Norseman Chief (37 page)

That sent Luntook into a laughing fit interrupted by coughs.  “Then your father is already dead, girl.  Do you think I would ally myself with the likes of Pajack?  He is a useful tool, to be sure, but a hot-headed fool.  No, I did not live these past seventy-six winters by allying with the likes of him.  If you give it just a bit of thought, you’ll know who I have on my side – someone craving to be chief of your people for years, someone who is intelligent enough to wait for the proper opportunity, someone with the foresight to know that it is only natural that the Mi’kmaq control all of this land and if he has any hopes of preserving your pathetic people, that he unites with us.  Someone who . . .”

“Hassun!” Rowtag cut the words of the old chief off.

“Good young warrior.  Now please cut me down so that I may hunt with the Great Spirit rather than talk with the likes of you.”

Alsoomse granted his request, driving the torch into his chest so that his dangling hair ignited, ruining a good scalp.  The old man leapt up in pain and horror, but Rowtag shoved him back against the wall with his foot.  He held him there until the writhing and moaning stopped and the sizzling and popping of his flesh increased.

. . .

“Hassun, the son of my old friend Nootau, a traitor?  He was nursing me so how do I breathe today if this is so?” I asked incredulously when the tale reached this point.

“He’ll know!” Torleik answered.  “Three days after the glorious victory on the beach and in the cave, and a full day after the rest of your forces returned, Rowtag and Alsoomse walked into the village.  That’s when they seized Hassun roughly by his arms, dragging him out of his own mamateek.”

“And that’s when I told you that your walnuts were still in danger if you and Achak didn’t bring my father back to life,” laughed Alsoomse.

“Yes, there’s that,” scowled the priest.

“But how do I live?” I asked.

“He’ll know!  My wandering eyes and questions delayed Hassun’s wicked plot enough to give your body time.  Another day longer may have meant your end.  The greedy raven switched your treatments time and again.  But you survive,” shrugged Torleik.  “Achak and I along with help from the women, made some medicines from the real yarrow and the proper herbs.  In time you began to recover you tough bastard.  I’m afraid you’ll never see out of that eye again, though.”

I too shrugged, “I figured as much.  One eye is good enough for Odin.  It ought to be good enough for me.”  The priest snarled at my mention of the old gods.  “And what of Hassun?  What did you do with him?” I asked.

“He awaits your judgment Chief Enkoodabooaoo,” answered Alsoomse.

CHAPTER 16

I let Hassun stay bound in the center of the village for the rest of that winter.  He was fed enough to prevent starvation, but he lost most of the extra flesh he carried.  I assigned Torleik as the traitor’s guardian out of fear that someone else may cut Hassun’s throat instead of his meal of dried venison.  The priest took the gift of a focused audience as an opportunity to proselytize.  He did an admirable job at his tasks, keeping the captive alive and converting him.  Within three weeks of sitting out in miserable sleet and the resulting slush, Hassun had repented of his sin and accepted the Christ as his savior.

Torleik crowed with ample pride at his works.  James the apostle himself would have been proud of Torleik.  But the priest’s success would prove to make my duty as chief more difficult.  Yet I dealt with it and think on the subject only long enough to write the account here on the page.

I had planned on letting the traitorous scum weep and cry in his own filth all winter.  Then when the equinox brought sunshine and hope, I wanted to order his torture and death so that the entire village would see justice.  But then Hassun became a Christian and Torleik forbade me from executing the man for deeds he performed before he knew the truth of the One God.

As jarl or chief or whatever I was, I felt it in my right to do whatever I wanted.  But as I read the first book I had laid hands on all those years ago during my raid on Wales, I found that that is the way of a foolish ruler.  The words of the One God say that a king’s heart is in the hand of the Lord.  So Torleik was correct.  I could not torture and kill Hassun.

But a ruler must see justice done or else his people will not stand for him.  How could I allow Hassun’s weak-minded treachery to go unpunished because he professed a belief in the One God, a god my new people did not know?

In the end I did what I thought best.  Neither my prayers to the One God, nor my trips to the spirit world in the steam house brought answers.

When I could walk securely without aid, I gathered all the men of council together – I even invited Alsoomse to stand beyond the circle.  It was the first time in the lives of all those present that a woman had come into the mamateek for council, though Achak said his grandfather spoke of a woman in his grandfather’s time who actually acted as chief for many seasons.  With her wild success against the Mi’kmaq, no one mumbled about her presence.

“Since Hassun wished for his hand to grasp the axe of leadership,” I began.  “I will see that he loses his right hand.  Our people will know that is what happens to those who ally with the Mi’kmaq.”  Approving grunts spread around my home.

I went on, “But there is a powerful One God about whom I read and to whom I pray.  Hassun has seen fit to accept this One God and his son the Christ.  For that, Hassun has become my brother, Torleik’s brother, and he joins thousands of brothers across the sea.  The One God will not permit me to kill my brother.  His death must come from the arrows of God.”  Their faces said they disagreed.

“But we cannot look on the face of such a man, not after what he did.  So when Torleik has seen that Hassun’s arm stump has healed.  I will exile the traitor to the large island where I first came into contact with you.”  Silence.  Stewing anger.  To justify my actions, I again said, “This is my will and so that you all understand that I punish traitors, I will take his hand.”

With my sword I took his hand that very day.  Hassun actually thanked me for my mercy as he roiled, clutching the bloody mess.  My people grumbled for weeks about my decision, second guessing me at every turn while Hassun happily ate of my food.  Then on the day he was to leave, I called the council men and even Torleik to the shore to watch him leave in an old canoe.  Torleik gave him an extra supply of dried fish for the journey and an extra hide for warmth.  I did not approve, but let the matter go.

The traitor had a hell of a time managing the paddle with one hand and his stump, but eventually he caught a rhythm, such as it was, and began to move into the sea, calling his gratitude as he went.  The council grumbled about letting him go, and very soon some wanted to trudge back to the village to have him out of their sight.  “You’ll stay,” I commanded.  The men weren’t happy.  Torleik was happy, even telling me that I laid up treasures in heaven by my actions that day.  I scoffed.

When Hassun was fifty or more ells from the shore, he suddenly dropped the paddle and wavered in the canoe.  We heard a faint shriek carried over the waters.  In another moment he fell over the gunwale into the sea.  The shocked council men watched his lifeless body slowly taken further and further out to sea by the powerful current.  Torleik stood, mouth agape.

“There,” I said slapping the priest’s shoulders.  “We’ve given our brother mercy from the One God, but the One God saw fit to agree with Glooskap and punish him anyway.  We’ve done our duty and Hassun was given up to the spirits of the dead.”

As the other men filed away finally satisfied, laughing, Torleik stayed behind a moment, his eyes wide as he thought through what he had just witnessed.  “Father, remember a wise king winnows out the wicked; he drives the threshing wheel over them.  The One God has merely done the work for us.  Now off to the village with you.  I want to pray here alone.”  The priest nodded and walked away shaking his head.

I lowered myself down to my knees and did pray.  I thanked the Lord for his grace in my life.  I thanked him for my daughter and wife.  I may have even nodded off after a time since the weather and sounds were nearly perfect.  One of my dreams came to me then.  The Jesus I had encountered on the beach when I made my first solo visit to these shores, returned.  He called me by my Algonkin name.  “Enkoodabooaoo,” said the mighty Christ.  “You have served your people well.”

I said nothing.

“It is time for you to live up to your name.  Your Alsoomse shall reign in your stead.  Take your woman and return to the homes across the sea.  Live up to your name and spend the rest of your days on the hunt.”

I said nothing.  I felt comfort from his words for I was tired.  I had lived seventy years.  My body was spent, exhausted.  It was time to die.

I was awakened by Alsoomse’s boot in my ribs.  I shielded my eyes from the sun over her head.  “Nice shot,” I said.

“I know,” she smiled, still clutching the new bow she had just used to slay Hassun.

. . .

So I explained to the council I would take my moose antlers down from my mamateek and take them with me to Leifsbudir.  I took those antlers and the growing stack of parchment from my journal.  The whole village thought me mad for caring so much about those fragile pages.  In truth, in my youth before I ever learned my letters, I would have scoffed at a frail old man doting on his writings.

The people were to listen to Alsoomse as they would to me.  My woman and I would spend the summer at Leifsbudir alone in prayer, I told them, returning after the warmth of summer had faded.  I half expected to die that summer because no one was older than I.  That was twenty-nine years ago.

Hurit, whom I called Nuttah, died next to me in her sleep during our twenty-first year alone.  It was on a warm summer night and I scooted far from her so that I didn’t cling to her skin due to the humid air.  Sometime between patting my head good night and the dawn her heart beat for the last time.  When she didn’t awaken after I lightly shook her, I swung my feet over the side of the sleeping platform in the old long house built by the Icelandic brothers Helgi and Finnbogi at the shores of Black Duck Pond.  I sat like that for the whole day, I think, chewing on my lip, neither happy, nor sad – just reflective.  Eventually I buried her body amongst the bones of the mass grave left from Freydis’ madness a lifetime ago.

Alsoomse and her son, he was born about nine months after our victory over the Mi’kmaq at Pitupok, came at least twice every year to visit and exchange stories.  As far as I knew my daughter had never accepted a husband and I never bothered to ask.  The boy, I thought, resembled Rowtag the Younger who had admitted to me all those years ago that he thought my daughter beautiful.  I suppose the two of them found comfort in each other’s arms as they waited for low tide to escape from that sea cave after the battle at Pitupok.

I played with that boy for a half-a-day at a time when he came.  Eventually, he and I both grew too old for play and so we sat around the central hearth smoking a pipe together, until he rarely came at all.  The path of life, I suppose.

Alsoomse led her people well.  They thrived as there were at least sixteen years of peace following her great victory.  But as can be expected from stiff-necked fools like the Mi’kmaq, when their ranks were replenished with endless crops of new, young men, they became more and more bold.  Deer and moose were taken and gutted from our lands.  Soon captives were taken.  It was a familiar story.

In my twenty-ninth year of self-imposed exile, Alsoomse came to me with a question beyond her normal meaningless drivel.  “What will become of our people?  My people, I mean,” she asked while her son stalked a bear out in the forest.

“I don’t know.  I suppose they’ll hump, live, and die like they always have.  Why do you ask?”

“I am afraid that soon we won’t hump or live, but only die.  We are too few.  We’ve never allied with any other tribes or peoples.  The Mi’kmaq have made friends among themselves and others.”

“And they are beholden to those friends,” I pointed out.

“Yes, but they will survive.  It is only a matter of a month or year or years before they band together and push us off our land, into the sea.  When they do this, our lucky surprise attacks won’t always work,” she fretted.

“Huh, you worry about the future which is best left for those living in it.”

“Perhaps.  But I think before I leave this world for the next I ought to see my people live the way they desire without the incessant Mi’kmaq threat.”

“Ah, you speak in nonsense.”  I waived her off.  The older I got the less patience I had for discussing
shoulds
and
oughts
and
maybes
and
perhaps
.  Even writing the words exhausts me.

“I do not, father.  I rule, but you are chief.  I wish you to order us to again move the village.  This time I do not want to move fifty paces up or down the river to leave the pests behind.  This time I want you to bring us to this very island so that we have two days worth of sea travel between us and our enemies.”

I panicked.  My own comfort was all I had considered for years and now this woman who served as a steward in my stead wanted to bring hordes of her people to live here.  I shuddered.  I took a deep breath, letting it out loudly through my nostrils.  I did not want them here.  But the girl was correct.  My island was enormous and other than the occasional visitor from the Skin Boat people, I was alone.

“Daughter, you will move my people to a new village on this very island.  You will send a shaman into the cave beneath the tree and he will bring the bones of our ancestors with him.  He will find a new place, a proper place for their remains to rest in this new land.  You will hunt, fish, and populate this land, making it a territory for countless red chiefs long after I am dead and long after your own bones rest in a hillside.”  I ended, shuffled away like the old man I was, proud of my speech.

It only took my daughter two weeks to bring all of her people to the island.  She honored an agreement we struck and kept those people out of my hunting grounds – really just trapping or snaring grounds at my age – until such time as I died.  Then they could traipse wherever they pleased for the tribe would be hers, she would be chief.

Soon after the people fled to the safety of these shores, I awoke with a massive headache.  My one eye had flashes of light before it.  I went back to bed and slept throughout the next day or longer.  Alsoomse visited me soon thereafter.

“My eyesight has failed altogether,” I told her.  “Well, I see hints of images.”

“How will you write on your precious pages?” she asked.

“I won’t.  I am done writing.  I am just too tired.  Talk to me in the morning.  I want you to write my words.  If I am still alive at your next visit, you may write for me then as well.”

So I, Alsoomse, took over writing for my father the very next morning.  My time as his scribe was short-lived.  He spoke little, making even less sense.

He said only, “Write my exact words.  King Olaf came to visit last evening.  We had a marvelous time.  I drank more ale than I had in years.  What a headache, by the One God it remains.”

Then, later that morning, my father said, “I shit myself silly all morning.  I should not have eaten with the Irish.”  I do not know who exactly the Irish are and why they make him loosen his bowels.