A Crown of Flames

by Pauline Creeden

  “Who wrote this?” she cried.

  “Your father did, on behalf of the Queen. I know that much.”

  Dyrfinna made a strangled noise, staring again at the sheet. Yes, that was her father’s signature at the bottom.

  “What is it, Sissy?” Aesa asked, her little hands on Dyrfinna’s arm.

  Dyrfinna took a deep breath so she could answer her sister without screaming. “It’s a letter saying… that I’ve been exiled. For the rest of my life.”

  She looked at Ulf, mouth open, wanting to scream, How could he do this? How could he do this?

  “Exiled? What’s that word mean?” Aesa asked.

  The parchment rattled in Dyrfinna’s hands. She took a breath, tried her best to still them. Her heart was hammering too hard. “It means I can’t ever go home again. I can’t ever go back to Skala. Ever.”

  But she could not say—here, in front of her little sister—was what that final sentence of the proclamation said.

  “Wherefore, if the above-named ever or at any times falls into the power of Queen Saehildr by returning to Skala, such a one shall have her head struck from her body by the sword until she die.”

  Dyrfinna had seen these executions. She would be led in chains to the city square, forced to kneel before a block, and the executioner would come out with an axe.

  Their axe strokes were seldom true, even when wielded by an expert. It usually took at least two blows. Sometimes three or four, when things went wrong.

  And their own father had signed this warrant.

  3

  The Charm

  It was late at night and Aesa couldn’t sleep. She was too excited about going home to Mommy and sailing on a big ship and though she was not entirely comfortable because the ship was a little scary.

  Dyrfinna couldn’t sleep either, but she couldn’t tell Aesa her reasons.

  Dyrfinna was able to tuck her in, under a canopy of sailcloth that some sailor rigged for her. She sat with her little sister, stroking her hair until she fell asleep, snuggled in among some extra sailcloth. Only then did Dyrfinna get up to call a counsel together on her ship.

  Dyrfinna had been going back and forth on the other two boats, getting a chain of command set up, making plans for whatever would come next on the voyage. She’d set up battle practice on the ships, and she put people in charge of that. She led fighting drills. She talked about battle tactics.

  But Aesa kept clowning around all day. Or she’d sit next to Dyrfinna and make sad pouty faces. Or she’d complain about how Sissy needed to pay attention to her.

  “She’s just not used to this,” Dyrfinna said to herself, but she was a little annoyed with her sister. The sooner she got her home to Mama, the better.

  Except Dyrfinna had been permanently exiled.

  She met with the people she’d chosen for leadership positions.

  “First, I can’t return to Skala,” she said. “I’ve been exiled; they’ll kill me. I guess Papa heard I survived and decided to write his little proclamation. And we have another problem with approaching Skala directly.”

  “What’s that?”

  Dyrfinna frowned, thinking. “You are the Queen’s troops, having been held prisoner,” she said. “Skuld has directed us to seek out the location of the dragon’s burial mountain, find Nauma, and stop her as quickly as possible. But I believe the Queen would choose to recall you into her army. You enlisted in her army at the beginning of the war, and in the army you must serve until your term of enlistment runs out.”

  “We could all run away,” said one of the soldiers. “If that’s the case, let’s desert her army.”

  The others frowned at him.

  “Absolutely not. I made an oath to the Queen to fight for her,” someone said. “I’m not going to desert her army. Anyway, they kill deserters. Deserting brings shame onto your family.”

  “We can ask her to release us from the terms of that agreement.”

  “She might not do it,” somebody warned. “And then who would go to take out Nauma as she deserves? For if the queen took all of us back into her army, Dyrfinna would have nobody to go into battle against Nauma.”

  “Should we split up the forces?” Dyrfinna asked. “A certain number of you believe strongly that we should seek out Nauma, but most of you will stay true to the oath you gave before the queen. I can respect that, even though splitting our forces would leave us at a distinct numerical disadvantage.”

  “Understatement,” somebody said.

  Ulf, the ship’s captain, spoke up. “Perhaps those of you who are fulfilling your oath can go before the Queen, as is proper, tell her of this new danger, tell her the goddess Skuld bade us go on this journey, and ask her to join this expedition to stop Nauma in her tracks. I hate to not go straight out into the wide world and seek Nauma out, but an oath must never be broken.”

  “We need to approach the city cautiously,” Dyrfinna said. “This task that we have been charged with is a great one, and we can’t deviate from this path. If we can get any help from the Queen, we should. But I don’t know if we’ll be able to convince her of the importance of this mission.”

  “I’m convinced,” said one of her crewman. He looked around at the others, who all nodded. “I want to get Gefjun back. Even if it also means getting King Varinn back.”

  Dyrfinna smiled. She didn’t tell them that she had pledged fealty to the Moorish king. “The king has treated me with respect, though he had the perfect right to have me bound in chains and thrown into his dungeon.”

  “I bet that’s only because Gefjun interceded,” someone else stated.

  “True,” she said. “But he didn’t have to listen to her at all. It was his right.”

  The ship sailed on for two days, getting closer and closer to Skala. Dyrfinna, who was not usually one to brood, was now brooding.

  “What’s wrong?” Aesa said, sitting down beside her.

  Dyrfinna sighed but decided to come out with the truth. Part of it, anyway. “I can’t go home to Skala, because then I’ll get in big trouble.”

  Aesa got a big frown on her face, instantly skeptical. “Well, then, kill them. Then you’re not in trouble anymore.”

  “It’s… not that easy.”

  “Then wear a disguise, silly.”

  “Those never work.”

  “Nuh-uh! Not in every story you’ve told me. It always works.”

  Ragnarok, sitting next to them, rumbled, “Dress like a man.”

  “I can’t grow a beard.”

  “Not every man has a beard, if you haven’t noticed.”

  Dyrfinna sat down next to him. “But I don’t have a big knot on my throat like you men do.”

  “Look at my cloak,” Ragnarok said, patting his brooch that held it on. “Just pin your cloak up a little higher to hide your neck. And we can bleach your hair, easy. We’ll make you into a pretty blonde boy.”

  “I have a fine hat,” said one of the crewmen, taking it off his head and putting it on hers.

  “Hey, no,” Dyrfinna said, pushing it aside. “I hope you don’t have lice.”

  He shrugged. “We all have lice.”

  Dyrfinna sighed. “True enough.” She let him plunk the hat on her head.

  Somebody else horned in. “We can change your clothes.”

  “I can fix your shoes and make you much taller,” said a crewman who happened to be a cobbler.

  Aesa clapped her hands. “Yay! You’re going to be so pretty!”

  Ragnarok roared with laughter. “Ah, little flower, I wouldn’t go that far.”

  Pretty soon Dyrfinna looked at herself in a piece of polished silver—or rather, she looked at a blonde, frazzle-haired bumpkin with a black tooth.

  “I am not entirely convinced that this is a wise choice,” she said.

  The cobbler fixed up her shoes with a riser inside and thicker soles on their bottoms, which brought her almost eye-to-eye with the rest of her men.

  “Now this? I like this a lot,” Dyrfinna said. One
of her men made a face at her and she made it right back, on his level. “Arr.”

  They modified her outfit. The things that Dyrfinna swore she’d never wear—a garish chain, a leather hat—she wore them now.

  “I pray to Freyja that I never meet myself on the street,” she muttered, looking down at those black leggings she wore under her green kilt. “I’m scaring myself to death. This is terrible.”

  “One more thing,” Ragnarok said, his eyes wandering away to another corner of the sky. “You can’t wear your sword. They’ll recognize you right away from your sword.”

  Dyrfinna gaped. For a moment, she was nearly about to proclaim that she was not going anywhere without that sword. Her sword fit into her hand like no other, and helped to make her the warrior she was.

  But Ragnarok said, “Carry mine, and I’ll carry yours. Aesa, you can tell people that the sword went to you and that you chose me to carry it home for you.”

  “I’ll carry it,” said Aesa, not understanding what Ragnarok meant.

  “I’m in disguise, honey,” Dyrfinna said. “If anybody asks you why Ragnaork is carrying my sword, tell them it’s because you wanted him to keep it safe for me.”

  Aesa balled up her little hands. “No!” she said. “Sissy’s sword killed that bad wolf for me. I’m going to carry it!”

  Dyrfinna shrugged. “Well, okay, then.” She realized that Aesa carrying the sword would actually work better. She’d be bringing her sissy’s sword back home to her mama. “You have to stay with Ragnarok,” Dyrfinna said. “I will be somewhere else in the crowd, surrounded by people. We can’t look at each other, just in case somebody sees the two of us looking at each other and realizes it’s me.”

  Ulf had been watching all this with an amused smile on his face. He put a hand on Dyrfinna’s shoulder. “Now, Scarecrow, I can do a little thing that will keep you from having to dress in a way that’s going to draw all the attention to yourself.”

  “Oh, if you could, I would appreciate it,” Dyrfinna said, making yet another a face at herself in the polished silver.

  “It’s a little charm. Look at me, please,” Ulf asked.

  He took her face in both hands and then began singing. When his song ended, he released her face – and the people around Dyrfinna gasped.

  “Sissy, Sissy!” Aesa cried, amazed. “He changed your face! He changed your face!”

  Now when Dyrfinna looked into the polished piece of silver, she was shocked to see a slim young man looking back at her. He was still beardless, and resembled her a little, but he had more of a square-cut face and an Adam’s apple. She touched her fingers to her neck but could not feel it, even though the reflection looked like she was touching it.

  “Isn’t that a good charm?” asked Ulf proudly. “Now you can go with us to see the queen and watch what they say and not be called out.”

  “Then I am going to find clothes more worthy of a young man of means,” Dyrfinna muttered, pulling the awful hat off her head, “instead of dressing like a scarecrow. Wait a moment, Ulf. Why didn’t you put that charm on my face in the first place? Why’d you wait for me to dress like a raving lunatic before you said anything?”

  Ulf grinned. “For the entertainment value.”

  She thwacked him with the hat in her hand.

  Soon Dyrfinna was dressed in fine clothes. Ulf braided her bright-blonde hair so it looked like a man’s. Her transformation into a young Norsk man was complete.

  “I can’t get used to my hair being this color, though,” she said, rolling a braid between her fingers. “It looks all washed out.”

  “I think you’re pretty,” said Aesa, running her hand through her braids.

  “Aw, chipmunk,” Dyrfinna said, and gave her a big hug.

  The ships came into view of Skala. Cheers began to rise from the ships… and then stopped as the city inside the walls came into their view.

  The stink of cinders filled the air.

  About half of Skala was burned, the houses and lovely gardens that adorned them were nothing but ashes and cinders and wreckage. Some houses were still smoldering, sending up smoke that lay heavy across the town.

  Some groans arose when crewmen noted that their part of the city had been burned.

  “This is not the homecoming we wanted,” Dyrfinna muttered.

  4

  A Sad Homecoming

  The guardian dragon came flying out of the city toward the ship, the wind hissing in her wings like fire, and the garnet-red of her scales glowed as if flames ran underneath them. Dyrfinna lowered her hat over her eyes, as the rest of the crew cheered the dragon who flew over her ships. Each beat of the dragon’s wings blew heated air over them.

  Ulf, the captain, hailed the dragon. “We are citizens of your city, of glorious Skala. We were all imprisoned by King Varinn, but now we’ve returned, and we’re home!” Everybody cheered again.

  “Well met, Ulf!” the dragonrider called as his dragon slowly circled the ship. “I see a lot of familiar faces here. This is a great day. A lot of people will rejoice tonight to see you. Come to the docks!” Then the dragon circled and flew with them into the docks of the city.

  At the sight of the ships, people began running down the hill toward them, calling and shouting to their friends and family, “Three ships are here! Come and see!” The cries of women and children came to Dyrfinna as the ships slowly glided into the docks and people began crowding at the wharf. The people on board the ships called to the people on shore, “Honey, hello, I missed you, I’m home now.” Everyone on the ships was hungry to see their loved ones again.

  But the people on shore were eager to see their sweethearts and husbands and fathers and aunts and sisters again. Most everybody on the ships had been a prisoner of King Varinn for a long time, so everyone craned their necks to see if they could spot someone they’d been worried about.

  And yet their joy was muted as they climbed out of their ships, because now that they were in Skala, it was clear how great the damage of the fire had been.

  Dyrfinna, in her disguise, hung back in the crowd. Aesa was with Ragnarok and he was taking her to Mama. Somebody pointed her out to Ragnarok. He lifted a hand and waved her over, his eyes wandering off again.

  “Mama, Mama, Mama!” Aesa screamed, running to her, arms wide. Mama came running and scooped up Aesa, both of them hugging and crying.

  Dyrfinna turned away to hide her tears. Aesa was home again, safe in their mama’s arms. She longed with all her heart to go to her mother and see her again, tell her who she was, but she held back, stayed silent. At least Aesa could tell Mama that she was safe.

  Her friend Ulf nodded at the group of friends who stood near him, including Dyrfinna. Then he raised his hand for silence from the crowd. “We need to seek an audience with the queen. We have been captives at King Varinn’s court, but he has released us because a new danger has come to us all. We must talk to the queen about it.”

  A few of the queen’s guards were in the crowd. “Come with us,” one of them called. “We’ll take you up and let her know you need to speak to her.”

  “Who’s this one?” said one of the guards, pointing at Dyrfinna.

  Dyrfinna swallowed and dropped her eyes. She used to spar with this guard back in the long-ago days when Thora, the queen’s daughter, had invited them over for visits.

  “A fellow prisoner,” Ulf explained. “King Varinn captured him in an attack on the Danes a long time ago, but he was such trouble to the king over the years that he was finally thrown in with the prisoners. He has sworn fealty to our cause.” Dyrfinna bowed respectfully.

  One of the women guards, who Dyrfinna knew as a flirt, winked at her and blew her a kiss. Dyrfinna felt herself blush and looked at her feet. The disguise-charm must have been working very well. This guard had always been nothing but business around Dyrfinna in her regular form.

  Ulf’s wife and children came running up. “Daddy, Daddy!” the children shouted, though the wide-eyed toddler in his wife’s arms ju
st stared at him as if not sure what to think.

  There were hugs and kisses all around with Ulf and his family. “Come with me,” he urged his family, hugging all of them tight. “We need to go see Queen Saehildr. Maybe the queen will give you a little gift.”

  Dyrfinna half-smiled, but it vanished. Varinn had said that the queen had killed his son—only a little boy, five years old—and fed the king his heart. She looked away from the little ones, sickened ... but also confused. Dyrfinna had known the queen for most of her life as a distant benevolent figure, and she’d known her daughter Thora very well. But all the things she’d known about the queen didn’t fit with this idea of a woman who would do such a gruesome and sickening thing.

  They started up the long slope where the city of Skala sat, on the side of a mountain that rose up slowly. Houses set in tiers that followed the streets, up and up until it reached the queen’s keep at the top of the great slope. Beyond that stood Mt. Pyrr, the great mountain a little distance away that had been a landmark in Dyrfinna’s world for all of her life.

  But the streets in this part of the city were desolate and filled with ashes, and everybody’s voices fell silent as they walked through the ruined houses and burned gardens.

  “They came in, straight through town,” Ulf’s wife was saying, “and they were pursued by an orange emberdragon.”

  Dyrfinna’s heart dropped. So Papa Ostryg’s story had been true.

  Ulf’s wife lowered her voice. “But the dragon didn’t burn the town, as some people say. It was Papa Ostryg’s people, setting fire to the houses of people they hated.”

  Dyrfinna’s eyes widened.

  Other people in their group were whispering.

  “Papa Ostryg wanted to make it seem like Finna burned the town,” Ulf’s wife said.

  Dyrfinna cleared her throat. “I heard that Papa you keep talking about was finally killed by her dragon, just outside of Varinn’s keep. The dragon ate him.”