Runestone

by Don Coldsmith

  He paused in consternation. He had talked himself into an impossible corner. He had been about to search for words to say “they drove chariots.” Golden chariots, the story said, drawn by powerful steeds. Until now, when he needed a word he did not know, he had merely asked Odin to supply one. But now, how could he tell a story of golden chariots to people who had never seen a chariot, or even a wheel? For that matter, even a horse!

  Odin was looking puzzled, and Nils turned to Svenson. No help there! Svenson was almost overcome by amusement, trying hard not to burst forth in his boisterous laugh.

  “Sven,” Nils said curtly in their own tongue, “help me, here!”

  Svenson spread his hands in a helpless gesture, his big shoulders shaking with restrained amusement.

  “It is your story, my friend!”

  “Well…I…well, the young giants carried the sparks. …” (Torches! yes, torches, he thought.) “They made torches, and each day they run across the sky and around the other side.”

  Svenson could not restrain a guffaw of laughter. “Good!” he called. “That will do!”

  The People were puzzled. Some laughed nervously, following the lead of Svenson, but not quite understanding the joke. Was it something about Fire Man’s connection with the heavenly fires?

  Nils plunged doggedly ahead, past his predicament now, and able to return to the original version.

  “They had to … to run very fast, because they are always chased. The Wolves of Darkness follow them, to try to swallow the lights. Sometimes the wolves catch up, and…Well, you have seen. The wolves take a bite or two. Then the people had to make a great noise. The wolves spit out the sun or moon, and it is whole again.”

  There was a murmur of quiet conversation, excitement in the tone, and some puzzlement. Svenson spoke aside and in Nordic.

  “Nils, you don’t have any people yet. Who makes the noise?”

  Nils was annoyed. Sven was having far too much fun over this.

  “Do you want to tell this?”

  “No, no,” the sailor insisted. “My job is to make a fire, remember?”

  Nils regained his composure and continued.

  “Fire Man says that I have left out some of the story,” he admitted. “That is true. At first, there were no people to make noise. It was a very dangerous time. But as soon as they had daylight, the gods saw that something was going on in the rotting flesh of Ymir. There were maggots. These grew and became small creatures that looked like men and women, but were not. Some were ugly and loved the darkness, some were beautiful and loved birds and flowers and sunlight. So the gods gathered them all and sorted them. The dark ones are the…” (What could he call gnomes and trolls?) “Kobolds” he decided, using the Norse word. “The others are…faeries.”

  The People were wide-eyed.

  “The Little People!” someone said softly.

  “You know of this?” asked Nils, surprised.

  “Of course, Thorsson,” Odin said aside. “The Little People. I did not know you have them too. Ours can cause mischief and harm, but can help you if they want to.”

  “It is much the same, then.”

  Odin nodded. “Go on about humans.”

  “After a while,” Nils continued, “the gods saw that the earth was a good place. They would come down sometimes, using a bridge. …” At this point he paused, not knowing the words, or even sure that the People knew the concept of a bridge. He consulted with Odin.

  “Yes,” Odin assured him. “To cross a stream … a log…”

  The next idea was harder. How to describe the rainbow that formed a bridge from heaven? With hand motions and words like “colors in the sky,” he managed to convey the meaning.

  “The gods would come down to walk along the shore,” he went on, “and one day Odin and two others—more of Odin later—but on that day they came upon two trees, called Ask and Embla. They seemed to have human form, so Odin gave them spirits, and the wood came alive and became First Man and First Woman. These, then, bore all the humans of the earth.”

  42

  As long, dark, and frustrating as the winter was, it eventually began to show signs of lessening. There had been many days in the month that the People called the Moon of Snows when the sun did not show itself at all. Svenson said it was January. After long periods of no sunlight, when a clear day did occur it was almost a futile effort. The pale and watery rays of a yellow sun that rose only halfway above the horizon toward the zenith did little to warm the drifted world.

  Next came the Moon of Hunger. In most years, Odin explained, food supplies ran short. There would be starvation among the People. But this had been a mild winter, and in addition there was plenty of meat. By the odd coincidence of their arrival here, much of the credit for a good year had gone to White Wolf, the powerful holy man who had joined them. Probably Nils Thorsson was only partly aware of the respect and prestige with which he was regarded. For one thing, he was almost totally absorbed in a delightfully sensuous and romantic marriage, and had little else to distract him. He had enjoyed the story fires, and the People seemed entranced by his tales of Norse legendry. He wished sometimes that he could recall more detail, but his listeners did not seem to mind. It was all new to them.

  There finally came a day when Nils stepped out of the lodge into a morning that was different. There was a slight breeze, but it came from the southwest. And it was warm. Not really so, he noticed, but there was a different feel about it, somehow. He was standing, puzzling about this, and squinting his eyes against the glare of sunlight on snow, when Odin came out of the lodge, allowed the doorskin to fall into place behind him, and straightened. He took a deep breath.

  “Ah! It is the time of awakening!”

  “What? What do you mean, Odin?”

  “Do you not feel it? A different spirit…Sun renews his torch and pushes Cold Maker back to the north. It is the Moon of Awakening.”

  Yes, thought Nils. March. He had begun to notice, or thought he had, the almost imperceptible lengthening of the time of daylight each day. The sun rose just a trifle higher. With the navigator’s eye, he noted the position of a tree’s shadow on the snow-covered dome of the lodge. Yes … it was nearing the equinox, probably. Had he thought of it, he could have constructed a pole marker whose shadow would have told him the exact day. Well, no matter.

  “Cold Maker will make another attack or two, maybe,” Odin was saying, “but no matter. Sun has won again.”

  The concept was little different from that of the tales of Nils’s childhood. Hrae-svelger, the corpse-swallower, had been placed in charge of the north wind by the disagreeable god Winter, enemy of the gentle goddess Summer, mild and lovely. Disguised as a giant eagle, Hrae-svelger would raise his great wings to fan sweeping blasts of icy wind. Nils had not thought to tell that tale at the story fires. Cold Maker…The People would be able to relate to Hrae-svelger. Maybe later, he would try to remember more of that one.

  For now, though, the idea of the coming spring was suddenly thrust upon him. It was almost a surprise, in a way. In his mind had been the vague idea that when spring arrived, he and Svenson, and perhaps Odin, would travel downstream to the colony at Straumfjord and seek passage home. Odin, assuming he had chosen to guide them at all, would then return to his People. That had seemed a simple enough plan. Now that the time was drawing near to put it into motion, it began to seem far more complicated. He had a wife, and so did Svenson. Actually, the thought of not returning to Straumfjord had never occurred to him, and did not now. Home was his eventual destination. What tales he would be able to tell to his drinking friends back in Stadt! The sadness, of course, would be that Helge Landsverk was no longer among them.

  But his friends would find his tales fascinating. The escape and pursuit after the loss of both ships, their capture, and the travel on upriver to live for a season with the Skraelings, and even to have married one of their women … It did not feel right, this line of thinking. He could not quite understand what it was that both
ered him, and could certainly not have put it into words.

  Sometimes he felt as though he were two different people. One was Nils Thorsson, from a respected old Nordic family. Well educated, a ship’s master and navigator, a man from a race of conquerors, respected and feared everywhere. Feared because of the past, of course. The courage of the Viking marauders in the recent past was changing quickly in these modern times. The courage had translated itself into bold ventures in exploration and trade. When he thought of all that was being accomplished, he gloried in the privilege that he possessed. To be a part of this magnificent age was an honor beyond belief.

  That was sometimes. At other times he found himself thinking of a completely different identity. He was no longer Nils Thorsson at those times, but White Wolf, a respected man of the People, and husband of Calling Dove. He loved that identity, that of husband to the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. Why, then, did he feel sadness when he thought of himself in that role?

  It came to him finally, on this day when the world began to come awake. That event made him think of travel back to Straumfjord. Now it would be possible to make such plans, but he found himself torn by this other part of him, the part that identified him as White Wolf. It had been far too easy to set the planning aside, to defer it because nothing could be done through the winter months anyway. That, he now began to see, had been only a convenient excuse for lack of decision. Or maybe he was falling under the influence of the People. They lived from day to day. With the exception of storing food for winter, there was little planning at all. That had frustrated him at first, but the enforced inactivity of winter and the exotic distraction of his marriage had made it much more comfortable.

  Now, however, they must make plans. He must thrust aside the temptation to let things slide along as they had all winter. He was having a great deal of difficulty in understanding why he dreaded facing these decisions. It finally occurred to him that it was because of Calling Dove. He had fallen into an easy companionship with her, and had become so comfortable in it that he did not really want it to change. Yet it must, in some way. He must consider the reality of parting with the woman who had become one of the most important persons in his entire lifetime. He did not want to think about it, but a tiny voice deep in his mind kept whispering, You have to.

  Maybe Svenson could be of help. He had the same problem. Well, nearly the same. Except, of course, that Sven had a wife in Stadt and a wife here. It was not really the same problem at all. Sven must have realized from the start that his was a temporary union, a convenience that provided a pleasant interlude while they waited out the winter. Probably Red Fawn knew this, too. She was a practical woman. It was with something of a shock that Nils realized that there was a sort of unspoken understanding between those two. They would be together while circumstances dictated it. When the time came, they would part. Nils would have to admit, it seemed, that among Skraelings there were really no ethics like those of civilized people, and among sailors, very few.

  One possibility continued to suggest itself to him. Maybe Calling Dove could return to Stadt with him. He had never suggested it to her, but then they had never discussed the reality of his departure either. And, while Svenson might not be able to take his Skraeling wife home, was there any reason that Nils Thorsson could not? He wondered what his mother would say. She had always wanted him to be interested in that buck-toothed Hingerson girl with the funny eyes. How would she react to a daughter-in-law such as Calling Dove? He must think more about this.

  He must also, of course, talk to Odin and to Svenson, make some solid plans, and consider a boat and some supplies.

  First, though, he must talk to Dove, explain to her the necessity of rejoining his people. He would be able to convince her of the advantages of civilization, he had no doubt. She would probably be pleased that he wanted to take her with him, wanted for them to stay together. She did not even know what she was missing. The thought began to please him, and he began to dream of the things that he could show her, share with her. The great ships, the cities, the exotic foods and clothing.

  Maybe it would be better, he now thought, to plan their departure, at least in general terms, and then surprise her. The idea pleased him. He approached Svenson first.

  “Sven, we should be making plans to travel.”

  Svenson nodded noncommittally.

  “Yes.”

  Nils was puzzled at the reaction.

  “Have you talked to Odin?” Sven asked.

  “Not yet.”

  “Let me know when,” the sailor said. “It is probably too early yet.”

  “Of course. But we should plan. Odin will know what to expect of spring storms.”

  Svenson nodded again. Somehow Nils had expected him to be eager to get back to the sea. Was he afraid of the dangerous river passage, down past the rapids and the area of their disastrous defeat? Surely not. Maybe Sven was feeling his age. He was no longer a young man.

  “I will talk to him, then,” said Nils, feeling uncomfortably that the conversation was not finished.

  As it happened, there was no opportunity to talk to Odin for a few days. Every time he attempted it they were interrupted, or were unable to draw aside alone. He almost had the impression that Odin wished to avoid this conversation. That seemed unlikely, though, since Nils had not even had a chance to tell Odin what he wanted to talk about.

  During the few days, he had time to do some thinking. There was much to be said, after all, for discussing the impending departure with Calling Dove first. With this in mind, he asked her to walk with him. It was sunny, as the clays had been, though nights were still quite cold. This was the warmest day yet, and there was actually enough melting of ice and snow to initiate a steady drip from the tree branches. A few birds, stimulated by the awakening of the season, began to sound their territorial songs, and Dove laughed happily.

  “It is good,” she said.

  “Yes. But I have something to tell you.”

  “Good. I, too!” She stopped and turned to face him. “I will speak first, for this, too, is good, my husband. Listen: I am with child!”

  She pointed to her belly, still flat and trim.

  “Are you sure?” he mumbled, completely stunned.

  “Of course! What is it, Wolf? You are not happy?”

  “Yes…yes, very happy. Only surprised.”

  “Why?” She giggled, her glance coy but teasing. “How could it not be so?”

  His head whirled. He was unable to grasp all the differences in his plans that this would entail. Could he attempt the dangerous journey with a pregnant woman? He felt confusion, resentment, and a little anger.

  “You are not happy!” Dove accused. A tear glistened in her eye as she whirled on her heel and strode away.

  43

  Life was difficult for Nils Thorsson for the next few days. He had spent a delightful winter snuggling in the warmth of the sleeping robes and then in the warmth of a vital relationship. There had been, of course, the cyclic inhibition of complete romantic fulfillment. Even then, there was an intimacy, an understanding of a promise of better things soon.

  Now, however, even that was gone. The delicious comfort of warm and softly rounded curves, cuddled against and around him in a myriad of ways, might as well be forgotten. He could not understand how a body that had seemed all softness and warmth now presented only the jab of knees and elbows when they entered their cubicle at night.

  To make matters worse, the entire lodge seemed aware of it. He received dark, critical glances from the other women. One old woman had an extremely annoying habit of staring at him with a frown, then shaking her head and clucking her tongue as she turned away. He was not certain what the sequence of mannerisms meant, but of one thing he was certain. It was not good. It was a clear sign of disapproval.

  One of the worst things about it was that Nils had virtually no idea why he was subject to such ostracism. He had done nothing to deserve it as far as he could see. He had not even begun
to tell Dove about the impending choice, to leave the People or not. There were many possible variations on that decision, but he had not even approached the subject. He went over the scene in his mind again and again. Things had been fine, they were talking and laughing, happy together. Then, before he could mention the subject that must be discussed, Dove had proudly told of her pregnancy. His reaction, then, must be at the root of the problem. But what had he done? What had been expected that he failed to fulfill? It was not as if he was opposed to this turn of events. Surprised, yes. Speechless for a moment. And in that moment, something had happened. The moment was gone, the warmth had been destroyed, and he was somehow the culprit. He had tried to plead his innocence, but Dove only pulled away, angrier than before. Even to look at her, to catch her eye brought tears sometimes.

  Could there have been something he should have done, a ceremony or ritual of the People, unknown to him? A response to be carried out when the husband was informed of the pregnancy? Surely Odin would have told him. He would inquire of Odin. Meanwhile, he would inform Svenson that they could not make any plans quite yet.

  It did not help that Svenson seemed to think the entire situation humorous.

  “Yes, I heard,” Sven chuckled. “Your bed is not as warm as before, maybe?”

  “Sven, this is not funny. I do not understand it. What did I do wrong? I had not even mentioned leaving for Straumfjord.”

  Svenson was laughing openly now, his blue eyes, squinting almost shut with mirth, tears of laughter streaming down his cheeks.

  “Ah, Nils, it is not that you did wrong. It is that there are times when a man can do no right Dove is newly with child, no?”

  “Yes. But, I—”