King's Man

by Tim Severin

  So this is the ultimate power of the White Christ faith: it is a belief suited to despots who would curb men's independence.

  I will never abandon my devotion to Odinn, though some might say he has abandoned me, just as he and the Gods have forsaken all those who followed the Elder Faith. Our world may have come to an end, but we never expected our Gods to be all-powerful and eternal. That sort of arrogance is reserved for the Christians. We knew from the very start that one day the old order would collapse, and after Ragnarok all would be swept away. Our Gods did not control the future. That was ordained by the Norns, and no one can alter the final outcome. While we are on this earth, each individual can only live his life to the best of his ability, strive to mould daily existence to best advantage, and never, like the unhappy Mac Bethad of the Scots, be duped by outward signs and appearance.

  Still, it grieves me that the body of my king Harald was taken back to Norway and placed in a Christian church. He should have received a true funeral in the old style, been burned on a pyre or interred within a barrow grave. That is what I had in mind when I tried vainly to rescue his body from the battlefield. I know that it was an old man's folly, but at the time I was sure that the Valkyries had already carried away his soul to Valhol, or that Freyja's servants had selected him and he was now in her golden hall, Sessrumnir, as befits the warrior whom some are already calling the last of the Vikings.

  I myself do not expect to go to Valhol nor to Freyja's hall. Those palaces are reserved for those who fell in battle, and — truth be told — I have never been a warrior, although I did my military training with the brotherhood of the Jomsvikings and have been present at the great battles: in Clontarf when the Irish High King fell, when the great Greek general Maniakes smashed the Arabs in Sicily, and of course at the bridge in Stamford. But I was never really a fighting man. When I took up arms, it was usually for self-defence.

  The thought of Sessrumnir has reminded me yet again of the twins, Freyvid and Freygerd. What has happened to them, I wonder? The last report I had was when their uncle Folkmar took them and fled for safety into the fastnesses of Sweden. It is too late for me to go to seek them, but in my bones I feel sure that they have survived. Once again I believe this is Odinn's wish. He taught that after Ragnarok, when all has been consumed by fire and destruction, there will be two survivors, twins who have sheltered beneath the roots of the World Tree and survived unscathed. From them will spring a new race of men who will populate the happier world that emerges from the ruins. With that knowledge I can console myself that my line may again bring the return of the Elder Ways.

  So, in these closing days of my life, I am content to set down on paper my gratitude to Odinn for the guidance he gave me. Odinn Gangradr, the journey adviser, was always at my shoulder. He showed me many marvels: the glittering reflection of the great ice cliffs in the still waters of a Greenland fjord, the endless sweet-smelling pine forests of Vinland in the west, the Golden Dome of the great Saracen temple in the Holy Land, the slow curl of the early morning mist rising from the surface of the broad river which leads eastward from Gardariki, the land of forts. And, more important, Odinn also brought me to the company of women I loved, and who loved me — a young girl in Ireland, a maiden among the ski-runners of the north, and — in the end — to the embrace of Runa. How can the monks around me compare their lives to that?

  I am still restless, even at my advanced age. When I was at my weakest and sat feebly in the herb garden next to the small infirmary, I would notice the high-flying birds passing overhead on their distant journeys, and wanted to rise and follow them. Now that my body is mended and I have reached the conclusion of my chronicle, I will add these final pages to the cache of writing that I have concealed within a secret hiding place in the thick stone wall of the scriptorium. When the opportunity presents itself, as it surely will if I keep my allegiance to Odinn, I will slip

  away from this minster and make a new life somewhere in the outside world.

  Where will I go? I cannot be precise. That is not a vision that has been given me. All I know is that my fate was decided long ago, at the time of my birth, and by the Norns. They were kind to me. I have enjoyed my life, and even if I had been able to change its course, I would not have done so.

  So I will leave this minster with a sense of happy expectation and my twins in mind. I will find a place where, in my final duty as a devotee of Odinn, I shall preach, and instruct my listeners that there will be a second coming of the Old Ways.

  My lord abbot, If you will forgive this final notation, I must report that two years past our monastery received occasional reports of an unidentified preacher known locally as the 'the black priest'. This man established himself at a remote spot on the moors, and the common folk flocked there to listen and pay their devotions. It seems that he was greatly revered, though what he preached is unknown. Now he is seen no more, and it is presumed that he has departed this life. His parishioners, if they may be called that, come almost weekly to us to importune that we build and consecrate a chapel at the place of his hermitage. They say he was some sort of saint. I tremble at the possibility that with such an act we may be serving the Antichrist. But the people are most insistent, and I fear that if we spurn their request, they will be deeply vexed, to the detriment of our own foundation. In this, as in all things, I seek your blessed guidance.

  Aethelred

  Sacristan and Librarian