“Tell him Grimarr and the other ships will be setting sail, and they will overtake us if we try to row away.” Ronnat translated. Lorcan scowled. This ship-board world was a strange and new thing to Lorcan, and his unfamiliarity meant that he had to yield a good bit of control to Sandarr, and Sandarr suspected he did not like that. The rowing, at least, was something Lorcan could understand. Once the sail was set, they might as well sprout wings and lift off the water like a gull, so unfamiliar would Lorcan be with that process.
For a half a minute Lorcan said nothing as he vacillated with indecision. Then Sandarr said, “Tell Lorcan I need him here, I need him to take the tiller.” Ronnat translated. Lorcan looked uncertain, but Sandarr stepped aside and gestured toward the oak bar that controlled the rudder and Lorcan stepped up and rested his hands on it, the way Sandarr had been doing.
“Tell him to hold it steady while I see to the sail,” Sandarr said. In truth he did not need Lorcan to hold the tiller. Anyone could have held the tiller. They could have just tied it in place, for that matter. But this way Lorcan was kept occupied and out of the way, and made to feel as if he was in control of things. Sandarr nodded at the big Irishman, then he and Ronnat headed forward.
There were enough men aboard that Sandarr did not have to stop the rowing in order to set the sail. With Ronnat’s help he called for those men not occupied at the oars to cast off the gaskets that held the sail furled to the yard, and then clap onto the halyard to hoist it aloft. More men were sent to the braces, with Sandarr actually placing the ropes in their hands, and the yard was hauled near fore and aft until the ship lay on a larboard tack. Then Sandarr saw to rigging out the beitass to hold down the windward corner of the sail.
“Tell the rowers to pull the oars in,” Sandarr said. Ronnat passed on the order but her voice could barely be heard above the breeze and the sound of the water along the hull. Sandarr repeated the words as best he could and mangled though the pronunciation might have been, his instructions were understood. The long oars came inboard and Sandarr pointed to the tall gallows forward of the mast. The rowers stood, moving awkwardly with the strange new motion of the ship, their entire world canted to leeward, and set the oars up on the rack and lashed them down.
Sandarr heard a snapping of cloth and looked up at the weather leech of the square sail. It was starting to curl, the ship turning too far up into the wind. Sandarr wasted no more than a few seconds wondering how to tell Lorcan what to do before he realized there was no way he could. He turned and ran aft, bounding up to the afterdeck and taking the tiller from Lorcan’s hands. He pulled it back and Water Stallion turned to leeward and the curl in the sail straightened as the wind came aft once more.
He looked at Lorcan. He did not look happy.
The rest of the men did not look happy either, but their discomfort came from other sources. Water Stallion was heeling now, her starboard rail nearly scooping the seas, the sail and rigging straining as they held the growing breeze. To a mariner such as Sandarr it was a beautiful thing. The ship was alive beneath his feet. But to the Irish, farmers and soldiers and various other breeds of landsmen all, it was frightening, the ship seemingly on the edge of control, racing through an element in which they could not live.
Sandarr could see the discomfort on their faces. And it only grew worse as here and there men started vomiting on the deck. He wanted to tell Ronnat to tell them to puke over the leeward side, but he did not think they would be willing to lean their heads over the sea, and besides, Ronnat was not looking too well herself.
Once again Sandarr looked astern. Half a mile separated Water Stallion from the other vessels, and still no one was coming in pursuit. Rather, the three ships in their wake seemed to be engaged in some elaborate dance, spinning around one another in an odd, silent ritual. He had no idea of what they might be doing, and he did not care. He did not think there was any chance Water Stallion would be taken now.
He shifted his gaze out to windward. The overcast had lifted a bit and he could see for several miles at least. He liked what he saw, which was nothing, an empty sea, a succession of low rollers, nothing to cause any concern. He breathed deep. He felt happier than he had felt in a long, long time. The land was all confusion and treachery and hurt. The sea was just the sea. Pure. Dangerous but uncomplicated.
Water Stallion stood on for the better part of an hour, Sandarr lost in his thoughts, driving the ship along close-hauled, making five or six knots on a course that took them directly away from the shore. The plan they had agreed upon was to head north along the coast, to bring the ship into a river that would let them get close to Ráth Naoi, Lorcan’s ringfort, and there figure what to do next. It was Sandarr’s intention to stand well out to sea and then tack. With the wind as it was, they would reach far up the coast before they had to tack again, and by making long boards they would only have to do that a few times before they fetched the river mouth. Since no one else aboard understood such maritime considerations, they did not argue, and Sandarr did not think they would.
But once again he was wrong.
Lorcan’s voice pulled Sandarr from his thoughts, his words like some animal’s grunting.
“Lorcan says we are getting too far from land,” Ronnat said.
Sandarr looked over at Lorcan and then at the men huddled on the deck. He could see concern on their faces, concern that was approaching fear. Some were craning their necks to look aft at the gray hump of Irish shore they were quickly leaving astern. None of them seemed to be enjoying this as Sandarr was.
“Tell Lorcan we must head out to sea, and then turn back to land. It is the only way we can sail north.”
Ronnat translated. She did not look any happier than the rest, and Sandarr did not like the tone he heard in her voice.
Lorcan listened and took half a minute to digest the words. Then he replied and Ronnat said, “Lorcan says you are to turn the ship now.” There was no equivocation in her voice, and none in the expression on Lorcan’s face.
“Ask Lorcan what, by all the gods, he thinks he knows about any of this,” Sandarr said. “Tell him if he is afraid he can go and sit with the others and I will call him when I need him.”
Ronnat did not translate. She just glared at Sandarr. And then she said again, slower this time, “Lorcan says you are to turn the ship…now.”
Sandarr looked from her face to Lorcan and back to hers. They were frightened, heading so far out to sea. Worse still, the further they sailed from shore the more dependent they were on his expertise. Him, a Norseman, whose trustworthiness would always be in question. Way out on the deep water, under the power of the mysterious sail, Lorcan was no longer in control and he did not like it. Even Ronnat, whom Sandarr had always thought of as an ally, was no longer on his side.
And that left him with very little room to maneuver.
“Very well,” Sandarr said. “We will never reach the river by nightfall if you will not listen to me, but I suppose I am not in command here. Lorcan, take the tiller and put her about when I give the word.”
He stepped aside as Ronnat relayed the instructions. He knew that she would not know how to translate them, and Lorcan would not understand them even if she did. But that was fine with Sandarr. A little humiliation dumped on Lorcan’s head would remind the great Irish ox that he knew nothing of ships and the sea.
Lorcan stepped over and took the tiller. Sandarr could see him struggling to wipe the uncertainty from his face. Without a word, Sandarr went forward and pointed to half a dozen men on the larboard side and directed them to the larboard brace, and a few more he sent to the starboard brace. Others were ordered by way of gesture to the leeward sheet and he personally went forward to where the tack was rove through the beitass and made fast to a cleat inboard.
“Very well, Ronnat, tell Lorcan to put the helm a’lee!” Sandarr shouted, but Ronnat just stood there, silent, unsure of what any of that meant, and even more unsure of how to render it into Irish. Lorcan looked equally confused.
<
br /> “Helm a’lee! Come up into the wind, we are coming about!” Sandarr shouted, the clarification utterly and purposefully unhelpful. Still no one reacted. With exaggerated exasperation, Sandarr stamped aft and pulled the tiller from Lorcan’s hand and pushed it forward. Water Stallion swung up into the wind, turning nimbly with the considerable momentum she carried, the square sail flogging as it came edge to the wind, then coming aback as the wind got on the wrong side.
The ship began to turn faster and to heel to leeward. Sandarr straightened the rudder and made his impatience evident as he gestured for Lorcan to take the helm again. Lorcan did, holding it steady, and Sandarr stamped forward, casting off the starboard brace, waving his hand to the men at the larboard brace to indicate they should haul away, taking the tack in hand and casting it off.
Everything was confusion and chaos, that much was clear to even the most land-bound aboard. Slowly the yard came around, the hauling made difficult by the wind on the wrong side of the sail. Then the sail began to flog once more as the edge passed through the wind, and then it filled on the starboard tack and was quiet and Sandarr gestured for the men to make the sheets fast and to help him shift the beitass to the starboard side.
All in all it was an ugly, unseamanlike and uncoordinated maneuver, and Sandarr hoped it made the point, loud and clear, that they could not sail the ship without him. He remained amidships, showing the men how to set things to rights, coiling the lines, adjusting braces, sheets and tacks, driving home the truth that when it came to working the vessel, he alone possessed the magic, he was the indispensable one.
It was twenty minutes after they had tacked that Sandarr looked aft again. Lorcan was still at the tiller, and he was pushing it just a bit and testing how the ship reacted, then pulling it and doing the same. Tiny adjustments to the ship’s course, but Sandarr could see in his face and in his stance that he was unraveling the mystery of this thing, this rudder, this ship.
The Irishman looked up at the sail, and out to weather, and Sandarr thought, Oh, no, you great ox, don’t start thinking you have any notion of how to run a ship on your own…
Sandarr turned and looked back toward the now-distant beach from which they had come. One of the other ships was underway at last, the Norwegians’ ship. Their sail was set and they were on a course to weather the headland and no doubt continue north, back to Vík-ló. They seemed to be paying no attention to Water Stallion and Sandarr did not imagine they would. The Norwegians had no dog in this fight.
The other ships, his father’s Eagle’s Wing and Fox, were still hovering off the beach as if unsure of what course to take. Sandarr had every expectation that they would come in relentless pursuit of Water Stallion. Certainly Bersi would be advocating for such a thing, if he was still alive. But they did not appear to be doing any such thing.
Next, Sandarr looked forward, beyond Water Stallion’s bow. There was something small and light-colored moving against the dark swath of land. He thought it was a sea bird at first, but then realized it was moving too slow to be that. He let his eyes rest on it, wondering what it was. And then he realized it was a sail, a small one, probably one of those Irish boats, those curachs, with a mast and sail rigged. That was unusual; the Irish were generally happier rowing rather than sailing, but not so very unusual as to warrant consideration.
Sandarr spared no more thought for the Norwegians or the curach. He had bigger concerns. Lorcan seemed to be getting his sea legs, or at least he seemed to think he was, which for all practical purposes was the same thing. With every fathom of distance they closed with the shore, the Irishman’s confidence appeared to grow, his fear of the ship and the sea to diminish.
And that begged the question, one that Sandarr could not help but contemplate; If Lorcan thinks he can sail this ship himself, then what need will he have of me?
He was mulling those uncomfortable thoughts when Ronnat appeared at his side. “Lorcan would have a word with you,” she said, then turned and walked aft without waiting for a reply, confident, apparently, that Sandarr would follow.
And he did, because he could see no advantage in not doing so. He stepped up onto the afterdeck. Lorcan was holding the tiller, his eyes moving from the sail to the windward horizon to the shore that stretched away down the larboard side, his massive arms making small, almost delicate adjustments to the helm. He spoke.
“What ship is that?” Ronnat translated. She pointed toward the lone vessel standing out toward the headland. It was several miles away, but clearly seen, even as the sun was starting to grow lower in the west.
“That is the Norwegian ship,” Sandarr said.
“Why does she sail off on her own?” Lorcan asked and Ronnat translated.
“I don’t know,” Sandarr said, “save that they are not part of my father’s fleet.”
Lorcan pointed with his massive beard toward the other ships, quite far off now and still milling around the beach. “Why do they remain there? What is their business there?” he asked.
Does this fool take me for some sort of druid, or mind reader? Sandarr thought, but said only, “I don’t know.”
Lorcan listened to Ronnat’s brief translation and he glared at Sandarr as he did, making his suspicions clear. He was silent for a long moment, running his eyes over the far horizon again and the Norwegian ship and the others. Then he spoke.
“We will capture the Norwegian ship,” Ronnat said.
Sandarr frowned. The arguments crowded together in his head. “Why would we want to do that?” he said at last. “We have a ship now, and we can barely sail the one.”
“Lorcan says two ships are better,” Ronnat replied with Lorcan’s words. “Those men on that ship have been in battle, they will be weak, and we are fresh. And many.”
Sandarr looked out at the Norwegian ship, then up at the sun, then back at the Norwegians. He did not give a goat turd for what Lorcan wanted, one ship or a thousand. His thoughts were centered on what would be best for him, Sandarr, what course of action would lead to his becoming lord of Vík-ló, the reason he had come to work with Lorcan in the first place. Further obstruction, thwarting of Lorcan’s plans, was not it. He could see that. He nodded.
“It will be a close thing,” Sandarr said, “to get up with that ship before the sun goes down. We will have to tack once more. Turn the ship, like we did before.”
Lorcan scowled. “Why must we turn the ship?” Ronnat translated his words. “Then we will be heading out to sea again. Why not sail toward them?”
Sandarr sighed. Slowly, patiently, in words familiar to Ronnat, he explained the concept of leeway and points of sail, and how they could not, if fact, sail right at them. He made it clear that if the Norwegian ship worked too far to windward, Water Stallion would never catch her in time.
Lorcan listened. He nodded. And then he smiled.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
When we parted, flaxen goddess,
my ears rang with a sound
from my blood-hall’s realm…
Gisli Sursson’s Saga
“That,” Thorgrim Night Wolf said with certainty, “is Far Voyager.”
The two of them, Thorgrim and Starri, had rowed the curach for twenty minutes, until the shadow of the land no longer made for a fluky and unpredictable breeze, and then they had stowed the oars and set the sail and let Njord, the god of wind, whisk them south.
Thorgrim was happy to give over the effort of rowing. The effects of his all-night vigil were wearing on him and the wounds across his chest were throbbing. One, he was sure, had opened up, just a bit. He could feel the warm, wet blood on his skin. But now he had exchanged a rowing oar for a steering oar, and he still did not have a hand free to tend to his injury.
“You’re right, Thorgrim,” Starri said, after having looked some time at the distant ship, just now appearing around the headland to the south. “I am happy to see your eyesight is not failing as fast as the rest of you.”
“My eyesight has not been slashed and stabbed
and left for dead as the rest of me has,” Thorgrim said. “Now, would you take the steering oar so I might patch myself up once again?”
Starri shuffled aft and Thorgrim passed the handle of the steering oar to him, then moved to Starri’s place on the weather side. He undid his belt, pulled up his tunic and saw where the blood was running down the right side of his chest. He pulled a knife from its scabbard, cut a strip from the bottom edge of his tunic and bound the wound as best he could.
Starri was shaking his head. “Not good, Night Wolf, not good.”
“Humph,” Thorgrim said. “When I start looking to you for advice on well-being that’s when I will know for certain that things are not good.”
They were sailing a shallow angle away from the shore, taking the seas on the larboard quarter and beam. The swells were rolling the curach with an unpleasant, corkscrew motion, the kind that would soon have had them heaving over the sides if they were prone to such things, which they were not. Happily, the sail was full and it dampened the motion somewhat and drove them along at a respectable clip.
Thorgrim, anxiety barely suppressed, wanted very much to take the steering oar again, but on reflection he had to admit that Starri was holding the course and working the boat through the swells as well as he could have done, or nearly so.
Rest, he thought to himself. Rest. There will be work enough soon. A good rest, Thorgrim knew, was like a good meal; something to be taken when it could be had, a necessary part of being ready for action. So he did not take the steering oar, but rather leaned back against the side of the boat and closed his eyes.
“This is odd,” Starri said thirty seconds later. Thorgrim opened his eyes again. “The way these ships are sailing, one to the other, is very odd,” Starri elaborated. “Would you not think they would sail in company?”
Thorgrim looked over the side, surveying the position of the distant ships relative to one another. “I would think that,” Thorgrim agreed. “And I would think Ornolf, or whoever commands Far Voyager, would want to get further off shore, not hug the land so.” They were silent for a few moments, watching the two vessels. Far Voyager was perhaps a mile and a half away. Water Stallion, which had made her ugly tack and was standing out to sea once more, was a bit farther away than that. They seemed to ignore one another, as if each were sailing on his own separate sea.
The Lord of Vik-lo: A Novel of Viking Age Ireland (The Norsemen Saga Book 3) Page 27
