The Lord of Vik-lo: A Novel of Viking Age Ireland (The Norsemen Saga Book 3)

by James L. Nelson

  Harald nodded and he squatted down again, and again he spoke softly to the girl, and though Thorgrim could not understand the words he could hear the tone in his son’s voice, friendly and with no threat of violence in it. The girl listened. She nodded, she said something, a single word. Then Harald spoke again. Then he paused. And then the girl began to talk.

  Chapter Ten

  Congalach son of Mael Mithig…king of Laigin, plundered Áth Cliath, and took away valuables, and treasure, and much booty.

  Annals of Ulster

  It was a few hours past midnight, the time when vigilance was at its lowest ebb. Lorcan’s horse climbed the gentle slope of the hill overlooking Vík-ló, its hooves making barely a sound on the still-wet sod. Lorcan half expected his arrival would take the watchman by surprise. He thought he might catch the man sleeping, and if he did he would cut his throat. But the watchman must have guessed Lorcan would return with the messenger, and he was waiting. He stepped out of the shadows as Lorcan rode up, said softly, “My Lord Lorcan?”

  Lorcan grunted and climbed down from the horse and the watchman took the reins. The cloud cover had broken up and a quarter moon threw just enough light for Lorcan to make out the shapes of the houses of Cill Mhantáin, what the dubh-gall called Vík-ló, angular and unnatural looking, scattered around the space within the earthen walls. The light from the moon shining on the River Leitrim made a bright pattern in the rippling water that reminded Lorcan of well-polished chainmail in fire light.

  The moon had been a help on Lorcan’s journey from Ráth Naoi, but he had made that ride so often now that he felt certain he could do it even on the darkest of nights. With Ruarc mac Brain spending so much of his time at Tara, Grimarr Giant and his heathen Northmen followers were becoming more of a problem for Lorcan than was the Irish rí ruirech. The more entrenched the dubh-gall became in their ship forts the more they interfered with the politics of Ireland. The more they plundered, the richer they became and the more they altered the landscape of power.

  “Is she here?” Lorcan asked.

  “Yes, Lord,” the watchman said. “I’ll fetch her.” He disappeared into the dark and Lorcan continued to stare hatefully at Vík-ló spread out below him. He had put a stop to all trade with the dubh-gall, hoping to starve them out, but it was a futile gesture; he had known from the start it would be. As long as they had their ships, their cursed, cursed longships, they would not be starved out. His decree had inconvenienced them and no more.

  He heard the sound of soft leather shoes on the grass and once again the watchmen appeared out of the dark, this time leading a young woman behind him. The woman had a great shock of red hair, bound behind, just visible in the moonlight. She was dressed poorly and in the Norse fashion. But Lorcan knew her. Her name was Ronnat and she was Irish, a slave in Vík-ló. Thrall was what the dubh-gall called them; to the Irish she was a cumal.

  The two of them, watchman and cumal, stopped a few feet before Lorcan. The woman bowed low and murmured, “My Lord Lorcan.” Then she straightened and her eyes went to a place just above Lorcan’s shoulder. She was frightened, he could see that, but there was nothing he could do, or cared to do, about it.

  “What have you learned?” Lorcan demanded.

  The mounted messenger had come to his hall at Ráth Naoi, bringing word that there was information to be had from Vík-ló. The messenger had arrived near midnight. Lorcan had set out immediately. He wanted news.

  “There was a girl aboard Fasti’s ship. Grimarr found her. After you…” Her voice trailed off as she looked for a way to describe Lorcan’s defeat without saying as much and so incurring Lorcan’s wrath, but Lorcan did not have the patience for such niceties.

  “Yes, what of her?” he demanded.

  “She…was hidden. Under some boards, on the ship, Lord, and Grimarr thought Fasti must have put her there.”

  “Grimarr found her right after the fight?”

  “Yes, Lord. Before the ship was even towed to Cill Mhantáin.”

  Lorcan looked sharp at the watchman. “And I am only hearing of this now?” he demanded, his voice deep, low, an animal sound which visibly frightened the watchman and the girl.

  “Lord, there was none could speak to her,” the watchman protested, taking a step back. “No one knew if she had aught to say,”

  “There’s but a few in the dubh gall town can speak our language, Lord, few who could speak to her,” the girl said, “and no one was allowed near her. We did not know if she was worth your attention…” The words spilled out as if they might form some defense against Lorcan’s anger but Lorcan waved them away.

  “So why do you send word to me now?” he asked.

  “Some strangers arrived a few days after the fight. Fin gall. One of them could speak Irish, so he questioned the girl. I didn’t hear it myself. Few are allowed near her, and those only dub gall, no Irish.”

  Lorcan grunted and scratched at his beard. He looked up at the watchman and gave a jerk of his head and the man bowed and disappeared into the dark. When Lorcan and the girl were alone again he said, “Go on.”

  “What I heard,” the Irish girl said, “was that when the young fin gall spoke to her, in front of Grimarr Giant and the others, she had a great deal to say. She told them she had served the monks at Fearna and was taken captive there. She said when they were on the ship – she must mean Fasti’s ship – they could see your men following on land and the dubh gall feared an attack so they stopped in the night and hid the plunder ashore. When they went ashore to hide it, Fasti brought her along. She did not know why. But then, when you and your men attacked in the curachs, Fasti hid her under the boards. She understood none of this, but Grimarr thinks it was Fasti’s way of getting word to him where the Fearna treasure was hidden. Even if he was killed in battle. Which he was.”

  “And the girl knows where the treasure is? She told them where to find it?”

  “I do not believe so, Lord. She said she would know the place if she saw it, but she could not tell them where it was.”

  Lorcan stared off toward the glinting moonlight on the water. There were miles upon miles of coast between the place where he had seen them shift the plunder to Fasti’s ship and the River Leitrim where he had had the pleasure of splitting Fasti’s skull. The plunder from Fearna could be anywhere along that rugged shore. Unless one knew exactly where to look for it, it was pointless to even try.

  He sensed the girl shifting nervously but he ignored her. Grimarr Giant, you whore’s son bastard, he thought as he looked toward the dark longphort. Once, he had thought he might work with Grimarr, that together they could defeat Ruarc mac Brain and both enjoy the benefits of Ruarc’s defeat. The Northmen were bold warriors, Lorcan would not deny that. There was no army in that part of Ireland that could stop a force made up of the dubh gall and his own men. All of Ruarc’s lands would fall to their swords.

  They had actually met, Lorcan and some of his chief men riding through the gates of Vík-ló and welcomed by Grimarr and Fasti. The Northmen were not such fools that they were blind to the possibilities. And then it had come to an end, all communication stopped. Lorcan did not know why. It was only some time later that he learned the truth.

  Grimarr’s sons, Sweyn and Svein, had died, killed while in the pay of Irishmen. It had changed Grimarr. Rage had always been a part of who he was, a very big part, but now it seemed to consume him entirely. He would not fight alongside any Irishman, he would not negotiate, he would not even speak to one. Lorcan did not know who had killed Grimarr’s boys, but Grimarr gave the Irish a big portion of the blame, and so what had almost become an alliance became instead a sworn enmity.

  Lorcan had heard stories of the atrocities Grimarr and his men had carried out at Fearna, and it was sickening, even to a man such as himself. For Grimarr, this was no longer about wealth or money, or so it seemed to Lorcan. It was about vengeance. And that was a good thing, because if Grimarr was driven by vengeance he was more likely to do something stupid, somethi
ng that Lorcan could exploit.

  He looked back at the girl, who was still fidgeting. “Is there more?”

  “No, Lord, I was told no more,” she said.

  “Very well,” he said. He lifted the small silver brooch he had been rubbing between his fingers and handed it to her. She took it and he saw her eyes go wide. “You may go,” he said

  She nodded, made a shallow bow, then turned and headed back toward the longphort, her mop of hair glowing dull in the moonlight. How she got in or out he did not know or care, as long as she was able to do so. No one in the longphort knew she spoke the Northman’s tongue, save for the man who had given her the information she had just passed along. She was his link, and happily she could be bought off with trinkets. There were others in Vík-ló who would not be had so cheap.

  So be it, he thought. The means of getting his hands on the Fearna plunder was there, within those earthen walls, no doubt under guard in the big house of the Northman Grimarr Knutson. That plunder represented the wealth Lorcan needed to secure the loyalty of the rí túaithe and the aire forgill. Whatever Lorcan had to pay to discover where it was hidden along the coast, it would be a tithing compared to the treasure’s value.

  Her name was Conandil. Harald had told Grimarr that, and Grimarr showed not the least interest in that fact, acting as if he had not even heard. But the more Conandil spoke, and the more Harald translated, the more Grimarr became very interested indeed.

  Grimarr Giant’s was an odd reaction, Thorgrim could not help but notice. The big man leaned forward, as if trying to physically gobble up every word. As Conandil’s story spooled out, her voice soft and lilting, but strong, steady, not cowed by terror, Grimarr became alternately delighted, angry and suspicious. He glanced nervously around at the assembled men, each of whom was staring at the girl, intrigued and curious. Thorgrim could see he was not pleased to have so many ears listening to this tale.

  Once, as Conandil described going ashore to hide the plunder, Grimarr cut her off with a growl and an upraised hand. He told Harald to silence her. Harald relayed the words, Conandil closed her mouth and then Grimarr did not know what to do next.

  He stared at Conandil and she stared back, meeting his eyes. Grimarr clearly did not want to share this with the others, but he had no choice. Sandarr was his son, Bersi one of his chiefs. They had been on the Fearna raid, which meant part of the plunder was theirs. They had fought Lorcan. They had a right to be privy to this.

  Thorgrim and his party were strangers but the Irish girl could only speak by way of Harald. And Harald’s knowing was as good as Thorgrim and Ornolf’s knowing, or so Grimarr seemed to conclude.

  “Tell her to go on,” he growled at last.

  It was a most interesting tale, to be certain. Thorgrim listened the way he might listen to a skald reciting verse about the exploits of some long dead king. It was entertaining, but it was of no importance to him. He had sworn an oath not to mention it. And, more important perhaps, he had no interest in exploiting any of this. He did not want his men to learn of their proximity to a hoard of silver. He wanted to repair his ship and be on his way.

  Grimarr was as good as his word. Better, even. As the next high tide approached, he sent two dozen of his men down to where Far Voyager was made fast to the shore, the rising water having all but lifted her out of the mud. Grimarr’s men and Thorgrim’s men went aboard, and together handed ashore all the food and water stores, the cargo, the plunder they were bringing back to Vik, the sea chests, the arms and shields and furs and spare cloth. They unshipped the yard and sail and handed that ashore, and the beitass and the oars and the oar gallows as well.

  With the ship thus lightened she rode higher still, entirely free of the mud’s grip, and with planks and rollers and line, with blocks and tackle and the combined strength of eighty men they hauled her up above the tide line, pulled her dripping from the estuary. They made a line fast to her masthead, hove her down and rolled her on her side until the shattered planks were high enough off the ground that Thorgrim and his men could get at them. They cut away the cloth that Starri and the others had bound over the injury, the great bandage to stop sea water from bleeding into the hull, and each man shook his head in amazement that Far Voyager had not gone to the bottom.

  Seasoned oak, along with saws, chisels, mallets, drills, adzes, axes, clench nails arrived at the work site. Anyone might have thought that such generous assistance was a mark of Grimarr’s honor, and an indication of the gratitude he felt for their help in translating the Irish girl’s words. But Thorgrim Night Wolf knew quite a bit about the ways of men and he knew that was not the case. Grimarr was eager to recover the plunder from Fearna, and he would rather the Norwegians were not around when he did so. The faster they could get their ship repaired and be gone, the better for Grimarr Giant.

  There was a man named Aghen who lived in Vík-ló who was a master shipwright in Grimarr’s employ. Grimarr did not, apparently, feel so generous as to order Aghen to help Thorgrim with the work, but he did send him to take a look at the damage and offer suggestions. Thorgrim and the shipwright pushed at the strakes and gauged the depth of the cracks and poked with knives at the wood all around.

  “The planks are sound, not rotten,” Aghen said. “I do not think they need to be replaced. I think if you cut them out to here and here…” he indicated the point where the planks reached to the frames inside the ship, “you can scarf in new pieces. If the work is done well, it will be as strong as the original.”

  Thorgrim nodded. That had been his opinion from the beginning but it was good to hear the same from a man of Aghen’s experience. Thorgrim liked Aghen. He was not a young man, and he carried himself with an air of confidence. Not a boastful, swaggering confidence, but the sort that comes from being a master of one’s craft. They climbed aboard the ship, which was tilting at a forty degree angle as if caught on a frozen wave. They wandered fore and aft, inspecting, discussing, Thorgrim asking Aghen’s opinion on this and that.

  “This is a well-made ship,” Aghen said. “You Norwegians can build good ships, but I perceive this is not one of them. You have made a lot of changes, but if I had to guess, I would say this was Danish built. I would guess it is from Hedeby.”

  “And you may be right,” Thorgrim said. “It was a war prize. I know nothing of where it came from, or where it was built.”

  They set to work the next day, Thorgrim and a gang of men carefully cutting away the smashed strakes while others used hammers and wedges to split oak planks to the right thickness to fill the gap. The rigging was unrove and inspected and in some cases turned end for end. Weapons were cleaned of rust, sharpened and oiled. There were a hundred minor jobs that needed doing and Thorgrim did not want his men sitting idle, or becoming drunk, at least not excessively so. There was too much mischief they could get up to in the Danish longphort. So he kept them at it.

  Harald, who was led by his belly the way a bull is led by the nose, came back around dinner time. He had taken it upon himself to see Conandil, and to offer his services as interpreter if Grimarr needed anything more from her, or if there was something she needed but was unable to communicate. Thorgrim nodded as Harald told him of this largely fruitless exercise, but something in his head was shouting an alarm. Young women in danger seemed to hold a certain attraction to Harald. This was something Thorgrim was coming to understand, and he knew it did not generally end well.

  “Grimarr did not seem much pleased with my being there,” Harald concluded. “He let me talk with her, but not for long, and he did not seem to care what she had to say.”

  Thorgrim nodded. “She’s told him everything she can about the Fearna plunder, and that’s all he cares about as far as she’s concerned. He’s probably afraid she’ll tell you something else that will give you, us…us Norwegians…some advantage over him.”

  Harald frowned. “She’s told him all she knows, as you said.” He paused, wavering over asking the next question. Thorgrim waited.

  �
�What will become of her, do you think?” Harald said at last. “Once Grimarr has the treasure?”

  “I don’t know,” Thorgrim said, but he had a pretty good idea. “Perhaps Grimarr will give her her freedom, if she truly helps him to find this hoard.” He tried for conviction in his voice, but missed the mark. He knew how unlikely it was that Grimarr would set the girl free. Conandil was a thrall, young and healthy, with many years ahead of her. Once Grimarr was done with her she would be off to the slave market at Dubh-linn or Hedeby. She was valuable, and she was Irish, which meant Grimarr would see her as a commodity, nothing more.

  And Harald knew as much. Thorgrim was surprised he even asked the question. He was probably doing the boy a disservice by holding out this unlikely possibility of Conandil’s being freed. He knew Ornolf would scoff at him, tell him he was making the boy weak. But Thorgrim did not care and he could not help himself. He hated to see his son in pain of any sort.

  The days passed and the weather in the wake of the storm was blessedly mild. Thorgrim, a skilled and experienced woodworker, personally saw to the most crucial repairs. With mallet and chisel he feathered the plank ends, working from the lowest damaged plank to the highest, fitting and adjusting, fitting and adjusting, until the existing planks and the new scarfed-in wood overlapped seamlessly. Half a dozen men worked with him while others were set to various tasks that would make their stay in Vík-ló more pleasant and see Far Voyager well set for the rough passage to England and beyond.

  On a patch of open ground near where Far Voyager sat stranded ashore they erected a tall framework over which they stretched the ship’s sail to make a massive tent, a temporary hall in which they could eat and drink and not be beholden to the Danes for hospitality. Beyond this hall they erected tents in a neat row. They dubbed their newly founded village West Agder.

  They had little contact with the Danes. It was not a stand-off, nothing hostile in this segregation that Thorgrim could sense, there was just not much call for any interaction. Thorgrim’s men went about their business, the Danes went about theirs.