Foxmask

by Juliet Marillier

  “That’ll do,” Thorvald said, trying not to sound too interested. It was important that nobody got any hint of what he intended to do.

  “Very well. Under conditions such as were apparent that day, my guess is that the boat might have traveled somewhat north of due west. Perhaps sharply north. We have no proof that there’s land of any significance to the west, but there are some very strange tales. I heard that a fellow came in to the Northern Isles some time back, in a state of shock so severe it was almost as if he had lost his wits entirely. He was one of our own kind and had sailed the same path as I did, but was blown off course by contrary winds and failed to touch shore in the Light Isles. His words were a stream of nonsense, but he seemed to be telling of a sojourn of two or three seasons on another group of islands further to the northwest. They’d be several days’ sailing from here at least, and maybe considerably more, since we’ve heard so few reports of such a place. One or two other accounts do seem to confirm their existence. That would be the last land to the west, a marginal place. It would be easy to miss it. Should your father’s craft have drifted somewhat northward, it is possible he may have reached that shore.”

  Thorvald’s heart was thumping. “Why was the man in such a state of mind?” he asked eagerly. “Was he deranged by the journey itself, or something more?”

  Tadhg frowned. “My account is third-hand, of course. The fellow was terrified out of his wits; they could get little sense from him. He was frightened of staying by the seashore, as if he expected an enemy to come from the water. He spoke of stealing children, and of some kind of singing. It was quite odd. Very probably his long voyage and the isolation had caused these waking nightmares. It’s not the easiest experience. A man’s faith can be sorely tested.”

  “Yes, well, that’s why you do it, isn’t it?”

  Tadhg smiled. “Indeed. And I will be honest with you, I have often wondered whether such a voyage would change Somerled for the better, as Eyvind hoped it would.”

  “Perhaps he was unable to change,” Thorvald said. He could hear the crunch of Sam’s boots on the path outside. “Maybe he was so evil that he could never redeem himself.”

  “Ah,” Tadhg observed, “while we cannot say what did happen to your father, I can tell you one of God’s most profound truths, and you would be wise to ponder it, Thorvald. No man is quite beyond salvation. God’s grace is in all of us. If nurtured well, that little flame may grow into a radiant goodness. We are all his creatures; we are part of him. To change, all we need do is learn to love him. Even Somerled could do that. You must believe it possible that he did so, in his own way.”

  The arrival of Sam with a string of pale-bellied fish dangling from one hand and his bundle of gear grasped in the other put an end to that conversation. Cups were filled with ale, a meal was cooked, and easy talk flowed: of the weather, of the arrival of new lambs on the brothers’ small farm, of a forthcoming wedding and the death of an old man down at Hafnarvagr. That was where Tadhg was heading: quite a way. Sam offered him a bed for the night, but the priest refused. He’d a lift arranged with a local farmer; indeed, he’d best be heading over there now, before it got too dark. They’d sleep at the fellow’s house and take the cart on in the morning with a load of vegetables and some chickens for the market. Tadhg wiped his plate clean with a scrap of bread, then rose to depart.

  “Remember what I told you, Thorvald,” he said mildly. “Take time to consider. On reflection, a monster can become no more than a fleeting shadow, an unassailable mountain a gentle rise. You are young; you rush to seek answers, heedless of the cost. If you allow time, you may find that all you need to do is wait.”

  Thorvald let him finish. There was no point in arguing. The truth was simple. He bore his father’s legacy, and it marked him as surely as Eyvind’s courage and goodness had marked his small son Kinart. If that child had not been snatched by the sea, he’d doubtless have grown up into the sort of leader folk followed to the ends of the earth. Tadhg had missed the point. To know himself, to look into his own spirit, Thorvald must find out what kind of man his father truly was. And there was only one way that could be done. It was perilous. His mother wouldn’t like it. Sam would take a lot of convincing. Nonetheless, he must attempt it, or forever live with the knowledge that he had not faced up to the truth. If his father still lived, he would find him. It was a quest: grand, challenging, heroic. Do this, and his life might come to mean something after all.

  Sam was not easily surprised. He listened calmly to the story: Margaret, Somerled, Ulf, battles and blood, murder and exile. From time to time he sipped his ale and nodded. Once or twice he frowned. One of the reasons Sam had remained a friend for so long was his talent for calm. He was almost as good a listener as Creidhe, and a lot less inclined to make helpful suggestions when they weren’t wanted. When Thorvald came to the end of the tale, Sam did not comment at once. He poked the fire, topped up his friend’s ale and let a cat in the back door, all in complete silence.

  “You want to borrow the Sea Dove,” he stated eventually, his blue eyes thoughtful.

  “Not exactly,” replied Thorvald, a wave of relief sweeping through him that Sam had understood this part of it without needing to be told. “I’m not enough of a sailor to take her there myself. You’d have to come with me. I could pay you, if that would help.”

  Sam’s brows lifted a little. He took a mouthful of ale. “How long do you plan being away? From full moon to full moon, or maybe a season? Perhaps more if the wind carries you astray? There’s a lot of fish to be caught in such a time, enough to pay for a fellow’s wedding and furnish his cottage nice and snug: best woolens, fine linens, a piece of seasoned wood for a cradle. Enough to cover his hand’s wages. What if the boat’s damaged? That’s my livelihood down there, Thorvald. She may be a sturdy craft, but she’s not made for that kind of ocean voyaging.”

  The words were less than encouraging. On the other hand, there was a certain note in Sam’s voice, and a certain glint in his eye, that showed his interest had been sparked.

  “It needn’t be long.” Thorvald leaned forward, elbows on knees, keen to press what little advantage he had. “Brother Tadhg didn’t seem to think it was very far. We could be there and back again almost before anyone knows it. We could tell them—”

  Sam raised a hand, cutting off the flow of words. “Not so fast. What about when we get there, if we get there? You planning to pop in, announce that you’re this fellow’s son, then sail right home again? What if you can’t find him? What if you do and he wants you to stay? Where does that leave me?”

  The smile that curved Thorvald’s lips felt like a mockery. “I can assure you that won’t happen. I’m not expecting to be greeted with open arms, even supposing we do find what we’re looking for. I’ve no intention at all of staying there. All I want is the answer to a question.”

  “And what question’s that?” Sam asked, stroking the cat, which had curled itself on his lap in a ball of gray-striped contentment, purring like a simmering kettle. But Thorvald did not reply, and the silence lengthened between them.

  ‘I’ll think about it,” Sam said eventually. “But I’ll be straight with you, Thorvald. I can’t see much in it for me, beyond helping an old friend.”

  “One last adventure before you settle down?” Thorvald suggested. “One last foray as a single man? You worry me with your talk of cradles. I did say I’d pay.”

  Sam nodded slowly. “If I agreed, it’d be as a favor to a friend. I’d expect that to be returned some time.”

  “Of course. I’ll do whatever you want,” Thorvald offered eagerly. The fact was, such a favor would be easily repaid, since Sam never asked more of him than a day’s help on the boat or a hand with laying thatch. His friend was easily pleased.

  “Mmm,” Sam said with a funny look in his eyes. “I’ll hold you to that, Thorvald. Give me a day or two to think about this. One thing, though. In open water you’ll need a crew of four, at least. We’d have to get another coup
le of fellows in on it. And they’d certainly want to be paid.”

  “No.” Thorvald had wondered when Sam would get to this; he had known there needed to be a good answer to it, but the look on his friend’s face told him none of those he had thought up was going to be sufficient. “I can’t have anyone else. Asking you to come along is one thing, getting other men to do it is another thing altogether. As soon as we started asking about, the whole island would know. This is secret, Sam. It has to be just you and me. You’ve told me often enough how well the Sea Dove goes under sail. And it’s not very far. We could do it easily. Don’t you go out every day with just your deckhand to help you?”

  “You’re crazy,” Sam said flatly. “I wouldn’t so much as consider it, not without one more man at least. You seem pretty confident about how far it is. I thought we didn’t know that for sure.”

  “Brother Tadhg said a few days’ sail. Folk would hardly get the chance to miss us.” A lie, that, almost certainly. “Come on, Sam. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity: a true adventure.”

  “An adventure isn’t worth having if you never get back to tell the tale,” Sam observed flatly. There was a brief silence.

  “So you won’t even consider it?” Thorvald asked, watching his friend closely. “Not as a test of your boat, or of yourself? Not at any price?”

  Sam’s mouth stretched in a faint grin. “At any price? You’re not as rich as that, Thorvald, however good a farm your mother runs. Now tell me, did you mean what you said about returning the favor? Say I do it, and then what I ask you isn’t to your liking? Will you stay true to what you promised?”

  Thorvald’s heart leaped; evidently there was still hope. “Of course,” he said with complete confidence. He could not think of a thing Sam could ask for that he would not be prepared to deliver. “I gave you my word, didn’t I? I know how much you’ll be risking, Sam. If you do this, I’ll be in your debt forever.”

  “If I do it, I’ll be as mad as you are,” Sam muttered. “Well, I’ll give it some thought and let you know. Maybe we could pick up a crew in the Northern Isles, fellows that don’t know you, if that’s what matters. There’d be a lot to organize.”

  “It must be kept secret,” Thorvald put in quickly. “I’d be stopped if they knew—my mother, Eyvind, any of them. You mustn’t tell Creidhe.”

  “You’re a grown man,” Sam observed, rising to his feet. The cat, dislodged, fell bonelessly to the floor and strolled away unperturbed.

  “All the same. They’d think this foolish, dangerous. They chose not to speak of my father all those years; they made a decision to forget him. It’s hardly likely they’ll want him brought to life now, when he’s so conveniently faded into the mists of memory.”

  “Still,” said Sam, “your mother did tell you.”

  Thorvald shivered. “So she did,” he agreed. “More fool her.”

  “A bit hard on her, aren’t you?”

  Thorvald did not reply, but later, while Sam slept as tranquilly as a babe, he lay awake pondering this, wondering if he had been entirely fair to Margaret. There was no doubt in his mind that she should have told him the truth earlier, not saved it for now, then expected him to absorb, understand and forgive as if this were a small, everyday matter. On the other hand, she’d been young back in those days, younger than he was now. And perhaps Somerled had not been what people said. Perhaps there’d been reasons for what he did, reasons nobody else understood. Maybe he’d been like Thorvald, an outsider, a man with few friends, a person too clever for his own good.

  Thorvald lay staring up at the roof thatch, listening to the purring of the cat as it kneaded the blankets behind Sam’s knees. The fisherman sighed, turning over. Thorvald considered the implications of his plan. There was no doubt he would hurt people he cared about, his mother and Creidhe especially. It was a long voyage, almost certainly longer than he had given Sam to believe, and there were no guarantees of safe landfall. Somerled might not be there; might not ever have been there. He might have perished long since, somewhere out at sea alone in his little boat. When she learned what he had done, Margaret would be horrified. Creidhe would be hurt that he had not confided in her; she was accustomed to sharing his inmost fears, his frustrations, his schemes and plans. This he could not tell her. He must hope she would forgive when he returned. If he returned. One thing was certain. This was a journey he was bound to undertake: bound by his blood.

  TWO

  Three tides on western shores

  Whale harvest, blood tide

  Night of voices, death tide

  Isle of Clouds, fool’s tide

  MONK’S MARGIN NOTE

  Creidhe’s weaving was almost finished, a soft blanket of finest wool, vivid red on deepest blue. The decorative borders with their pattern of foxes, owls and little trees had already been done on the strip-loom; Creidhe would sew the pieces together to produce a seamless effect. Margaret asked her what project she would start on next, but Creidhe could not answer. For some reason there didn’t seem to be a next, not right now. Perhaps she would go to the Northern Isles as her parents wanted, she told her aunt. It might not be a good time to embark on a new piece of work. And there was always the Journey, that very private embroidery which seemed to grow and grow and never quite be finished to her satisfaction.

  “Don’t worry about Thorvald,” Aunt Margaret told her bluntly one afternoon when the two of them were beginning to fasten off the warp threads, working side by side as late afternoon sun slanted in through the open doorway, touching the colored wool to fiery brightness. “He’ll come home when he’s ready. He told you what this is about, I suppose.”

  “Some of it,” Creidhe said awkwardly. It was difficult to approach such a subject, even though Aunt Margaret was a trusted friend. This was not just about secrets, it concerned murder and betrayal, and it was beyond imagining that neat, self-sufficient Margaret, a woman who displayed none of the signs of a passionate nature, had ever been embroiled in such high drama. “I know he’s unhappy,” Creidhe went on. “I’d like to help him, but . . .”

  “A man can’t be helped if he doesn’t want it,” Margaret said. “You’d be best to leave him alone, Creidhe. Thorvald has to work this out for himself. Your father’s right, a trip away would be good for you.”

  Creidhe said nothing. Margaret might think Thorvald was off brooding somewhere and would come home when he’d forgiven her. Creidhe knew better. Thorvald was away visiting Sam again. Sometimes it seemed to Creidhe that Thorvald thought she was stupid, just as he thought the pastimes she loved so much—weaving, sewing, cooking—were women’s pursuits requiring little in the way of cleverness. She knew she was not stupid. She could tell Thorvald was planning an expedition. He was going to find his father, and Sam would be traveling with him; it took two men to sail the Sea Dove. If Margaret had not worked that out, she knew her son less well than she imagined.

  This was going to be a challenge. It might be quite a long way, and Creidhe had never enjoyed the motion of a boat, not even the small faering they used to take out when they were children. But one thing was certain. For all his eighteen years, Thorvald was not very grown up at all, and had no idea how to look after himself. And whatever anyone might say about him, he was deserving of her help, of her love. People looked at Thorvald and saw only the bad side, the gloomy moods, the sudden anger, the silences. Creidhe knew him better. He had been her friend as long as she could remember. He had been there the day Kinart died, a terrible, long-ago day when her parents were too shattered by shock and grief to take heed of their little daughter. Creidhe had stood quietly in the shadows, watching as the cold, pale form of her brother was laid out on the table to be washed and dried, and prayed over and cried over. Margaret had come, and Thorvald with her, himself still a small child. It was Thorvald who had settled by Creidhe’s side, wiped away her tears, warmed her hands in his. It was he who had kept away the terror of the unknown that day when her whole world went awry.

  And later there
were many more times, times when she had been sad or upset and he had heard her catalog of woes in accepting silence, and told her it would be all right. Times when he had got her out of trouble. She could remember a trip out on the lake in a forbidden boat, a capsize, and an embarrassing rescue. If not for Thorvald that day, she might herself have drowned. If not for his help, she’d most certainly have had to go home in wet clothes and confess her stupidity to her parents.

  Then there was the reading and writing, something Creidhe had always found immensely difficult. She’d struggled with Margaret’s lessons, for her attention kept straying to the things she’d rather be doing: baking, embroidery or just being out of doors in the fresh air. Thorvald had helped her then, adding his own unofficial tuition to Margaret’s formal sessions. He’d sit with Creidhe down by the western dike and watch gravely as she made the letters in the earth with a pointed stick. He never got cross when he was teaching her. It was her own fault that she hadn’t been able to learn.

  There was no doubt in Creidhe’s mind that that patient teacher, that kindly child represented the real Thorvald, the essence of the man he would become. Other folk might see him as arrogant, unfeeling, even cruel. There was no doubt he could be all of these. His true face, Creidhe thought, he showed only to those he trusted, and there were precious few of them.

  All the same, right now he was still unpredictable and moody, and still prone to sudden, illogical decisions. He must not undertake such a grand adventure without her by his side.

  Once she had decided this, there were plans to be made. There was no way Thorvald and Sam would agree to take her with them, so she’d have to stow away. That meant finding out when they were leaving and getting to Stensakir the night before. How long would they be gone? Which way were they going? And how could she do it without worrying Eyvind and Nessa half to death?