The Jo Fletcher Books Anthology

by Frank P. Ryan

  There was another hissing whistle. The stag’s head jerked and dropped as it crashed to the ground in a cloud of snow.

  This time there was no blood.

  Lowing in pain, the dazed stag lay on the white forest floor, majestic horns half-buried. It did not see the hunter step into the clearing.

  He was blond, tall and slim, clad in white sealskin and sable from head to toe, with a bow almost as tall as himself slung across his shoulder. Closing the gap with powerful strides, he crouched by the fallen animal, picked up the blunt training arrow that had taken the stag in the temple and smiled.

  The big knife sighed as it left the sheaf.

  The hunter gripped a horn, held the stag’s head and drew the knife almost tenderly across its throat. Blood pumped out of a small, thin wound. The animal convulsed and sagged in his arms. The hunter frowned and stabbed the knife into the cut, twisting violently. The stag jerked and bleated, kicking out as it struggled for its life. The hunter smiled, held on tighter to the horn and twisted the knife harder. As the kicks lost power he gradually widened the wound, blood staining the snow in an expanding circle. Mumbling soft, soothing words, he drained the life out of the fallen stag.

  ‘Prince Karle!’ The shout rang out from the forest behind the hunter and the deer. ‘Prince Karle! Where are you?’ A rake-thin man stumbled awkwardly into the clearing, an attendant in his wake. ‘There! Ho there! Are you well, Prince?’

  The hunter sighed and rolled his eyes. Moving swiftly, he jabbed the point of the big hunting knife into the stag’s neck and ripped outwards, severing the artery and the windpipe. Then he let go of the head, stood and turned. ‘Well met, Breki,’ he shouted. He watched the man stumble across the clearing, wading through the snow. Breki’s long blue cloak was supposed to be majestic and sweeping but instead kept getting caught in half-buried bushes and low-hanging branches. His attendant struggled to keep him untangled, but the man couldn’t put a single step right.

  As soon as he was close enough, Breki offered the prince a royal salute. ‘The honour is all mine, Prince Karle. What a magnificent beast you’ve taken!’

  ‘Thank you,’ Karle said, smiling. ‘He was a noble opponent. Fast, too. I caught a glimpse of him and had to give chase.’

  ‘You just disappeared all of a sudden. The hunt master was out of his wits. He thought he’d lost you and the king would have his head.’ The faint sounds of baying hounds and hunting horns drifted in behind them. ‘That’ll be him and the hounds,’ Breki said.

  A younger man half-ran, half-stumbled into the clearing, and Breki pushed him. ‘Galti! What have you learned?’

  The sandy-haired youth blushed furiously. ‘Does his – his lordship require anything?’ His eyes went to the bloodied blade of Prince Karle’s hunting knife, sparkling in the winter sun.

  ‘No thank you, Galti,’ Prince Karle replied. ‘I will wipe the blade myself. But you can fetch me a handful of branches, thick as your thumb.’ The young boy scurried off as Karle crouched down to the kill.

  Breki drew his own hunting knife and set to work alongside the Prince. ‘You are far too kind to the boy, Karle,’ he said. ‘He’s lucky to be here with us.’

  ‘Far too kind, you say. Maybe,’ Karle said thoughtfully as he sliced a small hole in the deer’s belly. ‘Maybe a prince should just tell people to do as he wishes.’

  ‘Exactly,’ said Breki. ‘People expect you to.’

  ‘They expect a prince to be . . . princely,’ Karle mused.

  ‘Yes,’ Breki replied. Their knives worked in tandem, slicing open the belly of the stag and drawing out its entrails.

  ‘Tell me then, Breki – what is a prince?’ Karle asked quietly.

  Breki flushed. ‘A prince . . . a prince—’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘A prince is a son of the king and queen,’ Breki muttered.

  ‘And am I the son of Jolawer, our noble king? Who is three years my junior?’ Karle’s knife moved faster, tearing through skin and flesh.

  ‘No, but—’

  ‘Am I the son of Eric the Victorious and Sigrid the Haughty, therefore brother to Jolawer?’

  ‘No. Careful with the stomach lining, it’s—’

  ‘Then what am I, Breki?’

  ‘You are Prince Karle. You are – you—’

  ‘I am the king’s noble servant, reliant on the good will of carls, thralls and fishwives alike. No one will ever follow me out of duty,’ Karle snapped. ‘Kings are followed; the king’s mother’s younger cousins are . . . tolerated.’

  ‘Now, Prince Karle,’ Breki said. ‘There’s no—’

  ‘You know well enough that I am a prince in name only. I have to make my own fortunes, and that’s why I’m kind to Galti. You can lead all you like, but it doesn’t count for shit if nobody wants to follow you. The gods know this – you can’t go to Valhalla unless you give your life in battle. They won’t have you unless you want to go to them.’ Working quickly, they gutted the deer and threw the steaming innards away. As they finished, the boy returned. Prince Karle turned to him. ‘Would you follow me, Galti?’

  Confused, Galti passed an armful of thick branches to the prince. Then he nodded. ‘Yes. Yes, I would. Your majesty, I mean.’

  Satisfied, the prince turned back to Breki. ‘See? I aim to be a prince of the people.’

  ‘And everybody loves you, Prince Karle,’ Breki added quickly. ‘You are well loved throughout the land of the Svear.’

  ‘That’s good,’ said Karle as he methodically broke down sticks to prop open the deer carcass. ‘That’s good to hear.’

  The peace and quiet of the clearing was broken for a second time as three exuberant hounds burst from the cover of the forest. They bounded across the open ground towards Karle and his prey, baying loudly and kicking up a small snowstorm in their wake.

  ‘It looks like the old man has had some exercise,’ Breki said.

  ‘Indeed,’ said Karle ‘I would expect him to be here any moment now. So I wonder, Breki. When Jolawer told you to follow me, did he promise you a prize? Did he maybe say you should stick me if you got the chance?’

  ‘I – what? The king did no such thing. He only said I should listen and report—’

  Breki’s brain caught up with his mouth. He looked at the gutted deer and the broad, thick hunting knife in Prince Karle’s hand.

  The Prince calmly reached for the cooling innards of the stag and tossed them into the clearing. The hounds reversed in mid-bounce to chase their prey. Behind the men and the stag, their barks turned to growls.

  ‘A prince of the people,’ Karle said as he reached for the stag’s skull, ‘needs loyalty.’

  ‘I’m loyal!’ Breki sputtered. ‘I am!’

  Karle’s hand closed on an antler, his foot on the neck of the beast. He looked at Galti straight in the eye. ‘Repeat after me, boy. It was an accident. I saw it.’

  ‘I – uhm—’

  Breki blanched. ‘Your Highness. I didn’t – I would never—’ He tried to step away, but his foot was deeper in the snow than he has realised, and stuck fast. The prince put his foot to the middle of the stag’s antler and, bracing himself, pushed down hard, pulling the other way. Bone broke with a snap. Moments later, Breki’s eyes flew open as the stag’s horn punched through his throat with force. He coughed, clutched and clawed at the wound and tried to tear the pain away, but it was too late. By the time he sank to his knees, he was already choking on his own blood.

  Prince Karle looked at Galti and raised an eyebrow.

  ‘It was an accident. I saw it,’ the boy said.

  The prince smiled. As he reached for his hunting horn he looked the boy up and down. ‘I think you will do well, Galti,’ he said. ‘And I need an attendant.’

  Then he blew three long, mournful notes: emergency; help needed.

  Snorri Kristjansson was born in Icela
nd and is a writer and a teacher, with a background in acting, music and stand-up comedy. He has published the Viking fantasy series The Valhalla Saga, including the titles Swords of Good Men, Blood Will Follow and Path of Gods with Jo Fletcher Books and his next series, Kin and Council will be published starting in 2017. He lives in Edinburgh with his wife.

  Mountain Radio • by Tom Fletcher

  Mountain Radio

  by Tom Fletcher

  It’s the exposure that’s the thing. The sense of limitless space at your back. The climb might be easy – the handholds friendly and the footholds firm – but if you know that behind you is a great rocky yawn, or a drop all the way down to the bottom of the valley, you can feel it in your fingers. If you could transport the same rock face down into a grassy field, it would be a different climb, even if you didn’t look over your shoulder once. If you’re up amongst the tops, or on a crag jutting out over nothing, then the emptiness around pulls at you. You feel the force of gravity more keenly. You start to doubt the ropes and the carabineer clips, if you have them. You start to doubt the protection that you’ve wedged into the stone, if you’ve used any.

  That’s all part of the appeal, obviously. Otherwise we wouldn’t do it.

  I was heading up Great Gable, alone. From Wasdale, Great Gable looks like a pyramid; a pointed hulk. It was noon on a summer’s day and like the other mountains, it was glowing in the sunlight. Their grey takes on a kind of russet quality in some weathers. The sky was a smooth deepening blue.

  For all of the light, though, there were shadows too. Great Gable toohas three big rock faces protruding from the screes, overlapping like scales. They’re called the Great Napes. I distinctly remember that on this day, each cast a thin black shadow onto the next, and I thought the shadows looked like three jagged claw marks: three huge vertical scratches.

  I had decided to stop using ropes and clips three weeks before. I was hoping that this expedition up Great Gable – old, over-familiar, easy Great Gable – would be a rediscovery. In those three weeks, I’d found that free soloing is a different sport to roped climbing. Your brain and body work completely differently if you know that you can actually fall. Your mind is sharper. Your whole being sings, like a stretched wire in a high wind. Every movement really counts – every decision is crucial. It’s punishingly physical, and yet as cerebral as a game of chess. I was excited to experience a well-known mountain in this new fashion. To find hidden depths in an old friend.

  So I was climbing.

  The sun was warm on my arms and the back of my neck. My left hand was solid in a comfy handhold, and I took the opportunity to chalk up. I hadn’t done away with my chalk pouch; a purist might have, but so many of my slips and falls in the past had been the result of sweaty hands. My feet were both firm against the dry stone. I was wearing good shoes; they were bright yellow and drastically curved, like luminous bananas. The tendons of my left arm stood out prominently. Once my right hand was good and chalky I found a hold for that and reached into the chalk pouch with my left. The pouch hung from the back of my harness. From my coccyx, more or less. I liked to keep it central so that I was never twisting too awkwardly across myself. Not in order to reach the chalk, anyway. The climbing itself often entailed awkward twists and turns and contortions, especially when you think you’ve gone wrong.

  I was hanging from one of the Napes. I could feel the mountainside sloping steeply away beneath me. I could feel the vast body of atmosphere behind. The shape of the valley in the air. I could feel Wastwater, the supposedly bottomless lake, gleaming below in the light of the mid-afternoon sun. It wasn’t directly below me, of course; but if I were to peer over my shoulder, it would not look far away. Part of the magic of the mountains is the way they play with your sense of perspective. You can stand on a summit and look down at the lake in the valley below and imagine yourself jumping into it, almost. Certainly reaching it with a well-thrown pebble.

  The stone in front of my face was flat and smooth and enlivened by pale green lichens that were so thin as to be imperceptible to my fingertips. Their designs were fractal and gorgeous. The visual texture of the stone itself was intricate – the mineral grains a repeating pattern of light and dark greys. I like to examine the surface I climb. You can’t help it, really; your face is so often pressed up against it, because if you lean too far back your centre of gravity shifts in the wrong direction.

  So, the warm sun and the detail of the rock and the burn in your arms and the exhilaration of a fully engaged brain and the sense of hanging in space by the thread of your will and that thread alone.

  A cloud of chalk dust hung in the air around me. There was no wind. I listened to the mountain, and all I could hear was the sound of running water somewhere in the distance. It was a good sound. I wanted to bathe my face in it. That, in itself, was cooling. I closed my eyes and hung there a moment longer. Then I set off again, pulling myself up by my right arm and reaching for the next handhold with my left. I found a tiny horizontal ridge, maybe just two or three millimetres proud. It was just thick enough for my fingernails. I couldn’t hang on it for long, but it would do. I jammed my left foot into the cup that my left hand had been in a moment ago. I took a deep breath and then straightened my left leg out with force, pushing myself up, almost jumping up the rock face, searching with my eyes and arms and hands for the shapes and formations that I could catch, maybe, that would save me.

  I was near the top when I started to think too much about the pain in my muscles; the accumulation of lactic acid making everything hurt and feel wooden. My feet were secure, but I was holding on to more or less nothing with my hands. When there’s nothing obvious to grasp, you press all of the pads of your fingers against the flat plane of rock and then squeeze, try to pull them together, arching the back of your hand up and away from the surface. The friction and tension hold you there somehow. All of the muscles in your hands and forearms tense like metal. That’s what I was doing. The face was also ever-so-slightly inclined outwards, so, although my feet weren’t about to slip off, I would tip backwards if my hands – my fingertips, rather – failed me.

  The thing I’ve always found hardest about climbing is building up the courage, in moments like that, to let go with one hand and reach for another handhold. Even if you know there’s a handhold there. Because during those seconds, you start to fall. It might not look like it, but you do. You feel your weight shifting; your centre of gravity moving; the skin at your remaining contact points sliding ever so slightly across the stone. It is terrifying in the best way. Space beckons you. You hear the gulf whispering. It’s not just there, waiting, any more; it’s communicating. The ground, already distant, drops away infinitely. You imagine yourself completely alone in the world, impossibly high. You know then that in your future there is a peak that really is that massive, and one day you’ll get to the top of it and look down and see the clouds far below.

  I stretched and slid my right hand quickly up, beyond my vision, over the bulge to which I clung, and I felt the hollow recess of a solid lip with pure joy. I pressed my forehead against the cool stone and relaxed, comfortable now that I could let a whole arm take my weight.

  When I looked, my right hand and forehead had left marks – wet traces of perspiration. Time for more chalk.

  Eventually I hauled myself over the top of the second stage. A stage is a section of a climb, and often the end of a stage is a breathing space: a decent ledge where you can sit down and have a sandwich before attempting the next stage, or, if you’re on some really serious mountain, secure a bivouac and get some sleep. Sometimes, on smaller mountains, you can decide to stop climbing altogether at the end of a stage and just walk along the ledge until you’re off the face completely and can find a gentle slope or even a path.

  I took off my backpack and lay there for a moment or two, panting, with my eyes closed. The hard, bumpy stone was a pleasure to rest on.

  When I opened my e
yes, there were clouds in the sky above, spooling out from behind the top edge of the next stage, which was something of an overhang. They were moving quite quickly, like in film that’s been sped up. The rich blue of the sky became obscured and I felt a drop of rain land on my cheek.

  Beneath me was a significant vertical drop; sticking my head out and looking straight down was pleasantly vertiginous. I looked out over the valley, at the view that had been behind me as I climbed. The lake was the centrepiece; a deep, still body of water that I always think of as patient. Around that were green fields and bright streams and dark copses. Wasdale opens out at the western end and, in that direction, you can see the sea at the horizon.

  As the clouds rushed across the sky, Wastwater turned from blue to slate-grey in a matter of seconds. From higher up the mountain I could hear the wind.

  I didn’t want to climb in the rain. Not without ropes. I didn’t have the confidence. Wet hands and wet rock make such a difference. And as I thought about it, the rain got heavier and heavier. The rain was coming down, as they say, the clouds descending and becoming mist. No. I couldn’t climb in that.

  From the ledge I was on, I could scramble off the face onto Great Hell Gate – a chute of scree that runs up alongside of the Napes and then opens out into a big scree slope. It was the only other option, so I swapped my climbing shoes with the lightweight walking boots I had in my backpack, shouldered the bag, and set off.

  The scree was hard work. It kept moving beneath me; a river of rock. It was like trying to go up a downward escalator. My feet sank so far into it that I could feel the sharp edges rubbing against my ankles. And the rain got heavier still. The mist thickened, and before long, I couldn’t see much further than maybe twenty feet in any direction, which meant I could see nothing but the now-damp scree. I kept on walking, feeling secure in the knowledge that as long as I was heading uphill then I was heading the right way.

  Maybe it is strange that I didn’t just let the scree carry me down the mountainside – that I was so determined to head uphill at all. My only explanation is that the thought of heading downhill never even entered my head.