Birth Of the Kingdom (2010) (43 page)

As a rule the younger ragamuffins were caught and put on a boat back in the direction they had come. Gure the foreman even used to toss the helmsman a silver coin for his trouble.

Sigge and Orm were twelve and thirteen years old when they arrived in this way at Forsvik just in time for King Knut’s burial at Varnhem. Like everyone, they had known that the king was going to die for about a year, but they had no idea that he had now passed away. As a result of the funeral at Varnhem, however, neither master nor mistress was at Forsvik.

Whatever Sigge and Orm had imagined about reaching the Forsvik of their dreams and seeking out Sir Arn himself, all their hopes were dashed at once by everything they saw. Perhaps they had expected a great house with carved dragonheads sticking out from both ends of the ridgepole, with Arn the knight riding in the barnyard with his flashing sword surrounded by young men and boys trying to act as he did. What they found was a village with four streets, a throng of people all hurrying back and forth, and a buzz of foreign tongues.

To their relief they discovered that there were many youths of their own age wearing clothing like themselves of grey homespun. But everywhere they also saw young men, some almost as young as they were, wearing full weaponry with chain mail and blue surcoats as if it were the most natural thing in the world. On their way down the longest street they stopped first at a big open building without walls but with a roof overhead. There at least two dozen young boys were practicing with sword and shield while older boys corrected them, demonstrated the correct methods, and then forced them to repeat the exercises time after time.

Farther down, near the end of the street, there was an open field with a fence around it, and from there came the loud thundering of horses’ hooves. Soon Sigge and Orm were perched on the fence rails, watching as if in a dream how young men moved at lightning speed back and forth across the field to commands shouted by older men. And all those on horseback wore armour as if they were going to a noble’s feast or to war. So it was true that one could learn to be a knight at Forsvik.

They sat too long at their outpost, like all the young stowaways. After what could have been hours or no time at all as far as Sigge and Orm were concerned, the riders out on the field broke off their practice, lined up in a long row, and strode off to the largest street in the village. Then the two boys were discovered and grabbed by the scruff of the neck by a young man who dismounted from his horse. Showing no kindness, he began pulling them along toward the harbour.

Then Sigge grew angry and said without the slightest shame that he and his brother had no intention of leaving on any boat, because they had both received Sir Arn’s own word that they could come to Forsvik.

At first their captor laughed at these preposterous words, but Sigge refused to back down. Planting his heels stubbornly
in the dirt, he snarled that both he and his brother could swear before God and all the saints that they had been given a promise by Sir Arn himself that they could come here. Their guard then grew more wary, since he was used to captured stowaways acting submissive and whining rather than impudent. He got up on his horse, told Sigge and Orm not to move from the spot, and galloped over to the head of the riders. There he stopped before a man who bore the Folkung mantle and was one of those who had barked the commands out on the field.

At once the Folkung came riding toward the boys at a gallop with the young man who had caught them close behind. He leaped to the ground, handing his reins to the other rider, and went over to grab Sigge and Orm by the scruff of the neck. They were once again caught in a hard grip, this time in hands that were wearing iron gloves.

‘Forsvik is for Folkungs and not for runaway thrall boys!’ he said sternly. ‘What are your names and where do you come from?’

‘My name is Sigge, Gudmund’s son from Askeberga inn, and this is my brother Orm,’ said Sigge crossly but flinching under the stony grip. ‘What’s your name?’

In astonishment the Folkung loosened his grip. He too was unprepared for such candid insolence.

‘I am Bengt Elinsson and one of those in charge here at Forsvik next to Sir Arn himself,’ he replied not at all unkindly as he observed the two urchins. ‘Gurmund at Askeberga I have met, and so have all of us who have business between Forsvik and Arnäs. Gurmund is a freed innkeeper, is he not?’

‘Our father is a free man and we were both born free,’ replied Sigge.

‘Well, at least we’ll be spared the trouble of sending you back bound hand and foot. But you did run away from home, I presume?’

It was quite true that they had, since their father Gurmund had not been willing to listen to their entreaties to be allowed to move to Sir Arn’s estate at Forsvik. When they persisted he had beaten them, and finally so assiduously that they had run away, as much for that reason as because of the dream of mantles and swords. Sigge was ashamed to say anything of this, merely nodding to confirm what had been said.

‘Your father has beaten you, that is all too obvious from looking at you, and that indicates his lack of honour,’ said Bengt Elinsson, his voice no longer as stern. ‘I know a lot about how it feels to be your age, and don’t think that I aim to cause you more harm. But you are not Folkungs, so there are no jobs for you here at Forsvik, at least not the sort of jobs you have in mind. You’ll both have to return home. But I shall send a message to Gurmund that he must never again lay hands on you, unless he wants to contend with Bengt Elinsson next time.’

‘But we have Sir Arn’s word,’ Sigge insisted hesitantly. ‘And Sir Arn is a man who stands by his word.’

‘Yes, you are certainly right about that,’ said Bengt Elinsson, trying with difficulty to conceal a laugh behind his hand. ‘But when and where did Sir Arn give you two, sons of a freedman, such a promise?’

‘Five years ago,’ said Sigge boldly. ‘He spoke to us in the barnyard and showed us a sword that was so sharp it made my finger bleed just to touch it. And then he said we should seek him out in five years, and now the five years have passed.’

‘What did the sword look like?’ Bengt Elinsson asked, suddenly quite serious. ‘And how did Sir Arn look?’

‘The sword was longer than other swords, in a black scabbard with a golden cross. It was shiny, with magical runes in gold,’ said Sigge as if the memory were altogether fresh.
‘And Sir Arn had kind eyes, but many marks from blows and cuts on his face.’

‘Sir Arn is at the king’s funeral and won’t be back at Forsvik for a few days or perhaps a week,’ said Bengt Elinsson in a completely new and friendly way. ‘Until he returns you shall be our guests at Forsvik. Follow me!’

Sigge and Orm had never in their lives been called guests, nor could they understand what had made the mighty Folkung change his mind so abruptly. They stood there without being able to take a step. They must have looked extremely foolish, for Bengt Elinsson then put his arms around their thin shoulders and swept them along with him toward the harbour.

They were taken to a powerful blond man named Gure who was at work building a house. He in turn accompanied them to a row of smaller houses where there was much noise from hammers and saws. Inside one of the houses sat four boys of their own age and two older men at a long table making arrows. A big pile of arrow tips of various types lay in the middle of the table among bowls of tar, goose feathers, linen thread, and various sorts of knives. Gure explained that such young guests at Forsvik were not only to eat sweet bread; they must also make themselves useful. Some of the arrow-making was simple work, and there they could begin. But two of the other boys would show them around Forsvik so that they could learn where things were and could see where they would sleep and eat. He pointed to two of the young boys at the table. They stood up at once and bowed to him as a sign that they had understood and would obey. Then Gure left without another word.

The two boys who were going to show Sigge and Orm around were named Luke and Toke, and both had hair cropped as closely as Sigge did, which was a normal way to cut thrall children’s hair because of the lice. So Sigge took it for granted that the other two weren’t free, and that he was
superior; he tried to order them to stop staring and instead do as they were told. The one who looked older and stronger told him at once to shut up and remember that he was new at Forsvik and should refrain from putting on airs.

So at first there was little conversation among the four boys as the two Forsvikers began showing the others what there was to see. They started at the smithies; there were three of them located next to one another, but the boys were soon admonished not to get in the way. They continued through the glassworks, where small drinking glasses in shimmering blue and bright red stood in long rows; the older masters had four or five apprentices each. Inside a thundering furnace the glass lay like a big glowing loaf of dough; the masters and apprentices stuck in long pipes, caught up a piece of the dough and began rolling the pipe round and round as they ran over to wooden forms that they wetted with water before they began to blow and turn at the same time. It looked like very hard work, but the great quantity of finished glasses that stood on shelves around the walls showed that they must be very successful in their work. The heat soon drove the boys onward to the saddlery, where men were working with both saddle tack and many other items in leather; then to the weaving rooms where there were mostly women of all ages; to the cooperage; and to two other workshops where the work seemed similar to that of making arrows, but everyone was working with crossbows under the guidance of two foreign masters whose language was impossible to understand.

Sigge and Orm’s eyes were so big that it made the other two boys more kindly disposed toward them, and when they headed over to look at the stables and practice halls for the warriors, Luke and Toke became more talkative. Luke said that he and his brother were freed as children, since they had been born as thralls at Forsvik. Now there were no
thralls here any longer. Nor was the land at Forsvik used for anything other than pasture for winter fodder for horses and livestock. So a great deal in their lives had changed, more than just being given freedom. If everything had been as it was before, most would have grown up working the land. Instead all young people now were allowed to be apprentices in the workshops, which was like Heaven compared with toiling their whole lives out in the fields.

The two big stables were almost empty because most of the horses were kept outside as long as there was forage. But here and there a horse stood and stared at them suspiciously as they passed by, and saddles and weapons hung along the walls in long rows. Those were the weapons of the young noblemen, and nobody from the workshops was allowed to touch them.

The young nobles came from Folkung estates near and far and trained for five years. Each year new ones arrived, small and nervous, and in later years a number of them went home, self-confident and mortally dangerous with lance or sword. The young nobles also had their own longhouse, the largest at Forsvik. Ordinary folk were not allowed inside, but Toke said that there were more than sixty beds.

Next to the young nobles’ longhouse stood the foreigners’ house, and there it was not advisable to enter either. And beyond the foreigners’ house stood Sir Arn’s and Fru Cecilia’s own house. Outside it grew a whole little forest of white and red roses grew, and below the house on the slope toward Bottensjön stood rows of apple trees. The fruit would soon be harvested, and the gardens were full of all sorts of root vegetables and herbs.

The tour concluded where it began with the arrow-making workshop, and Sigge and Orm had to learn the first simple job, to bore holes in the arrow shafts where the points would be fastened, using tools they had never seen before. Luke
told them that they had now made more than ten thousand arrows at Forsvik, and most of them had been sent to Arnäs in great casks with a hundred arrows in each. Every day at least thirty new arrows were produced at Forsvik.

With the two new apprentices in the arrow workshop the tasks were reassigned so that Sigge and Orm were occupied only with the simple work of boring holes for the points. Luke and Toke then fastened the points in place and wound them with linen thread which they dipped in tar. Then the arrows were sent on to the two foreigners who worked with the most difficult task, putting on the fletches.

This was not the way Sigge and Orm had dreamed of their new life with Sir Arn at Forsvik. But they could sense that it would not be a good idea to tell Luke and Toke that they intended to be apprenticed among the young nobles.

But when Orm, who till then had been too shy to say almost anything at all, let slip a few words about his dreams at the late supper of bread and soup, he was mocked by all the workers at the table. Only Folkungs went into apprenticeship to be warriors, not freedmen with names like Sigge, Toke, Luke, or Orm. With a name like that a boy never got beyond the workshops.

Sigge clenched his teeth and said nothing. He had received a promise from Sir Arn himself, and he intended to remind him of it as soon as he got the chance.

Arn rode for the first time with a squadron of retainers from the funeral ale at Varnhem to Arnäs. Sixteen men including Sune, Sigfrid, and Torgils Eskilsson had accompanied Cecilia on the alternate route down to Varnhem, along the shore of Lake Vättern.

The young retainers from Forsvik had drawn many curious looks at Varnhem; only the three eldest had reached the age of eighteen. Their horses were not saddled and equipped like
those of others; their flanks and chests were covered with cloth in the Folkung colours. A few people had stepped forward to look at the stout black leather straps running beneath the cloth; they also pinched here and there and found that beneath a thin layer with the Folkung colours was a thick layer with chain mail sewn in as protection from arrows. The fact that only three of the retainers had reached the age of grown men also seemed odd, but even the very young in Arn Magnusson’s retinue carried their weapons with great self-confidence, and they rode like few men in Western Götaland could ride.