He was dizzy by the time he stopped, but he didn’t mind. Freya was now tied tightly to the maypole by a dozen or more lengths of ribbon. Vulgar grinned from ear to ear.
“There,” he said. “Was that fast enough for you?”
“Untie me, Vulgar,” Freya hissed. “Right now!”
“Good luck finding a new king, Your Highness,” Vulgar said. Smirking, he gave her one final bow, then with a whoop of delight, he turned and ran through the door and out of the Great Hall.
Vulgar ran from the Great Hall and dashed across the village green. He had done it. He was free! Now to find some proper Viking stuff to do.
It didn’t take him long to find Knut. His friend was at the edge of the village trying to carry a bundle of sticks. He was dropping most of them, and every time he bent to pick one up more would fall to the ground.
“Hello!” cried Vulgar.
Knut gave a yelp and dropped the rest of his sticks. He stared at Vulgar in surprise. “I thought you were supposed to be dancing?”
Vulgar shrugged. “I told Freya that real Vikings don’t dance around maypoles. She said I could go.”
Knut looked puzzled and scratched one of the horns on his helmet. “Really?”
“Nah,” Vulgar said with a grin. “I tied her up and ran away. What are you doing?”
“Collecting sticks for the bonfire.”
Vulgar’s eyes lit up. “Thor’s teeth! I’d forgotten about the bonfire.” He leapt into action and began pushing the fallen wood into a pile. “We’re going to need a lot more than that,” he said.
“I don’t think they want too much,” Knut said. “It isn’t going to be a very big bonfire.”
“What?” spluttered Vulgar. “Says who?”
Knut shrugged. “The grown-ups. They’re worried a big bonfire might be dangerous.”
“Of course it will be dangerous!” Vulgar cried. “That’s the whole point! Vikings eat danger for breakfast!”
“Really?” said Knut, frowning. “My mum gives me oatmeal.”
“I’ve tasted your mum’s cooking,” said Vulgar. “Trust me – it’s dangerous.” He pushed sticks into the pile. “Let’s get some more wood. We’re going to make this the biggest bonfire Blubber has ever seen. It’ll be so big it’ll melt the snow on the mountains! They’ll be able to see it at the North Pole!”
The boys spent the next hour gathering sticks and branches from the woods outside the village. Some of the branches were too big for them to carry, but they heaved and dragged them over to their ever-growing pile.
As Knut dropped a large branch on to the stack, Vulgar leapt out from the woods, a long spiky stick held in one hand. He waggled it around like a sword.
“Halt, lowly dog! It is I, Thrunt Mangleson, leader of the Viking horde. Face me in combat or… or…”
“Or what?” asked Knut.
“Or I’ll have your arms off,” growled Vulgar. He swished his play sword around to prove his point.
Thrunt Mangleson was one of Vulgar’s all-time Viking heroes. He had led an army of Vikings in an attack on the town of Lumpp, far across the sea in Angle Land. The Vikings came with swords, shields, axes and a great big hammer with spikes on the end. The Lumppian townsfolk had spades and frying pans, and wore wooden buckets as helmets. It went down in history as “The Seven-Minute War”.
“Very well, Mangleson,” said Knut, grabbing a stick from the pile. “Challenge accepted!”
The boys laughed as they began clacking their sticks together in battle. The pretend swords swished and sliced through the air as they thrust and parried around the woodpile.
Suddenly Vulgar heard a war cry from behind him. He turned sharply, his sword raised, ready to face whatever horrible creature had crept up on him. A huge dark shadow passed across him, and Vulgar’s face went pale.
“Mum?”
Helga reached down and lifted Vulgar up by the tunic.
Vulgar heard a giggle coming from behind his mum. Freya stepped out from behind Helga’s back, stuck her tongue out at Vulgar, then smiled sweetly.
“Did you tie the princess up?” Helga demanded.
“No!” said Vulgar. His mum growled at him. “Well… maybe a bit.”
“Apologise,” said Helga.
“But…”
“Say. Sorry. Now!”
Vulgar wanted to argue, but his mum could be scary when she wanted to, and now she really wanted to. “Sorry,” he mumbled, then he gave an oof as Helga let him drop to the ground.
“Since you’ve missed out on so much rehearsal time, you’re going to stay at the castle until the festivities tomorrow so you can practise,” Helga said. Vulgar opened his mouth to complain, but his mum shot him that look again.
“All right,” he grumbled. He dropped his stick, waved a sad goodbye to Knut, then trudged after his mum and Freya all the way to King Olaf’s castle.
Vulgar didn’t mind the castle. It had suits of armour and swords and tapestries about battles. He just didn’t like the fact that Freya lived there.
“Midsummer Kings need to have perfect manners,” the princess said. “It’s dinner soon, so I want you to use your napkin properly.”
Vulgar blinked. “What’s a napkin?”
“It stops your food landing in your lap,” Freya explained.
“Oh. My dog usually does that.”
Freya sighed. “You tuck it into your tunic or lay it across your lap. As you eat, you can also use it to dab the corners of your mouth. But dab. Don’t wipe. Kings never wipe.”
Vulgar thought about this. “What, even after they’ve been to the—?”
“Vulgar!” Freya yelped. “Don’t be so… so… vulgar. Go and wash your hands.”
“They’re not dirty,” said Vulgar. He looked at the black dirt beneath his fingernails. “No more than usual, anyway.”
“Go,” said Freya, pointing to the bathroom. “And use soap!”
“Soap? But…”
“Do you want me to call your mum back here?”
Vulgar bit his lip before he could say anything else. With a sigh he turned and trudged into the bathroom.
“And scrub properly,” ordered Freya. “I’ll be checking them carefully.”
After three attempts, Vulgar’s hands were clean enough for Freya’s liking. She led him through to the dining room, where a huge table was laid out with more food than he had ever seen in his life.
King Olaf was sitting at the head of the table, already munching his way through a whole chicken. Vulgar raced to the table and grabbed for some pickled whale meat, but Freya slapped his hand.
“Manners,” she said. “A king doesn’t eat with his hands.”
Vulgar pointed to Freya’s father. “He does!”
“Yes, well, you don’t!” She passed him a fork and tossed him a napkin. “Your mum said you had to do what I told you, remember?”
“No, she didn’t!”
“Yes, she did,” sniffed Freya. “You obviously weren’t listening.”
Reluctantly, Vulgar tucked in his napkin and speared some food with the fork. King Olaf was now tearing into a whole leg of roast elk, using his fingers to get at the juicy bits.
“Tell me about the evil spirits that come on Midsummer’s night,” Vulgar said.
Olaf wiped – not dabbed – his mouth on the back of his sleeve. “Oh, they’re nasty things,” he said. “Trolls… um… other things.”
“Ogres?” asked Vulgar.
“Hmm? Oh yes. Yes. Definitely ogres. Nothing worse than ogres.”
“Have you ever met an ogre?” Vulgar asked.
Olaf snorted. “One? I’ve met two hundred of them! An entire ogre army once attacked me in the woods. It’s lucky I had my sword, otherwise I could’ve been in real trouble.”
“Did you defeat them all?” gasped Vulgar.
King Olaf smoothed down his beard. “Put it this way – they don’t call it ‘Dead Ogre Wood’ for nothing.”
Vulgar frowned. “But nobody does call it that.
”
The king frowned. “Yes. Well. Maybe they should start.”
“What other evil spirits come out? Sprites?”
“Of course.”
“Elves?”
“Almost certainly.” King Olaf nodded. “Mischievous beggars, elves.”
Vulgar looked sideways at Freya. She had eaten her main course and was about to start on dessert. Vulgar wasn’t sure what it was, but it had strawberries and blueberries and thick dollops of cream. It looked delicious.
“Look – an elf!” he cried and he pointed into the corner of the dining room. Freya and Olaf looked in the direction he had pointed, giving him just enough time to scoop a handful of Freya’s pudding and cram it in his mouth.
He swallowed just as Freya turned back. “Hey, what happened to my pudding?” she squealed.
Vulgar grinned. There were little bits of strawberry between his teeth. “Must have been the elf,” he said.
Freya’s eyes narrowed. “It’s not elves you need to be afraid of,” she said.
“I’m not afraid of anything,” Vulgar replied.
“Good. Then you won’t be scared of the castle ghosts.”
“Ghosts?”
“Oh yes!” boomed King Olaf. “The place is full of them. Old King Godfred the Ghastly is the worst. Legend says he used to chop people up and have them for dinner. Sometimes when the castle is quiet you can hear him pacing the corridors, sharpening his axe and growling like a wild animal.”
“Growling?” whispered Vulgar.
“Yes,” said Freya. “But that won’t bother you. You’re not afraid of anything.”
That night, Vulgar lay wide awake in bed. The guest bedroom he’d been put in was nice. That was the problem. It was too nice. It didn’t shake with his mum’s snoring. It didn’t smell of stinky dog. When he couldn’t sleep at home he’d count the fleas on his covers, but there were no fleas anywhere to be found.
And he was also worried about Godfred the Ghastly. Was he out there somewhere, pacing the corridors and sharpening his axe?
Vulgar gulped. That did it. He’d never get to sleep now. There was only one thing for it – he had to sneak home to his own bed.
He tiptoed to the bedroom door. It gave a creak as he eased it open. He held his breath and peeped out into the corridor. A single torch was burning in a holder on the wall. It cast spooky shadows across the stone.
Being careful not to make a sound, Vulgar crept out into the corridor. The flickering flame of the torch made the shadows move and for a moment he thought he saw a little elf darting through the darkness.
He froze, then almost laughed when the shape gave a soft squeak.
“Just a mouse,” he whispered, tiptoeing on.
The safest way out of the castle would probably be through the kitchen door at the back. Vulgar made his way in that direction, sneaking along the corridor and creeping down the stone steps.
The corridor leading to the kitchen was almost completely dark. There was no torch burning here, and the moonlight coming in through the narrow windows did little to lift the gloom.
Vulgar was halfway along the passageway before he saw it – the shadow of a figure with a horned helmet blocking the back door. The figure let out a snorting grunt that made Vulgar’s heart pound faster. It sounded like the growling of a wild animal.
King Godfred the Ghastly had found him!
Vulgar held his breath and slowly backed away from the ghostly figure, looking for something to defend himself with. He thought about running away, but proper Vikings never ran away. They faced danger head on.
He gave a soft whimper. For the first time ever he really wished he didn’t want to be a proper Viking.
The door to the kitchen was on his right. He ducked in there and searched for a weapon, but all the sharp things had been safely locked out of reach.
There was a large iron cooking pot sitting on one of the worktops. Vulgar tried lifting it, but it was too heavy to budge. He decided just to take the lid instead and use it as a shield.
Over in the corner, a broom was propped against the wall. Its handle was longer and heavier than the stick he’d fought Knut with, and he reckoned even a ghost wouldn’t want to be thumped on the head with it.
He poked his head back out into the corridor, hoping the ghost would be gone. No such luck. The shadow was still there, growling and grunting away. Vulgar crept out of the kitchen. Maybe if he took the ghost by surprise he would have a better chance of defeating it. Carefully – ever so carefully – he crept along the corridor.
“I’m going to eat you up!” the ghost said, smacking its lips together.
That did it. Godfred the Ghastly’s ghost had seen him. There was no way to surprise it now. There was only one thing left to do.
“CHAAAAAARGE!” yelled Vulgar, raising the broom handle above his head and running for the shadowy shape. He brought the stick down sharply. It hit with a whang on the top of a horned helmet.
The ghostly figure seemed to grow to twice its size. “Ooyah,” it grunted. “Me bleedin’ ’ead.”
Vulgar swung again, this time cracking the ghost across one leg. It gave another yelp and began to hop. “Ow!” cried the figure. “’Ere, cut that out!”
Something moved behind Vulgar. An even larger shape lunged at him from out of the darkness. Freya had been right. This place was crawling with ghosts! He would have to fight his way out! Vulgar swung with his broom handle and the shadow gave a loud “Ouch!”
With a Viking roar, Vulgar swung again in a big half-circle. He managed to hit both ghosts this time.
“Oof! Me back!”
“Argh! My knee! Stop that right now!”
Vulgar was about to swing again when he realised that both voices sounded familiar. Very familiar. A horrible sinking feeling began to swoosh around in his stomach.
A torch came round the corner, carried by a sleepy-looking Freya. The torch’s flame pushed the darkness away, revealing Harrumf. He was rubbing his back and glaring angrily down at Vulgar.
“You!” he spat. “I might ’ave bleedin’ known.”
Vulgar smiled nervously, then turned to see King Olaf hopping up and down behind him. The king was wearing nothing but a long white nightdress and an angry expression.
“What is the meaning of this?” he demanded. “I come out to see what all the noise is and you start attacking me!”
“He attacked me an’ all,” Harrumf said. The old man’s beard was full of crumbs, and he had half a meat pie in his hand.
“I thought you were a ghost,” Vulgar explained. “I thought you were Godfred the Ghastly and you were going to eat me.”
Freya giggled and Vulgar felt his cheeks blush red. “He said he was going to eat me up!”
Harrumf frowned. “No, I didn’t.”
“Yes, you did! You were grunting and growling and—”
“Snoring?” said King Olaf.
Harrumf shook his head. “What? Not me, Yer Majesty. Wide awake and on patrol, I was.”
“So not asleep in that chair, then?” said King Olaf. He pointed to a chair propped against the wall, just where Vulgar had first seen the shadowy figure. “Halfway through eating that pie. Dreaming about… oh, I don’t know… the Midsummer’s Eve feast, perhaps?”
Harrumf fiddled nervously with the hem of his tunic. “Perish the thought, Yer High Royalness. Wouldn’t catch me sleepin’ on duty.”
“I would and I have many times,” King Olaf said. He waved a hand. “Still, no harm done, I suppose.”
“Eh? What about me back?”
Olaf ignored him. “Back to bed, you two. Freya, show Vulgar the way to his room, would you? And, Vulgar, I want you to stay there until morning.”
Vulgar’s shoulders sagged. “Oh, all right.”
Freya led him from the kitchen along the corridor towards his room. In the torchlight, Vulgar could see that her broad smile stretched from ear to ear. “Now you’ll definitely have to dance around the maypole with me,” she said.
<
br /> “Oh yeah? How do you work that out?” Vulgar asked.
“Because if you don’t,” the princess said, giggling, “I’ll tell everyone how terrified you are of ghosts!”
“You wouldn’t,” said Vulgar.
“Oh, I so would,” said Freya. They stopped outside Vulgar’s bedroom door. “Goodnight. Be sure to get plenty of sleep. I want you rested for our dancing tomorrow.” She smirked. “The whole village will be watching us, after all.”
“Don’t remind me,” Vulgar groaned, then he crawled into bed, pulled the covers over his head, and tossed and turned until morning.
Just before seven o’clock the castle was invaded by musicians, cleaners, decorators, waiters, waitresses and chefs. By then, Vulgar had already been practising his maypole dancing for over an hour. He’d had to beg Princess Freya to let him stop for breakfast.
As Vulgar trudged to the kitchen, people raced by him in both directions. They carried armfuls of bunting and stacks of plates and huge racks of meat.
The smell of cooking food wafted along the passageway and he followed his nose down the steps and into the castle kitchen. It looked completely different in daylight. Cooks bustled around, roasting every kind of delicacy under the sun.
Vulgar’s stomach rumbled loudly. In fact, he’d never heard it rumble so loudly before. Then he realised the rumbling was coming from behind him. He turned to see his mum rolling an enormous barrel of mead into the kitchen. Another barrel was slung over her shoulder. She patted him on the head with her free hand as she passed.
Vulgar the Viking and a Midsummer Night's Scream Page 2
