastery at Beggerin and the fishermen and the men and women who farmed the land and raised sheep and cows. Like the people in the ringforts, they would not be happy to see the Northmen come. Unlike the others, their distaste was tempered by the possibility of heathen silver.
The afternoon was getting on when they finally reached the place that Conandil called Loch Garman. They cast off the lines that bound the ships together and ran them up on the shore as far as they were able. Ships secured, a fire was built and a couple of pigs, lately purchased from the monastery, were set to roast. Thorgrim called Harald and Godi, Conandil and Broccáin to him.
“Well, we made it here and we didn’t sink,” he said. “So the gods have shown us some favor. Now there are four things we must do next. We need to set up some sort of defense, in case the Irish here decide they are tired of us. We need to repair Sea Hammer and Blood Hawk so they’re seaworthy again. We must send some men north to see if, by any chance, Dragon and Fox are still on the beach where they were left. And we must see where we can get o
ur hands on cloth enough to make sails.”
The others nodded and Conandil translated for her husband.
“All four are important,” Godi agreed, “and all are big jobs. Which do we do first?”
“First?” Thorgrim said. “We do all of it first.”
Chapter Five
The crew of eight score ships of Fair foreigners came to do battle….
The Annals of the Four Masters
The end of the rain, and the warm sunshine that followed, did little to lift the mood of Airtre mac Domhnall as he and the hundred or so men under his command made their way back across country to his home at Rath Knock. It was about six miles northeast of Ferns over country that was generally open, with low rolling hills like ocean swells. Airtre was in no great hurry to return.
There were several reasons for that. Foremost, though he would never admit it and generally avoided even thinking it, he was afraid to confess his failure to his wife. She was arguably the more ambitious of the two, the more eager to elevate them in wealth and status. There was little that she herself could do, of course, so it fell to her to encourage Airtre, in most emphatic terms, to advance their cause.
He could picture perfectly his wife’s reaction to the news that he had not secured any part of the legendary Treasure of St. Aiden, which may or may not exist. He saw it as clearly as if it were happening already: the tight lips, the bunched eyebrows, the head tilted to one side as if that would help her hear and understand his tale of barely conceivable failure.
She would say nothing, just let him talk and talk until his words trailed off into some pathetic mumble, and then she would shake her head and probably turn and walk away, making no reply. Letting him wait for her censure. Knowing it would come.
He shook his head now as he rode, driving the image away. Avoiding that scene was the chief reason he was in no hurry to return to Rath Knock, but there were others.
Airtre had his house guard with him, his men-at-arms, and like his wife, they would be looking for some material gain from this adventure. And he had the bóaire under arms as well, the free farmers who owed him military service, more than a hundred armed men. They might be farmers, not trained warriors, but they were young and strong, mostly, and able to make use of their spears and shields.
It was no easy thing to assemble them, get them under arms, and take to the field, nor could he get away with doing so very often. Farms had to be looked after, livestock attended to. If there was an immediate threat to the tuath, Airtre could call them at will, but to do so for the sort of adventuring he was undertaking now was trickier. And it would be a waste, after all that expense and effort, to return empty handed.
Ferns was three miles behind them when he finally came to a decision. He called the captains of his men-at-arms to him. “We will not be returning to Rath Knock directly,” he announced, trying to sound as if this had been his plan all along. “I think a tour of the tuath is in order. We’ll visit the rí túaithe and the aire forgill and we will secure any taxes owed us.”
In the wildly complicated hierarchy of Irish society, Airtre mac Domhnall occupied a place happily closer to the top than the bottom. He was the rí tuath of the land across which he rode, the king of the tuath. Below him were lesser kings, the rí túaithe and below them the aire forgill, the lords of superior testimony. They all owed allegiance to Airtre, and he reckoned, with all these armed men under his command, it would be a good time to remind them of that fact.
But Airtre mac Domhnall was not at the top of this great chain, only near it. Above him was Tuathal mac Máele-Brigte, the rí ruirech, the high king who ruled all of the region of Laigin. The rí ruirech was often a man to be feared, but not in Tuathal’s case. Tuathal was a weak king, and weakness invited others, family in particular, to look for the chance to assume power. It was well known in Laigin and beyond that Tuathal spent all his days trying to tamp down rebellion, and his nights fretting about his inability to do so.
Tuathal’s days were numbered, and while he was busy trying to keep his throne under his bottom and his head on his neck, it was an excellent time for men like Airtre to advance themselves as far as they could. Eventually someone more powerful would assume the station of the high king and put an end to the rí tuaths’ mischief.
For the next week Airtre and his men crossed back and forth over the tuath, stopping at the ringforts of the rí túaithe and the aire forgill who owed Airtre their allegiance. Those minor lords would welcome him and his men with smiles and good cheer, and with varying degrees of success they would hide their resentment at the great quantities of food and ale they consumed. They would hide from Airtre what signs of prosperity they were able to secret away, in hope that their taxes would not be raised in proportion to the rí tuath’s assessment of their wealth.
The ringforts that Airtre and his men visited were not the sorry mounds of grass-covered dirt surrounding some tiny farmhouse and byre. They were high earthen walls, vast circular walls three and four hundred feet in diameter housing well-appointed homes with walls of smooth-finished daub and neatly thatched roofs and big halls in which the ale and wine ran with abandon and the food was plentiful. Airtre and his chief men were well entertained in those places, and in the morning the grudging rí túaithe would provide breakfast for the war band and hand over whatever tax Airtre had concocted and then the small army would wind their way through the gate to their next destination.
It was a good diversion while it lasted, but eventually Airtre found he had run out of raths to visit, rí túaithe on whom he could impose, and he had no choice but to lead his men down the road to Rath Knock. And as he did, his generally buoyant mood began to sink.
It was late afternoon when the footsore men, marching with spears and shields, and the aching, stiff men-at-arms on horseback wended their way up the hill and through the big gate at Rath Knock. They spilled into the open place in the center of the rath, at the far end of which stood Airtre’s own hall. He looked around with satisfaction. Over the past week he had visited the finest raths in his lands, and none was as fine as Rath Knock, not even close. Which was as it should be.
Airtre climbed down from his horse, stiff muscles and chaffed bits of skin protesting. He handed the reins to the groom, conferred with the chief men about the disposition of horses, men, and arms. He glanced up at his own home, standing tall and imposing just beyond the hall. His wife would be there. Waiting. He could not put off the meeting with her.
He bid his farewells to his men and trudged off across the uncharacteristically dry ground to his home. One of the cumals, the female slaves who served in the household, was waiting, holding the door open for him as he stepped through into the dim light of the interior.
His wife was by the hearth, as he expected she would be, her dark hair flowing down either side of her tall, trim body. A good-looking woman, a beautiful woman. Airtre was not the only man to have been smitten by her; he was simply the wealthiest.
“Lassar, you look well,” Airtre began.
“I looked for your return a week past,” his wife said.
Airtre gave a wave of his hand. “It has been some time since I paid visit to the rí túaithe; I thought it was time.”
Lassar nodded, a knowing expression. She was perfectly aware of everything that had happened over the past week, of that Airtre was certain. She was only toying with him, making him say it. How she knew such things he could not imagine, but she always did. Sometimes he wondered if there was magic involved, if she was able to conjure spells, and that made him more nervous still.
“Tell me…” Lassar began, but her words were cut short by some activity just beyond the door. Then the cumal was there, bowing.
“Lord, there is a messenger here who begs word with you.”
“Very well,” Airtre said, sounding annoyed though he was in fact pleased at this interruption. “Send him in.”
A young man entered, mud-splattered and weary-looking, spurs on his feet, his cape tattered at the ed
ges. He bowed before Airtre then stood and spoke.
“Lord, I’ve been looking for you these past four days,” he said. “Covered half the tuath searching you out.”
“Yes, to what end?” Airtre asked.
“Well, lord…to the south of here, at the long stretch of beach, just south of the point at Cahore, there are two of the Northmen’s longships, lord, right on the beach.”
The word Northmen was not one Airtre liked to hear. It was a word no one in Ireland liked to hear. He frowned.
“Northmen? Two ships? Is there word of raiding? How many are there? Two ships, that is like to be near one hundred men.” His mind was already weighing odds, figuring the time it would take to call up even more of his own men to meet this threat.
“No Northmen, lord, just the ships.”
“Just…the ships?”
“Yes, lord. I saw them myself,” the messenger said. “Went right up to them. There are two ships up on the beach. Pulled high up from the water’s edge. No one there, no Northmen, not even dead ones. No word of any raiding in the countryside. Just the ships.”
Airtre straightened a bit and frowned deeper. Two ships, up on the beach?
“Do they seem damaged?” Airtre asked. “Might they have been damaged in the last storm, their men swept overboard?”
The messenger shook his head. “No damage that I could see, lord. I have no great knowledge of such things, but I saw no holes in the sides, and the masts still stood. The oars were in the bottoms as if laid there quite on purpose.”
This was odder still. Two ships, intact, but with no crews that any human eyes had seen. Airtre felt a little chill run through him. This could be something very wicked indeed.
Or it could be an opportunity. If these really were two ships abandoned by the heathens for some reason, then they might be put to some good use. His mind began to pick through various ideas. He could man the ships, row them up the River Slaney to Ferns, attack the monastery that way. If he picked clever men they might even pretend to be Northmen, and if they got away with that it could make him wealthy and save him considerable trouble as well.
Loch Garman: A Novel of Viking Age Ireland (The Norsemen Saga Book 7) Page 5
