The Tale of Melkorka

by Octavia Randolph

  Jorunn’s cheek went from red to white, and biting her lip, she turned away.

  ~~~~

  Hoskuldr set sail two days hence, as he had promised. He had thought long and hard as to how many men to bring; he felt he wanted enough to make a show of his wealth and importance in his own land, but not so many to make the ship more crowded than would be comfortable for his passenger. And they required no extra space for cargo, save for the food and water that was needful. It was an altogether different kind of trading journey, he thought to himself, as he checked the tie lines on the steering-oar; he would exchange a girl and her child for silver and gold, and silver and gold take up very little space.

  In the end he settled on ten men, and made sure they all carried good weapons, freshly painted shields, and had with them their best clothing. He brought too a serving woman from the house, as was only fitting for such important passengers.

  When he brought the Irish princess on board he saw how she stiffened at the sight of the sleeping tent. He had purposely left the flap open, and he gestured that she move closer. The thin matting that he usually slept upon when at sea had been replaced with a thick featherbed, topped with finely-spun linen sheets and a wool blanket.

  “For you,” he told the princess. “I will sleep with my men,” he ended, and looked down.

  ~~~~

  High summer is the best time for sailing, and they made good time due South and a little East to the kingdom of Connacht, in the Northwest of Eire. It had been a long time since Hoskuldr had journeyed there, and he had forgotten the brilliant green of the island, rising above the grey seas like the egg of an eider duck. But Melkorka had not forgotten, and she once again sat in the prow of the ship and looked out. This time she held her son Mellan before her so he might see his nearing home. She began to sing again, her voice sweet and high above the slough of the wind in the heavy sails. It was the song about her tower room, the room so high above the dusky earth the Sun filled it an extra hour with its light.

  For it was the tower her eyes sought, and when they neared the coast and began to sail down it, she lifted her arm and pointed with her white finger at the distant stone tower on a far crag of rock. As they grew nearer the tower was lost from view, but the landing place was just beyond the basin of a river, and Hoskuldr ran the ship upon the shingle beach. It was nearing dusk.

  Hoskuldr wanted to continue on at once to the castle of Mellan.

  “No,” said Melkorka. “To surprise my father and brothers at table, when they have no time to prepare for me, is not courteous. We shall stay here tonight and in the morning go on.”

  Hoskuldr, realising he was no longer in command of the party, could only agree. They made camp on land, for it is easier to cook there than aboard, but when it came time to sleep the princess would not return with them to the ship. She stayed on the bank of the river with her little son and the serving woman, while Hoskuldr and his men, loath to leave her, climbed back onboard for the night. As he turned to go Hoskuldr saw her pluck a little clump of moss from a stone and press it to her lips.

  Dawn comes early in midsummer, and it was not long after that they set out for the castle of Melkorka’s people. They followed the river bank, and Hoskuldr and his men marvelled at the great forest of trees about them, oak and hornbeam and linden, ash and elm. What wealth they would bring in Iceland! They walked along, Melkorka leading the way, her babe in her arms, the serving woman following after, and then Hoskuldr and his ten men. As they went the rising sun sent shafts of light through the tree openings, sometimes falling on the princess and casting her in a golden glow. They met no one on the way until the trees gave way to open land. There the village could be seen, with its folk already afield, digging amongst rows of turnips or guiding sheep along tracks to their pasture. Behind the village lay the fortress of Mellan, built of stone and wood, guarded by a stout paling. Rising above it and behind it lay the tower Melkorka had sung of.

  Then a young man with sandy red hair, dressed in the dull shades of hunting clothes and mounted on a dappled grey horse, crossed over the nearest pasture and spurred into a canter to reach them.

  “Melkorka!” he cried, and flung himself off his horse.

  This is what Hoskuldr had waited for, this moment of recognition which would prove the girl’s story true, and it did not disappoint.

  The man closed the girl in his arms, and embraced her in such a way to prove how she had been missed. Hoskuldr moved closer. They spoke in the Irish, and so his ears were closed to what was said, but tears were flowing down the face of the Irish princess even as she smiled at the man who held her.

  The man drew back after a few moments, gesturing to the babe in the sling at the princess’s breast. She nodded and spoke more, but though she lay her hand tenderly upon the child’s head, no smile was upon her lips. She turned for a moment only towards Hoskuldr.

  Now the young man, who Hoskuldr took to be her brother, went on speaking, and with his hand pointed to the stronghold before them. It was only at this second look Hoskuldr saw the long, white, shroud-pennants hung from the paling gates, the sign of mourning within. The princess gave a shriek, and sobbing, buried her head in her brother’s shoulder.

  When she turned at last to Hoskuldr and his men, her face was paler than moonlight.

  “My father is dead,” she told them. “The king has died, and I was not here to make fare-well.”

  Hoskuldr could not help sucking in his breath; he wondered now from whence would come his reward.

  Now Melkorka’s brother helped her up upon his horse, gave her once again her son, and holding the bridle reins in his hands, walked slowly at the head of the horse to the open gates.

  They were met within by all the joyous confusion of an unexpected yet longed-for return.

  Hoskuldr watched the princess be embraced by three more brothers, the eldest of which must now be king of Connacht, the youngest no more than thirteen or fourteen years. An old serving woman pushed herself forward and wept around the princess’s neck, and it was only to this woman that she surrendered her babe.

  Once they were within the hall itself Melkorka again spoke to Hoskuldr. “My father, the king Mellan, died at Beltane. My brother Kian is now king.” She inclined her head to the eldest, marked with the same fiery hair that crowded Melkorka’s head, though around that head was a fillet of gold. “In his name I welcome you.” Ale had been brought forth, and all raised it to their lips and drank.

  Hoskuldr had time to look about him. The hall was a great one, as befits a royal house, the fire-pit large, centred, and well-banked; the floors of cleverly pieced stone, the alcoves hung with gaily-woven woollen hangings. The massive timbers of the wood roof were formed from forest giants, and set secure with darkened pegs; Hoskuldr had never seen such joinery before. Many of Kian’s men had now gathered, well-knit, strongly built warriors, each with a knife of impressive worth at the waist. Swords in their bright scabbards and shields with dully gleaming bosses hung at one end of the hall, ready at hand. A hundred spears or more stood there, clasped round with iron hoops, clustered on either side of a weaving hanging from the wall. The weaving showed three green hills, above which hovered three swords.

  Hoskuldr gave a start of recognition when he saw it, recalling how the slave-girl had adorned her infant’s gown; and he looked from the weaving to the gown the princess wore, the same he had bought her so long ago in Hordaland. He saw the princess looking at him, and she spoke.

  “The folk of Connacht are a great and ancient people, just as our hall is great. You Icelanders keep no kings; but we keep no slaves, and treat all folk justly.”

  The princess paused a moment before she went on, with a nod of her head, “You and your men have the freedom of our hall. At dusk we shall sit at meat together, at my welcome feast.”

  As he watched, the princess of Connacht turned with her brothers to a passageway, and was lost to view.

  ~~~~

  Dusk came, an
d the hour of the feast. Hoskuldr watched the tables be set upon their trestles and the hall fill with the men and women of the stronghold. It seemed every man he had seen all day was there, and of all estate, crowding into place. His men were shown to a table along one side of the length of the hall, while he himself was led to the end of the high table itself. One by one Kian’s best men came out, those who sat also at high table, and then the princess’s brothers, the youngest first. All were splendidly arrayed, and wore upon their wrists great bands of twisted silver, and on some, hammered bands of gold. At their waists glinted knives with inland hilts of more silver, and the youngest brother wore a short dagger with a golden-chased pommel set with emeralds. Then came the new king, Kian, in a tunic of green-dyed linen, his wrists wrapped with gold, the fillet around his brow gleaming. Hoskuldr had never beheld such magnificence, and as he stood there at the foot of the table had almost to steady himself with his fingertips upon the oaken surface.

  Last to the table was the Irish princess. She stepped through the passage, her head lowered for a moment, then came and stood next to her eldest brother. A head-wrap like a fine veil of mist trailed off her red hair and fell about her shoulders. She too wore green, the deepness of which recalled the moss Hoskuldr had seen her kiss upon their landing; pure silk, and shimmering as she moved.

  Now that all were assembled the great hall doors were shut. Fire blazed up in the firepit, lending light to the summer dusk. In honour of the night wine was brought out, dipped from deep pottery crocks brought all the way from Rhineland. Hoskuldr saw the princess herself take up a small ewer from her old nurse’s hands, and walk quietly with it to the lowest table in the hall. There she filled but one cup, that of an old and shabby man.

  The princess returned to the high table. The food had not yet been brought out, and as Hoskuldr saw the family of Connacht still standing, he wondered if now was the time when they would address him, and present him with his reward. He had been working up a little speech in his mind, one in which he could modestly accept the silver for Melkorka’s safe return, and also subtly remind them that a man of his standing in Iceland was to be considered a not-unworthy father of her beautiful son. He had not quite fixed on the wording of that last part.

  Now he waited for the new king Kian to speak to him. But it was Melkorka who lifted her wine cup first, and at her gesture, all brought the sweet Rhineish wine to their lips. After the first deep draught Melkorka left her place and took a few steps nearer where Hoskuldr stood at the foot of the table. She moved delicately, her silk gown swirling at her ankles, and came close to him.

  She lifted her face and looked straight at him. Her eyes were the colour of glacial ice. She spoke in Icelandic, and so spoke only to Hoskuldr.

  “Icelander, when I could not speak, you hurt me to prove it. You used me cruelly night after night aboard your ship, so that it took all my force of will to survive. You bought me to satisfy your own lust, but then, lying, gave me as an unwanted gift to your wife. Now you come looking for your reward.”

  Hoskuldr had stepped back during the princess’ address, and was now nearly against the edge of the table. His eyes were so fixed upon her that he had scarcely noticed her four brothers closing around him. Upon their faces was the cool resolve men wear when they close in upon an ensnared beast during the hunt.

  Melkorka was but an arm’s-span from him now, and she raised her arm in the air above her head. She lifted her face toward the vast timbers of the roof, now lost in the gathering gloom, and her head-wrap slipped off and fell from her hair. The eyes of all were fastened upon her. To her people there in the hall it seemed the great war goddess Morrígú, red-haired, red-eyebrowed, stood before them, embodied in their own Melkorka.

  “Now,” she repeated, “you come looking for your reward!” At this Melkorka dropped her hand, finger pointed at Hoskuldr.

  It was her youngest brother, a lad of fourteen, who reached him first. The boy had his jewell-hilted dagger ready in hand, and he plunged it with all his young strength into the Icelander’s belly, just above the belt, and then with both hands, seized it and pulled violently down.

  Hoskuldr gasped and shuddered, his mouth opening as if to scream. Naught but a gurgle came forth. His knees buckled beneath him, and he fell back upon the floor, his eyes staring. His hand reached up, grasping for help which would not come.

  Melkorka looked down at the Icelander.

  “That is the rare metal I promised you,” she said.

  Her youngest brother, trembling at his act, stood at her side, and she placed her arm about him, kissed his brow, and held him closely to her. She looked now to her older brothers. The stranger being dead, she spoke in the Irish.

  “Send his body back to Iceland with the dagger in his gut,” she said. “His wife is not guilty of how he dealt with me, and it will buy her the milk cows she wanted.”

  A murmuring ran through the hall, and as Melkorka and her brothers stepped back from the body the crowd closed in to gaze upon it. Off to one side Hoskuldr’s men stood pale and helpless at the justice they had seen wrought.

  The Irish princess was moving now, down the length of the hall, to the last table there. One of the serving men had wondered, when, earlier that day, Melkorka had sent him to the crag where lived a certain goatherd. The man was a sort of hermit, rarely seen within the confines of the village or hall yards, but now he was to be asked to come to the hall. But Melkorka had ordered that the serving man not tell the goatherd that she had returned, as it were, from the dead.

  Melkorka reached the table where the goatherd Cronan stood, his hand clutching his wine cup. True to his name he had brown skin, darkened by weather and rough living. He wore the skins of the beasts he herded, a betrayal of his care; and his bleared eyes were watery.

  She did not grow near the man, but stood well apart, and those around him began to move away as well.

  “I am glad to see you enjoying your wine, Cronan,” she told him. “It is a special draught I prepared for you.”

  The man’s eyes opened, and his lips peeled back from his mouth. Beads of sweat had sprouted on his upper lip, and his hand began to tremble. He tried to place the cup onto the table, but his shaking hand missed, and it tumbled to the floor. The wine splashed upon his feet, swirling on the paving stones. He shuffled back from the dark pool it made.

  “I used to fear you, goatherd, but as a maiden I knew not why. You would watch me when I was out walking, and I feared your gaze.”

  Cronan, his face glistening with sweat, looked back up the hall towards the dead Icelander. Melkorka followed his gaze and spoke again.

  “You saw how the Icelander died. In an hour you will be begging for such a death, for the poisons I put into your wine will make you suffer as no man ever has.”

  Melkorka’s brothers had stepped forward towards Cronan, hands gripping their knives. It was clear from the wonder upon their faces that this time they knew nothing of what was happening. She turned to them, gesturing at their drawn weapons.

  “You will not need them, good brothers, and I will not have your noble steel touch the blood of one so base as this goatherd. Know that he is the one who, when I was out walking by the river, seized me, beat me, and then robbed me of my maidenhead.”

  Here the princess’s brothers swore and lunged forward with their knives, but she stepped between them with raised hand and said, “Do not, I implore you, brothers, deprive me, who was wronged, of my own revenge! Let him die as I have cast it.”

  They could not but allow her this, and Kian, the king, lowered his knife with a nod. Melkorka turned again to Cronan and went on.

  “After treating me thus, you handed me over to traders who carried me over the sea, where I was sold, and sold again, to that dead Icelander.”

  Throughout this speech Cronan had grown more and more distressed, his eyes bulging, his arms and legs shaking. Now he placed a hand at his waist and groaned as he pressed.

  Melkorka looked u
pon him and spoke in a voice so quiet that few could hear. “You begin to feel it, the poison filling your bowels. Soon you will be in a fever so great that only the burning of your gut will match it. Your throat will close and you will gasp for breath as your hands tear at your mouth.”

  Cronan began a howl, a high-pitched keening yelp, and wild-eyed, looked about him. Then he doubled over, clutching at his gut. All moved back a step. The goatherd grabbed a knife from the table and ran to the doors, but finding them bolted against escape, dropped to his knees before them. They saw the hand rise and then fall, and then the body topple sideways upon the stone pavers.

  The Irish princess turned her back upon him. She faced her four brothers. She let out a breath and told them of her act.

  “There were no poisons in his wine. I ground in only enough herbs to loosen his bowels, and make him fear the Fate I foretold.”

  Such was the homecoming of the stolen princess. Kian, king of Connacht, sent the Icelander’s body back as his sister requested. But the body of the faithless goatherd was tossed from the highest cliff of Connacht onto the sea shore below, for the seabirds to fight over.

  As for Melkorka, the slave-princess: by her own choice she never wed, although she was deemed the fairest woman in all Connacht. She devoted herself to her young son, and sat in counsel with her brothers, and adorned their hall at night. So highly was her revenge thought of that even in her own lifetime she began to be spoken of with the awe accorded a great warrior. Her son, that which Hoskuldr named Olafr, grew to be a champion of the Irish people. Then, curious about the land of his birth, he sailed to Iceland. There he became the father of the great and tragic hero Kjarten. This was in his Fate, for after all, he did have a drop of the blood of Unnr the Deep-Minded in him. But that is a tale I shall tell you another night.

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