by Ken Hagan
While Da was alive, he had blades forged for Einar and Cormac. The smithy work, done by old man Jarl, was wrought to an exact weight to suit the sword-arm of each brother. Both were given a sword, on coming of age, in expectation of a harrier life at sea.
‘Da made sure you would carry your own swords,’ Ma said to my brothers. ‘You have no need for his old blade.’
To be fair, no objection came from them. There wasn’t a murmur from Einar or Cormac when Ma put the blade in Sepp’s hand; but if Sepp was to be given Da’s sword, it might be expected that he should receive the nails too. The hornlet by rights should be his.
We could all see that Einar was upset to miss out on the sword. Being the man he is, he took it well and gave Sepp a hearty slap on the back. But when the hornlet of nails was handed to me, he froze, he had to bite his tongue. He didn’t say a word.
As for Jo, she had expected Einar to have Da’s old sword and his nails as well. The thought of Sepp getting the blade was a setback, but it was a lightning shock to her, when Ma declared that the nails, the token of Da’s soul, should fall to me. Ma was adamant.
‘Da would want Kregin to have them. The others have had their due.’
Jo takes issue. She tries every wile and guile she knows — and she knows plenty — to turn Ma from her chosen course. Ma is not for budging.
‘But Ma,’ Jo chokes out venom through gritted teeth. ‘Why is my Einar to be denied? Da trusted him more than the others.’
Sepp is none too pleased at that.
‘I have made up my mind,’ replies Ma, with an eye on Sepp, ‘and there’s an end to it.’
Jo lets rip her anger, not at Ma, but at me. ‘I don’t see why everyone should truckle to the nipper just because he got lucky! It doesn’t make the boy a hero because he lopped off a dead man’s head.’
*
Skip has been standing stock-still at the helm, anxiously waiting for night. For him, for all of us, the sunset has been long in coming, late in showing its colours. At long last the sun begins to slip behind a mass of red clouds on the far horizon. Over the evening waters, before dusk, sky and sea are bathed in strange heat. The oval moon, past the full three days before, fades into the haze. Stars come out, but only for a while in the dullness, then they follow the moon out of sight. Slowly, indistinctly, heaven and ocean join as one dense firmament, pale as milk.
‘Look,’ says Einar. ‘The north-star is out, though you can barely see it.’
An unexpected flash of sun breaks iron-red from its forge behind the clouds; it stuns the waters with raw light, shattering sea from sky, melting mist from the waves. In what seems like moments, the sun cools and falls into the sea. The moon escapes from the mist and shines over the waves. And now to steer-board, where Einar had pointed above the ship’s mast, the north-star out-shines all others in the sky.
The waves are silent against ship’s bows. The Vigtyr glides over the night sea without resistance, leaving no wake. We are faring north into cold waters, the north-star above our masthead. With so much heat in the air, it is strange to think that we are heading towards the ice lands.
*
I have the tiller, I have the helm. Einar is asleep between Jo’s knees, husband and wife outstretched on stern deck. Jo’s eyes are closed, but she is not asleep. She steals a glimpse, now and then, either at me, or at the wind in the sail, or she stares out at the moonlit waves passing by the stern.
‘Be sure to wake me, Kregin,’ Einar had said, as he settled down with his wife. ‘Wake me, if the wind gathers, or there is a change in the swell or if you lose sight of the moon.’ I’m certain Jo will wake him before I do.
Mel has Ma talking to the hen-crows, calling them by name. ‘Here Hrugi, here girl! Here Muni!’ And while she calls, she feeds the birds on morsels of pork through the bars of the cage. It is a game to Ma, a way of keeping my little sister amused, to take her through the short moonlit night. As for Mel, she has no doubts that her crows take in every word spoken.
‘Hrugi likes you, Mama,’ says Mel, ‘You’re her favourite, and Muni likes you too, they’re eating food off your fingers, they don’t take it from anyone but me.’
Ma chuckles. ‘It’s because I am licking the salt off the rind, before I give it to them.’
‘No Mama, truly they do love you.’
‘Well, I suppose they can see I’m an old hen-bird, a Mama just like them.’
‘Let me whisper a secret, Ma,’ says Mel in baby voice. ‘I don’t want little ears to hear.’ Ma leans from her seat on the tarp and kisses Mel on the cheek. Mel cups hands to hide her lips from the crows’ eyes, and passes her secret to Ma, not to be shared with anyone, especially not with Hrugi and Muni. Unable to keep her own secret, Mel suddenly asks in an excited voice, ‘Say now, Mama, when can we, when can we do it?’
‘At first light, I expect,’ replies Ma, ‘you will have to ask Einar. He knows best. No, Mel, don’t disturb him; you can ask when he wakes.’
Cormac and I are atop the skiff where Einar has put us, near the prow; we are here scanning north for signs of landfall. It should come with the first pale colours of dawn. Jo and Sepp are amidships seeing to the yard, trimming sail to steady us in a strengthening south-westerly; skip has had Alufa and Vrekla reefing down one third, now again, and another third in short order, to balance the heel of the ship. Bedwyr is seeing to the animals. The lad’s fever has gone. He pours, spilling as much as he pours, the ewes muzzling to drink in the box. Now he runs aft to the water butt, juggling an empty pail in the air. Relishing his new-found vigour, he slides under the sail ropes and passes by the ram’s cage at breakneck speed. The ram bellows.
‘Easy goes it on the water,’ says Sepp, ‘take your time; no need to go like the clappers. The ram can wait.’
‘Hey, Mel,’ Einar hails from the helm. ‘Bring out the crows, come on, sleepy-head, wake up, bring your birds; it is time they earned their keep.’
Before anyone can think to stop her, Jo grabs the cage. She sidles with it in the blustering way she does, putting her head under the sail amidships, to reach Einar at the stern. In her hurry she almost knocks Bedwyr into the sea; he has to grab hold with both hands to stop his fall. Had she done it when the lad was weak, he would have been overboard for sure.
‘Steady,’ roars Sepp at the top of his voice. ‘Careful, woman.’
Mel wakes up with a start in Ma’s arms, sees Jo with the cage, and runs to intercept her. ‘No,’ says Mel, shoving Jo’s hand from the crows, ‘I do it.’ Jo holds firm. ‘My birds,’ shouts Mel repeatedly. ‘Mine. I do it!’
‘It’s alright,’ says Ma, ‘Jo was only fetching them for you. She will hold out the cage. You can untie the catch and set them free.’
One glance at Jo’s face has told me that is not what she had in mind, but after their dispute over the nails, she daren’t say a word against Ma.
The two crows are in the air, circling the mast, looking this way and that. The birds are uneasy. They should have made off, once they were set free.
One of them — I can’t tell if it’s Muni or Hrugi — settles on the masthead. From her perch she lets loose a stain of droppings on the sail. Now the other crow is off, flying north to where we expect land to be. At least it’s working with one bird; we must be on course.
The crow on the masthead returns to deck; lands with a thump; she hirples over the tarps, hops, flutters to the up-turned skiff, where Cormac and I are sitting. The poor bird must be dizzy or feeling sick; she wobbles in a stupor, beak sunk on her breast, too weak to caw.
‘Go Hrugi, go girl,’ sobs Mel. ‘Go and find Bruni for me.’ The bird is not ready for flight. Hrugi lets Mel pick her up. Mel nestles the hen-crow and strokes her wings. ‘Her breast is trembling,’ says Mel in tears.
‘Bring her here,’ says Alufa. ‘Hold her from the sail-cloth, the sail is flapping. Maybe it is putting her off.’ Mel does as Alu says. The bird flutters out of her hands and swoops up into the pale sky, soars up and away, flying north.
Alu brings me water. Two brimming bowlfuls barely touch my thirst. When I return the bowl to my sister, I see her brow and neck glistening with sweat.
Facing aft, I can’t help but notice Vrekla and Jo. They are lounging on the tarps, behind the ram’s cage, stripped to their under-serks, ragged ends hitched up as far as their knees. I suppose they are doing it to cool off. Alu sees me looking.
‘I have told them,’ she says. ‘It is not right to be undressed like that on a ship. When Ma wakes from her nap, she will give them what for.’
*
Something’s wrong. This shouldn’t be happening. Hrugi and Muni have returned to ship; the crows perch on the yard to steer-board, sitting close, wing feathers claggy, sticking like horse-glue, no hint of flying off again. If there is no land to the north, we must have run off-course.
Ma is awake. Sepp and Einar whispering at the stern; Jo is crouched behind the sail, sitting on the cess-bucket; Vrekla lounging half-naked on the tarps. Ma hasn’t seen them in their under-serks, either that or she’s paying no heed. Mel is rummaging for something in the food pouch.
‘What’s it mean, Einar?’ Ma asks. ‘Why have the birds come back?’ Einar stops whispering to Sepp, but doesn’t give an answer.
‘Come down, Hrugi!’ cries Mel. ‘Come down and feed! Here, Muni, come!’
Mel licks salt off the morsels of fat, like Ma showed her, and holds the bits up in her hand, offering them to the birds. The crows ignore her. They have taken to fluttering to and fro, fore-stay to yard, restless and troubled, now on the yard, now on the rigging, cawing out wild, crowing like mad.
Geese, a flock of geese overhead, higher in the sky than usual, no mistaking geese in flight; they fly over in silence, no throaty birdcalls, no flapping of feathers. It is as if they daren’t disturb the air. They are flocking in great numbers — like in winter-fall — and yet it is not the time of year for them to fly south.
Noisy gannets, flying low, shrieking in formation, gulls high up, more and more of them, flock after flock of gulls in flight, harsh and shrill, flying from the north; and now, passing over, high beyond steer-board, another silent flight of geese.
Bedwyr swills out the cess-bucket. Jo has finished using it. He leans over amidships to rinse the bucket in the sea. ‘What is it,’ he shouts, ‘what’s that gurgling?’
‘It’s the beam wave,’ answers Sepp mildly, ‘splashing under the hull.’
‘No, master, no, it’s not,’ says Bedwyr. ‘Begging your pardon, master, but look! Look at them bubbles; they are coming out of the water.’
‘He’s right, Sepp,’ says Alufa, ‘it’s on this side too.’
‘What on earth is it?’ says Vrekla; she pulls her skirts on, makes herself decent. Cormac and I have our heads over the side, staring into the bow wave.
‘Ugh,’ says Cormac, ‘it’s like broth boiling in a cauldron, but it stinks.’
‘Well,’ says Jo with a sniff, ‘to me it smells of last week’s byre. Bedwyr, when did you last muck out the hold?’
‘Don’t pick on him,’ says Sepp, ‘the stall is clean, lined with straw. He did it at first light, while you and Einar were sleeping.’ None of us can keep our eyes off the waves.
‘Land ahoy,’ shouts Einar, ‘up ahead, over larboard bow.’
We look up, Cormac and I, from the froth under the prow of the ship, to see banks of steaming mists over the waters, and above the steaming mists, above what must be the hidden shoreline, stands the smoking ridge of a snow-capped mountain.
From this distance, two or three leagues out at sea, the snowy summit looks like a winter steading, its giant eaves touching the sky, with smoke rising through the white roof, as if someone inside the mountain has started up a forge for his day’s toil at the smithy fire. Tremor in the air, the water shakes.
‘Hell’s shit, hammer of fire,’ shouts Jo in panic, ‘is this where Thor stands guard? Is this where he guards the fire of hell?’
As if to answer her, and to answer our fears, the mountain belches back an angry roar. Fire bursts through the mountain summit, snow-peak sprouting flame and fire; skywards a tree of fire grows, sending huge flames, curling, swelling into bloom, its high crest a burning-light, scorching the sky above, scorching black, and red, and grey.
The fire has dark roots in the snow, and rising from its core, dark flame and steam, ‘tree-like’, bulging trunk to towering crest, branching outwards, spreading fire and cloud, dark burning, dark light, dark flame; dark fire.
A blast of heat knocks us off our feet, smothers wind and wave; blisters the air, roaring past the ship, a blast of heat, a hammer swipe, an axe-blow, a swiping blade. Thunder in the clouds, and lightning, darting, dashing; sparking the sea; flashing afar off; flashing near; flaring from sky above, glaring on the wet deck. A loud crack of timber behind us; a heavy thud hammers the bowl of the heavens; below ship, under us, the same thud as above, thumping low and deep. The roar from the mountain trembles over the waters, over the waters and under them.
The skies darken east; what should be light and dawn disappears over there, and what should be darker over here is fractured by light, flash after flash of lightning.
The Vigtyr dips low at the bows; seawaters gush over our prow into the hold. The sea quakes under us. The Vigtyr leaps fore and aft, like a wild horse leaps, to shake free of his rider.
I put out my hand like a child, Cormac brings me to my feet in rushing waters; while he holds me fast, I reach out my other hand for something solid, grabbing for the fore-stay, grabbing for where the fore-stay should be. No fore-stay to grab: rigging ripped clear out, from cleat and hook.
‘The mast,’ yells Cormac, shaking me, turning me round. ‘Our mast-head is gone!’
The vane from the mast, snapped by lightning, snapped from its perch, sizzles hot in a flood of sea on deck. And look! Flushed in the seething deck-water, Mel’s crows, burned to quill and cinder. The sail-cloth aft, stripped from the mast, draped amidships on stern deck, the rest of it trailing ragged in the sea, yard-arms sundered, shredded ropes, sail and tackle trailing in our wake.
Beam-scrouds down, no stays fore or aft; we are a ship without rigging. The mast-head has snapped at yard-height. One of our water-butts has rolled to the gunnels aft; the second butt has rammed into the first, jamming sail to deck; if it hadn’t toppled, the whole ruptured sail would have slid stern-wards into the sea. The helm, the tiller hidden. The shape of a tiller bulges under the fallen sail. Ma gone. Einar and Sepp gone; they were there before, standing with Ma at the stern. Alu has Mel in one arm, grabbing with free arm the root of the mast. With no rigging or stays to support it, the broken mast is swaying loose at the base, bending, wobbling, fore and aft, as if the shortened stump will be uprooted from the hull. The hull of the Vigtyr is bouncing like a dead leaf in a stream.
No Vrekla! No Jo! Bedwyr is running to give the alert, frantically pointing to the waves. Jo, she has gone overboard, she is in the water.
We are losing sight of Jo. I see her hand aloft, now she is under the wave. Dark cloud — mist, smoke, dust or fog — descends over the sea, shrouding the sky, dulling the flashes of lightning, hiding the mountain and its fiery crest.
Bedwyr turns me to the hold. The woolbacks are in trouble: their heads are just showing above water. The bull-calf is wild-eyed, up to his haunches in over-flood: the bilge has to be baled or we will flounder; quick, the pails!
Cormac has stripped to his breeches. He must be mad. He is going in after Jo. He passes me his jerkin. ‘Take it, Kregin, it’s yours.’ He hands me his boots as well. Madness! To go after Jo in seas like this — no light, no line attached. ‘It’s hopeless!’ I shout, ‘No!’, but already he is over the side, backwards, flipping head over heels.
Cormac is in the water, he i
s out in the darkness. I see head, arms, thrusting strokes; making for the spot where we last saw Jo. Smoke and dust folds a blanket over the waves, and he is gone.
Chapter 12
I am rooted to the spot, hugging my brother’s jerkin, hugging his boots, sunk to my knees on the watery deck. The sail is down, the ship over-flooded, listing stern-wards!
See to Alu! See to Mel! Are we all there is? Only Bedwyr, my sisters, me, four of us alive and the animals.
Seawater floods the hold: I should go help Bedwyr; he has made a start, he is baling out. But — no point: we are too far gone to bale, as good as lost without mast or rigging.
‘There,’ yells Alu; she points behind me aft, ‘there,’ she screams, ‘under the sail!’ She stares at me, eyes dazed and cold, as if she expects me to do something. I try to take in the meaning of her words. Mel screams. Alu turns away from me, smothers the child’s face with kisses.
At the stern, where Alu had pointed, shapes are bulging under the fallen sail, signs of life, struggling to escape, caught under canvas. Like the puffins captured under Jo’s apron they can’t break free from the snare.
Puffins have no place on board a sinking ship and yet I think of puffins. I am distracted by the chaos around me. Part of the sail is jammed to deck by the water-butts which have slid over it; the rest of the sail is in water, dragged tight by the sea.
We are listing aft, tipped stern-wards by a mass of trailing wreckage. Half of the sail is overboard; it is waterlogged and pulls us down. The yard-ends are torn-off; the sunken sail-cloth, sunken rigging snarled in knots and shreds, is a jumble of wreckage in the water. The driftage is dead weight in the water, it pulls us down. And yet. It might balance the hull, keep us afloat.
