The Voyage of Freydis

by Tamara Goranson

  There is a flash of light as I land with a heavy thud in a mound of snow on a rocky ledge. Immediately, there is searing shoulder and ankle pain. Willing myself to stay alert, I attempt to quell the hysteria rising in my chest as I try to shift my body and move my arm.

  The wind emits an eerie moan. Turning my head, I catch a glimpse of where I am lying on a rocky ledge that is jutting out of a cliff overlooking a frozen lake. My breath catches. I have narrowly missed falling to the lake below where I would have met my death. The relief washes through me before the panic peaks. By the gods, no one knows I am stranded here. No one knows I am injured and all alone. Surely, I will die out here.

  For the remainder of the afternoon I lie there staring up at the ice-blue sky waiting for the freezing cold to put me to sleep and stop the pain. In the silence, just as my eyes begin to close, I hear a faint noise coming from up above. With my good arm, I shield my eyes against the winter sun and look way up, wincing when I spot clumps of snow and ice and bits of dirt dropping from the rockface up above. The particles slip past me as they pick up speed.

  “Down here!” The words slip out in a puff of fog as a sharp and agonizing pain shoots down my leg. Moaning, I try to lift my head to better see the top of the snow-covered ridge. On the upper banks, a face appears. Squinting against the winter sun, I think I see Achak in his sealskin furs, but when I look again, Abooksigun is on his stomach peering down. He smiles mischievously and flashes teeth.

  I blink again.

  For the love of Loki, that little thief has followed me.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Wind murmurs

  “Stop!”

  I inhale the icy air, panicking as Abooksigun inches closer to the edge. His movements send an avalanche of powdery snow plummeting soundlessly down the cliff. “Don’t come any closer. It’s too dangerous.” An instant later, he disappears.

  I try to sit but a sharp current of pain jolts through my ankle and shoots up my leg, causing me to slink back down. I hear a click then a pop. Wincing, I try to adjust my position, shivering when a cold updraft swells from the lake below.

  “Abooksigun!”

  The white mist from my breath hovers in the chilly air before disappearing in feathery wisps. Just then, another shout mingles with the sound of a raven’s croak as the heat slowly leaches from me and the cold creeps down my back. In the swirling mist, the ethereal whispers breathe life back into me.

  Don’t be scared. You’ve suffered worse than this.

  Logatha’s singsong voice pings off the rocks. The melody of her wind murmurs carries me in a rhythmic trance into the sky. Through a rippling haze, I see her face as she comes to me on one of Óðinn’s black-feathered birds with its beady eyes and smooth, curved beak. Her image flickers, sparkles, breathes. In pain, I try to shake the cobwebs from my head, bracing myself as I endure another surge of stabbing pain.

  By the gods, you’ll make it through. I’ll offer sacrifice to the gods. Logatha’s words are carried into the stillness, released on a breath of wind.

  It’s what you do. It’s who you are, I reply in a hoarse whisper that escapes in wispy puffs.

  She mops the perspiration off my brow. I have waited long for you to return to us, Freydis Eiriksdöttir. Where are you, sister?

  I try to struggle up. I can’t come to you, I sputter, but her ears seem plugged. My ankle is broken and I can’t walk.

  Logatha’s life force mixes in with the icy fog breaths I push out. I have made her cry. I know it. I try to reach for her, but the pain is so intense that I have to drop my arm. Every bone in my body hurts. I feel the cold of everything.

  Logatha inches backwards along the ledge. An instant later, she takes a step out into thin air and my heart jumps while my breath ladders up my nose. She doesn’t fall. In the hazy light, a raven scoops her up on its black-feathered wings, carrying her away into the ball of sun where she disappears into the blinding light.

  In the distance I hear a raven croak, and I think I see a small black dot being swallowed by the brilliant sun. The sunset flares. The noise of flapping wings brushes past in a gust of wind and then a snowy powder rains down and my memories smudge.

  I am lying on a ledge.

  I am freezing cold.

  My body hurts.

  With a sob gathering in my throat, I discover that there is no raven and no Logatha. No blinding light. No wind. Just snow and ice and frostbite setting in. Peering up the side of the massive cliff, I feel the cold air claim my bones and a chunk of snow moving down my boot.

  I will die out here.

  Wincing, I try to shift my weight. Using my good arm to draw my furs around my face, the pain flares again and I draw a breath that sears my lungs. The boy has left. He might not return. He must be Loki in disguise. Or worse. Perhaps I forged him out of fear, out of hunger and burning pain.

  As I am clawing at my ankle with my frozen fingers, there is another jolt of agonizing pain. I gasp and my cry travels the length of the frozen lake. Then I lie still, waiting for the cold-loving Ullr to come for me after he glides around the world, covering the land in ice and snow. There again, Skaði, the bowhunting snow goddess, might claim me first.

  Time crawls. My will to live begins fading fast. In the cold shadows of the rockface, the thought of rolling over the ledge appeals to me. The thought pops in and out. Faðir’s face takes form and crystallizes in the mist. He died of sickness, which prevented him from entering Valhalla’s gates. He would want something more for me.

  With grim determination, I force myself to inch my body off the ground without looking down. Far off in the distance I hear a flock of birds coming towards me, their cries thin and shrill. It is almost as though they are mocking me. The sound pings off the cliff walls, and in distance a man shouts. His muffled cry flutters down from the bank above.

  Peering up, I see nothing but ice clinging to the rockface in lacy frost patterns, a patch of snow hanging from an upper ledge where a lone tree grows. My head is pounding; my back is cold; my eyes start brimming with big, fat tears. An instant later the boy’s face appears. Shielding my eyes with my hand, I try to determine if he is real.

  In a whirl of movement, Abooksigun stands and waves. I feel strangely peaceful, strangely calm. He has brought Achak and two other men. Their faces are wrapped in sealskin furs.

  High above me on a sturdy perch, Achak motions for me to shimmy closer to the rocks where they attempt to drop a rope. The ridge is steep, the drop-off sudden and treacherous. It will be a grueling feat for the Red Men to rescue me when my shoulder is useless and I can’t walk.

  I yell up, pointing wildly to my foot that is twisted, misshapen, and very sore. Achak seems to understand. A moment later his face disappears. Peeking over my shoulder, I look down and my stomach falls. The lake lies far below. If I fell, I would surely die. A rush of fear knocks the wind right out of me. I would rather face the rock wall than peer down into the nothingness.

  The hunters leave me waiting for far too long. When Achak finally reappears, he helps lower Abooksigun down to me, monitoring the boy’s body as it twists and turns and spins wildly in the air.

  Stretching out my good arm to grab his hand, Abooksigun tries to reach for me, but the sudden movement steals my breath away and I bite down hard and cut my tongue. Abooksigun is oblivious until he sees my fear-crazed face. Then his forehead crinkles into a frown. His eyes are chocolate-brown and bordered by lashes that are long and dark and thick and curled, the frost on them glittering as he paws his face. When he swings towards me, I see his determination mixed with an unexpected strength.

  “My ankle is twisted or badly broken, I can’t tell,” I say, knowing it is impossible for him to understand. Abooksigun quickly secures me to a second rope without untying himself from the initial line. Then he leans down to inspect my foot. Reaching underneath his furs, he pulls out a piece of softened hide and starts using it to wrap my ankle. I point to the leggings he is wearing.

  “Did you rip off a
piece of your hides to help bandage my foot?”

  He mutters something in his native tongue.

  “This was Achak’s, then?” I sputter when I hear Abooksigun say the hunter’s name. The boy’s face cracks a grin and he nods before motioning for me to extend my arm.

  I endure his ministrations in agony, clenching my teeth and stifling a painful moan when he yanks the wrappings too tightly. When he goes to touch my shoulder I jerk back, and my sudden movement dislodges a chunk of ice that plummets to the lake below.

  Abooksigun pulls back from me and eyes me hard. Then he signals to the men to lift me up.

  “You have redeemed yourself,” I say earnestly. When he sees me clasp my good hand to my heart in a gesture of gratitude, he bows his head in deference.

  Peering up, I shiver. Achak is at the top looking down. At that moment the rope falls down, and Abooksigun takes my mittened hand and helps me grab it. My other arm is useless – a dangling stump.

  They hoist me up. At the top, strong hands reach out and pull me up and over the icy ledge. A moment later I find myself lying on my back, staring up at Achak’s face. The huntsman chokes out some words, addressing me in a clipped, harsh tone.

  “I don’t understand,” I say, squinting up at him.

  He turns away but in moments he is back. In his hand he has a piece of wood that he tries to place in my mouth. There is a sudden surge of fear. Cringing, I clamp my lips shut and try to twist away. The movement jars my injuries and I cry out in pain.

  Askook scowls as he leans over me, blocking out the winter sun, and the memories come shimmying through me, unbidden. I am robbed of breath when I catch a glimpse of Thorvard’s profile bathed in sun. He is leaning over me, sticking his fingers in my mouth.

  “Stop it!” I spit, batting at the air, half-choking on the words as a sob erupts.

  Achak jumps. He points to his shoulder, points to mine. I shake my head. I can’t speak his language, and he can’t speak mine.

  A moment later, he straightens up and I focus on his glorious teeth that look like floating chunks of ocean ice, willing the rhythmic thunk of my heart to slow. A moment later, he motions for me to watch him closely, and I scoop up a breath and almost gag when I see him insert the woodchip between his teeth and bite down hard.

  Shaking my head again, I try to communicate that I am in too much pain for this stupid game. I won’t make myself vulnerable in the hands of any skraeling man.

  The others retrieve Abooksigun from the ledge below and then huddle together at my feet. The boy looks relieved as he natters away in his boy-man voice. Beside him stands a Red Man with soft, serious eyes. They call him “Nashushuk”. His face looks kind.

  Nashushuk comes to kneel beside me in the snow. Slowly, he takes his mittens off. “What are you doing?” I ask, eyeing him suspiciously. He ignores me. There is a stench of fish and smoke wafting off his furs. When he leans forwards, he too tries to coax me to place the piece of bark into my mouth. Miserably I look at him, knowing there is no point in trying to explain myself. Then I close myself off to everyone, to everything.

  Nashushuk glances at Achak who stands as still as stone. Achak looks cross. He won’t look at me. Just before he trundles through the churned-up snow with the winter sun bouncing off his fur-clad back, he throws a scowl at Nashushuk, and the words slipping off his tongue sound harsh and mean. Then he picks up his axe and moves in the direction of his other friend who is removing a caribou carcass from the sleigh. When Achak addresses him, I catch his name. Askook. He is a tall, austere-looking hunter-type with long black hair flowing down his back and red tattoos scrolling down one cheek.

  Abooksigun glances quickly at the men before he comes closer to me and places the rejected wood piece in his mouth. Numbly I watch him bite down hard but this time he simultaneously pretends to twist his shoulder into place. All at once I see the plan. They want to pop my shoulder back into place. Placing my good elbow across my eyes, I breathe in deeply and then beckon to the boy. A moment later I am tasting wood.

  By the time my shoulder has been reset and bound, Askook has prepared the sled to receive me. In a foggy haze, I let them transfer me without crying out, but my shoulder is in agony and I almost vomit from the pain when they lower me onto the sled.

  Abooksigun is immediately at my side, dropping ice into my mouth. Behind him, I catch a glimpse of the caribou carcass in the snow and I feel guilty for making them leave their hard-earned prize behind.

  Instead of meat, they will bring me home in their sled tonight.

  We travel back to the skraeling settlement with the moon reflecting off the snow, and the huntsmen ignore me – all except Abooksigun. I almost resent him for his nattering. Listening to the sled gently swishing through the snow, I fade in and out, smarting from the vicious pain.

  When, at last, the circle of brightly lit skraeling longhouses come into view as a beacon of hope in the freezing cold, Abooksigun points excitedly. His pearly-white teeth glow eerily in the dark. When I look up, there are millions of stars overhead, twinkling in the frosty night.

  As soon as the sled slides to a stop, there is a jolt of pain. Abooksigun quickly bends down to check on me. When he sees me pawing at my face, he exchanges the hide covering around my nose and mouth for one that isn’t matted with frost and ice. Just ahead, there are wisps of smoke snaking into the air from the skraeling dwellings, and as I follow the smoke with my eyes, Achak fires off a series of short, sharp words. When the grumpy one, Askook, replies, I have the distinct impression that he is blaming me for losing the caribou. There is a sudden surge of guilt. I know the pain of his disappointment. I know this loss.

  As soon as we reach the old woman’s longhouse, Askook abandons us. His black silhouette – a tall, straight stick that melds into the shadows cast by a line of silver birch – moves quickly towards the tent at the far end of the clearing where a blood moon hangs suspended in the sky.

  In the eerie quiet, Achak flicks a glance at me as he passes by and I try to smile up at him. To my surprise, he ignores me when he addresses Abooksigun in a serious tone. The boy chirps back but the conversation – the inflections and intonations – seem all wrong to me. A moment later the boy scurries off and Achak returns to help Nashushuk haul me into the family dwelling I thought I’d never see again.

  When the old woman sees my injuries, she instructs the men to move me to her bed of furs. There she unwraps my leggings and peeks underneath the dressing. It must be bad. The smooth skin on her forehead wrinkles into knots and she spits at a group of skraeling women who gather round. As soon as she turns, I look down and see my swollen, twisted foot that is red and blotchy and twice its normal size.

  The old woman uses her gnarled fingers to scoop out salve that she works into my injured foot. The pine stench is bad, but almost immediately I feel the tincture’s soothing warmth. Then she turns her attention to my wrist, my shoulder, and my arm.

  When my ordeal is over and the women have splinted my foot and wrapped and iced my other injuries I try to sleep, but I can’t get comfortable in the bed of cedar that lines the bottom of the old woman’s sleeping hole. I close my eyes and try to slow my breathing, but the pain is too intense. I cannot sleep.

  One by one, the Red Men leave the hearth fire to go to bed. In the silence, I turn my body towards the birchbark walls and cringe when the pain flares. Just then, I feel the heat of someone behind my back, and I hold my body very still. Without a word, Achak tucks the furs around my back.

  The next morning, I notice that someone has placed two circles beside my bed. One is made up of acorns that have been painted red. The other is a circle of pinecones, but the loop is missing a pinecone to complete the loop. I don’t see the significance until I notice that a small, misshapen pinecone has been placed in the center of the red acorns. Then my tears well up. He is trying to tell me that his tribe is circling around me to offer their protection while I heal.

  Glancing up at the drying fish dangling from the rafters,
I see the work these skraelings do to survive all winter long and realize that they are not so unlike my people. Furs and skins hang on the walls. Tools and weapons hang from posts. The smell of woodsmoke mingles with the smell of cooking meat. On the ground, there are birchbark containers full of drying herbs and root vegetables.

  I lay my arm across my brow, trying to blot out the pain of everything. At least I am safe among these people in this tribe. I should feel at ease knowing that it doesn’t matter where I sleep as long as I have a bed. Beothuk. Norse. All of us are just desperate to survive these winter storms in this wretched wilderness.

  When Askook enters the heated dwelling that afternoon, he brings with him a blast of cold. As he is tugging off his furs, I admire the leggings that he is wearing with spruce root stitching along the seams. The root is shiny and white and contrasts nicely with his ochre-red pants.

  Askook barks at Achak when he sees me lying in the old woman’s bed. To my surprise, Achak chuckles and the old woman smiles her toothless grin. Then Achak stands and offers Askook a seat by the smoking fire. They talk briefly amongst themselves, and I grow weary from watching their muscled shoulders rippling underneath their fine stag-skin shirts.

  Askook stays late to visit with Achak, Nashushuk, and some other men. When he shakes his fists good-naturedly at Abooksigun, the man-child glances at me quickly before he says something which makes the other hunters laugh. Then Askook’s voice climbs to a dangerous peak. His demeanour reminds me of my former life when I allowed Thorvard to rule my moods, to usurp my thoughts, and rob me of almost everything. I won’t have that anymore. I can’t. Not here. Not in this place where I have the chance to be someone new. I know the skraelings love the color of my hair. I hope to be revered for it.

  As the shadows shift I move in and out of sleep, trying to get comfortable. When Askook is about to leave, he passes by my bed and glances at me with his stone-cold eyes in an effort to intimidate. If I were whole, I would spring up like a wolverine, scratch his eyes out, and bite his hand.