The Norseman

by Jason Born

  By the time we finished the burial, everyone else had left the gravesite. Olaf got drunk. Those of us in his somber hall that day all got drunk. It wasn’t a bawdy drunk, but the gloomy drunk of those saddened by loss or those angry at the fabric of fate. I was the latter and sat on a three legged stool by myself in the corner of the hall trying to work out a plan to carry out my resolution. Kenna had gone to visit with Thordis and her babies.

  How did we lose so many good women to childbirth? Our cows, sheep, goats, horses, and all the wild animals seemed to have young and live. But we died. So many died. How would my slight Kenna survive the grueling drama of giving birth when healthy, strong women like Thyre succumbed to the blood and fevers. I corrected myself. Kenna was strong; it was her spirit and her mind that were strong. Maybe they would make up for the weakness in her body. Then I thought of the first tree we split for Olaf’s new boat, Crane, when the unseen weakness caused it to break. Did Kenna have an unseen weakness that would make the Norns twist her path toward death? I was plainly drunk and my thinking was unclear, but I kept going. Surely Kenna would die. My resolution of just one hour earlier was folly. I had no better chance of controlling my destiny than if I hoped to sweep my hands and control the stormy seas. Then I remembered a story where Jesus spoke a word and calmed a storm at sea. So it was possible, but he was God. Maybe I just had to pray to God to save her. But Olaf prayed and Crevan prayed for him. Of all the people on the earth who brought more people to the One God, wouldn’t Olaf have deserved the reward of a healthy wife and son? So many questions.

  I awoke next to my stool when the night had already fallen. For the first time in my life my neck was sore from the position in which I had passed out. I was what I used to consider old, thirty-three, and I felt it that night as I struggled to my feet and stumbled over the other passed out souls in the hall. Even Crevan lay with his white head on a table sleeping, still clutching his cup of ale. Olaf was curled up under a blanket with his beard and hair matted from sweat. I sat by him for a moment, studying the sadness in his face. The whitening of his hair and beard was nearly complete. Vigi, the dog, lay sleeping under one of his master’s giant paws. I shook my head. Even Olaf, a rich, a powerful king, was subject to fate. I would be no different.

  My defiance earlier in the day was replaced by acceptance. But it wouldn’t be a weak acceptance. Instead I would seize the opportunities thrust upon me. I had the opportunity to serve Olaf and I would. I had the opportunity to love Kenna and I would. That night, I went to my house and crawled in bed with Kenna and held her tight. Our time might be short or it might be long, but I would take pleasure wherever I could. As I lay behind her holding her, she took my hand and moved it to her still thin belly. We fell asleep there with a double embrace of the new life growing inside.

  The threat, perceived or real, from Sweyn seemed to fade with time and Olaf grew more at ease. When he returned from his travels the previous autumn and celebrated the gift his wife carried, he announced that I would again be put in charge of constructing another ship. He instantly loved his Crane and made that his command ship. The two crane heads looked smart atop the prow and stern. Serpent was still magnificent and was a part of his armada. Even though I didn’t greet him on Crane, he originally offered the command of Serpent to me, but I refused saying I would serve next to him on whatever vessel he chose. He liked that and said as much.

  That winter, Randulfr and Brokk brought The Whale and Boar to Kaupangen to pull them ashore and sleep through the protracted nights. It had been years since I saw the men and we drank long into many nights, sharing stories through the whole otherwise bleak season. Since I still owned Charging Boar, Randulfr had quite a sack of coins for me as rent payment. I added it to the hoard in my heavy chest. I would probably never spend all of the money, but it was better to have it than not.

  Thorberg and I again went into the forest to select the trees for the ship we would build the next year. Laborers brought the beastly trees down, but did not split them. Instead, we hauled them to the makeshift shipyard at the mouth of River Nidelva and soaked them until spring. Soaking the trees prevented them from drying and cracking and would allow us to bend those used for shaping the hull to our liking. Olaf decreed that this next longboat would be larger than Crane and that it was to have a gilding of gold instead of the iron plates affixed to Serpent. The addition of gold told me it was to be more of a floating hall than a warship, but my king wanted it, so we would produce it. That winter I again wrote letters for Olaf. I still used the medallion around my neck to seal them for Olaf had not yet taken the time to find or commission any type of official seal. This time gifts of silver crosses accompanied the writings to Aethelred, Kvaran, and Burizlaf.

  Spring came, Thyre and her baby died. Olaf wept, we all wept, and we all got drunk. Then Olaf left on Crane along with his other ships to subdue and reinforce his country. Randulfr left on The Whale to trade and raid. Brokk was dejected as I decided to keep Charging Boar with me to see if I could find time to build my own crew. Shipless, he sailed away with Randulfr. It would be the last time I ever saw my old raiding friends.

  Summer came; the new ship grew and grew to something bigger than I had ever seen. From stem to stern she was one hundred twenty feet long! It would have thirty-four benches! Two hundred men could fit on board the splendid creature! Even Thorberg was astonished by the site each morning when we resumed work. Metal workers heated and pounded the gold which would cover the prow and stern. Carvers peeled away wood from what would become the figureheads fore and aft; a massive, frightening dragon’s head on the prow and the long, winding tail of the beast on the stern. Gudrod, the shepherd, was busy. The smith was busy. We worked. In the evenings I would take Kenna, Thordis, Tree-Arm and his family, and other friends for tours of the fjord in Boar. These were happy times. Kenna vomited often from the baby, but was strong of will and sat next to me while I handled the rudder.

  Autumn came. The ship was brilliant. I had named it Long Serpent in honor of Olaf’s long time banner. It was the costliest ship ever built in Norway. I’ve already said it, but the ship was enormous. It seemed to grow to an even more amazing size when its sail was unfurled.

  Kenna grew too, as much as she could. Her body was still thin from her head to her feet, except for a round belly which swelled with our child. Her eyes were dark and sunken, but she glowed with happiness. Her hair thickened and shone, her small breasts swelled slightly. Kenna loved nothing more than to uncover her belly in the evenings and watch the punching and kicking from within. I thought this meant it was a boy who would be a fighter. To tease me she said that perhaps it was a girl who would be a fighter.

  One night in late autumn, when I began to wonder if Olaf would winter in Vik since he had not yet returned, Kenna awoke me with a low groaning. During the time she carried the baby, she had had occasional bouts of pain, but now she said that the bouts were more frequent and since she had witnessed her sister and other women giving birth, knew that the baby was coming. I quickly dressed and ran to fetch the midwife, an old woman named Sif who never had children of her own, but delivered almost every child in her reach over the past twenty years. She had spindly gray hair and a crooked tooth that captured your eye whenever she spoke. I ran back home while she dressed and gathered two other neighbor women who would help her.

  Kenna was sweating in our wooden bed. She was breathing normally and smiled when I came in and held her hand. Another bout came upon her. She didn’t scream as I had heard some women do. Instead her eyes fluttered and she tipped her head back with an open mouth, her lips quivering. She breathed desperately. I looked to the door in panic for the midwife and her magic to arrive, and then the bout passed and my Kenna returned her gaze to mine. After catching her breath she said, “Te amo.”

  I pet her soaking wet forehead and said, “Te amo.” It went this way for several more minutes; bouts of pain, then recovery, then we exchanged soft, “Te amos.”

  The blankets on our bed darkened
when water came from her womb and Sif, the midwife, along with her helpers entered our home in a flurry. “Halldorr, get your fat man hands away from her and stand over there.” I obeyed the woman and moved out of her way as she put a hand on Kenna’s forehead and mumbled something to herself. She took that same hand and with two fingers entered my wife’s groin, moving her hand in a circular motion, chewing on her lip with the crooked tooth as she did mental calculations. “We’ve got some time yet,” she said to the room. Then to Kenna she said, “You should piss and shit dear. I don’t feel like having the stuff on me tonight.” When Kenna’s eyes widened at the prospect, the midwife added, “It might feel like you’ll shit the little darling out, but you’re not wide enough yet. Halldorr, get your dung bucket over here!” I obeyed, producing the wooden bucket we used on cold winter nights. Sif and the women helped Kenna to the bucket where she completed her task.

  It was a long night. I worried and paced and asked questions. The questions were mostly ignored, though sometimes answered with a hiss from Sif. In the morning the sun rose and still I waited and the women worked. I ate a small bit of cheese and shared some with the women. Kenna looked like she would vomit at the sight of it. Thorberg came by to pick me up for some last minute details on Long Serpent and left in a hurry when he saw all the activity. My stomach told me the mid-day meal was approaching when finally, Sif pulled her hand from Kenna’s groin and pronounced that my wife should crouch on our bed and begin pushing. One of the helpers kneeled behind her, the other steadied one of her arms, while Sif kept shaping the birth canal. The head crowned and I saw a mat of wet brown hair. I prayed to every one of the old gods as well as the One True God that they, my family, would be safe. It moved fast now and the head was out. A shoulder wriggled free and then the whole body squirted out. The women began the next stage of their well-rehearsed dance. Sif used two short strings to tie off the cord that ran from the baby’s belly into Kenna’s womb. With a sharp, clean knife she cut the cord between the two knots. The helpers set Kenna back onto the bed and dabbed her head with cloth. I didn’t breathe.

  Sif handled my baby roughly inside a large cloth. She swabbed and rubbed it. She stuck a finger into its mouth and withdrew it full of thick slime. Sif turned my baby over in her hands while it was wrapped in the cloth and aggressively rubbed its back. Then a gurgling sound came and a cough and a whimper. Sif took the baby to Kenna and laid it on her naked chest. I stood there watching it all happen. Kenna took the baby in her arms and forced its mouth onto one of her now erect nipples and it latched on like it had done so a hundred times. My wife turned her sunken eyes to me and asked, “What will you call your son, Halldorr?”

  It was a reasonable question, but I didn’t know how to answer it. My son? He lived. Kenna lived. In my heart I did not think the Norns would allow a family in my life when it was forbidden for my king. I heard myself saying, “He is Olaf Halldorrsson,” and Kenna nodded and smiled as if she knew.

  The helpers left shortly thereafter, but Sif stayed for the birth of the placenta. She applied a little pressure by pulling slightly on the cord whenever Kenna had another contraction. Eventually it came out as little Olaf slept on his mother’s chest. Sif studied the bloody organ and swore. I thought her constant swearing would make her a good match for my friend Thorberg and chuckled to myself. Sif produced a long curved spoon made of smooth wood and slowly pushed it into Kenna’s groin all the way into the womb. “I am sorry dear, but that little shit son, Olaf, of yours left a part of his anchor stuck in your womb. I’ve got to see that we get it all out.” Sif then tilted the handle of the spoon and repeatedly scraped. This time Kenna howled in pain. Later she told me the pain of Sif’s scraping was worse than all the labor and birth combined. But Sif insisted, saying that women die quickly if parts of the placenta are left inside. Another blob of the organ came out and Sif again inspected it. She even matched it against the edge of the main portion which came out earlier. From what I saw, it looked like it all fit together and that she had retrieved everything. Sif shrugged as if to say that her best guess was that she had, in fact, finished, then gathered her tools and left.

  For three days little Olaf nursed and grew stronger, I think. He was a tiny, thin baby with hair and bones like his mother. Kenna, though, ate but grew thinner and weaker. Her bleeding had stopped after just one day and we both thought that was a good sign. We worried on the third day when she sent forth a pus-filled knob and began a fever. I summoned Sif and the second-best physician in the city. The best doctor was away with Olaf. Both looked grim and told me only to give her a mixture of honey, old vinegar, sea salt, and laurel. I did so, but eventually the fever became so hot that she was speaking gibberish and came in and out of consciousness. In one lucid moment she said, “Halldorr, being your wife was the proudest achievement of my life. Te amo.” When she used the past tense, I cried.

  After three days she faded to sleep and I never saw her eyes again. Thordis stood behind me holding little Olaf and wailed as I rested my head on Kenna’s hand. We buried her next to Thyre and King Olaf’s unnamed son in Kaupangen’s graveyard. She wore the dress that she had worn when we were married and the brightly colored glass beads I gave her. Meili and Auda, Kenna’s parents, cried. I cried beside them. Thordis wailed again and wished out loud for the return of her husband, Einar, for comfort.

  I found a wet nurse for little Olaf, but he refused to latch on to her nipple. We tried everything to get him to accept the milk. We poured it into his mouth, we even fashioned a nipple out of a cow’s stomach but the boy cried. He cried for his mother’s touch, as did I. He died five days after his mother. We buried him next to her in our rapidly growing graveyard. Fenris said some words, but I didn’t listen. Meili and Auda cried again. Thordis cried. I didn’t. I watched the small box descend deep into the earth and decided I wouldn’t cry again.

  I must have wept over my father’s death when I was a boy, though I am not certain. I wept over our banishment from Greenland and my second father. I had wept over Fife and Magnus. I wept over Thyre and her stillborn Olafsson. No more. Blood and cold killing was all this world was good for. And I would give her what she wanted. If that meant sending warriors to Odin’s hall or God’s hell, then so be it. I would live out my role as the Berserkers of yore. I would be terrible and I would kill wherever necessary and then some.

  The winter was bleak and blurry. Olaf returned one week after little Olaf’s death. He wept for me and for the memory of Kenna and all three of his dead wives, while I remained stoic. The completion of the beautiful Long Serpent was a weak ointment for the pain. He toured it in a solemn silence. Cnute and Einar wanted to help me in some way, I could tell, but they said nothing, because there was nothing to say.

  Most days and nights Olaf invited me to his hall and I accepted because I did not want to sleep in the house where Kenna died. I drank ale, gallons of ale. I drank until I didn’t think or feel. When I was sober on occasion I saw that Cnute still gambled his riches away in the corners of the hall. I rarely saw Einar that winter because he spent it humping his woman Thordis, my sister-in-law. One night, I was so drunk I exclaimed to the hall that I would go hump her for myself. I threatened some who tried to stop me with my saex. It finally took Olaf’s fist upon my nose to get me to sit back down and forget the idea.

  I didn’t read my book. I didn’t think of languages. I didn’t hunt. I didn’t go ice fishing with the men. I didn’t do anything all winter. I drank. Time meant nothing.

  One day, I don’t know if it was morning or afternoon, Cnute and Olaf came to me. I was sprawled out on my back at the side of the great hall stinking of ale. Vigi licked my beard and face, but I could not lift my arms to swat him away, so I let him go on. His breath smelled like rotten meat and I threw up in his face. Vigi jumped back at first but then started lapping up the disgusting mix of ale and mead and stomach juices. Cnute and Olaf looked at one another and then each picked me up by each of my arms, dragging me between them out of the hall like the
rag doll I had become.

  I hadn’t seen the sun in weeks and I cowered under its power. They carried me through the town, past the smith, past the shops, past homes, past gawking villagers. It seemed warm for winter and I realized that all the people I saw were dressed not for winter, but spring. They dragged me down to the river bank and I saw that someone had built a row of docks and that Long Serpent was moored to one of them. Cnute and Olaf carried me on the fresh wood planks of the dock. I mumbled a question to Olaf about Long Serpent as we passed its gang plank, but they didn’t stop to find out what I said. Instead they carried me to the end of the dock and threw me into the frosty river. Underwater now, my eyes opened but all I could see clearly was the murk around me. I flailed my arms and legs and surfaced five or ten feet down river from them. I bobbed a time or two and saw that they waved cheerily to me as I floated into the colder water of the fjord. The muscles of my arms and legs seized and I thought I would sink to my death in the freezing depths of Hel from the stories of the old gods, not the fiery hell from of the Christian God. Nor would it be Christ’s paradise, but at least it would be an end to my suffering here. I didn’t even question why my friend and third father saw fit to kill me so.