Raven of the Waves (18 page)

35

After Gorm had butchered the deer, and the blood and hair was rinsed off in the river, he found a stick among the river stones. He worked a hole at either end of the stick, and asked Njord for some leather thongs.

Njord sat in
Raven
, carving the walrus tooth. “You like to keep your hands busy, Gorm. So do I,” he said without looking up.

“It's to keep the thrall safe,” said Gorm, trying to disguise his impatience. Njord was a good helmsman and could sail as well as any man, but sometimes he was as slow-witted as any other villager.

Njord glanced at the stick in Gorm's hands. “We don't want Wiglaf running off, do we?” said Njord.

Gorm did not want to hear that the thrall had a name. Gorm would give the thrall a name when he had paid for him. A good, powerful name. Perhaps simply
Gormsthrall
.

Gorm fastened Wiglaf's hands behind him. He tied the stick between Wiglaf's wrists. He wrapped the straps until Wiglaf gasped. Gorm laughed in what he assumed was a soothing manner.

“Don't worry, your hands won't drop off.” Gorm smiled. “This little span will keep your hands apart. You can't untie your knots now.” He patted Wiglaf on the head. “Wiglaf,” he said, struggling with the ridiculous name. “Good Wiglaf, the thrall of Gorm. A good servant and helper,” he added.

Wiglaf gave him something like a smile.

Ulf threw an armload of half-rotten firewood to the ground and asked Lidsmod to help him. “There is much more than I can carry,” he said. Ulf beckoned him to the place where the birch logs were stacked. “I need your help with more than firewood,” said Ulf, when Lidsmod reached him.

Lidsmod had never heard Ulf speak in such a furtive manner before. His voice was low and quiet, and he glanced around them as he spoke. A blackbird made bright music high above them, and Ulf looked up as though the bird might overhear something it should not.

“I am telling you a secret,” said Ulf, putting a fist over his heart. “A blood secret.”

Lidsmod was flattered that Ulf would share such a secret with him, but he was mystified. “Ulf, please tell me—is anything wrong?”

“Swear, before the gods, that you will keep this between us.”

This was very serious. Lidsmod had never made such a formal promise in his life. “I so swear.”

“I am going to let little Leg Biter go free.”

Lidsmod did not respond.

“The thrall,” said Ulf. “I will let him escape.”

Lidsmod tried to read Ulf's features. This had been Lidsmod's hope as well, and while Gunnar had not agreed at once, he had not chided Lidsmod for daring to offer such a scheme. “Let me consider it,” was all Gunnar had said.

“The boy gave us his gift when he bound Eirik's wound,” Ulf continued. “That was a bad wound and might have bled until Eirik died. I think the thrall saved Eirik's life.” Odin thought was hard, and few men could do it. When men heard such talk, they tended to respect it.

“He repaid us for saving his life when we kept him from drowning. And I think we should give him a last gift. Besides,” Ulf continued, “Odin crippled him when he was born, or when he was still an infant. That means he belongs to the gods. We have to let the boy go. The others will understand when it's done. I'll pay for the thrall after he's gone.”

Lidsmod felt a flash of admiration and even love for Ulf.

“My thoughts walk with yours,” said Lidsmod, the old saying that meant complete agreement. “But I think Gorm will slice our heads from our necks.”

36

Wiglaf slept, despite the laughter around him, and the sounds of boasting and wild tales. Gradually the camp settled. New guards cast shadows across sleeping men as they took their places at the edge of the firelight.

Someone whispered; there was a step in the sand at his ear. This was the moment Wiglaf had feared. One of these men crouched beside him, knife in hand.

Wiglaf woke, sure it was only a nightmare. But it was not a nightmare. A killer knelt over him. And that bright knife glinted in his hand, eager to be sticky with Wiglaf's blood. Wiglaf tried to scream but he had no air. He could not move.

Then came some soft speech, and a gentle hand touched his shoulder. Lidsmod said something kind and covered Wiglaf's lips with his fingers. “Don't worry,” he seemed to say.

Firelight fluttered from the last charred logs. Men snored. Guards stood, looking away from the river, toward the forest.

Ulf's knife was red in the firelight. The knife bit through the hobble and slashed the bindings Gorm had contrived. Ulf's hands were quick, stripping the leather from Wiglaf's ankles and wrists. Ulf smiled and stuffed moss into the iron bell. Lidsmod and the stout, bald-headed man pulled Wiglaf to his feet.

They led him to the river.

Two guards watched over the ships, and these men lowered spears toward Wiglaf.

“What is this, Ulf?” asked one of the guards.

“Watch. I'll show you.” He turned to Wiglaf. He gestured, his voice low. “Run, Wiglaf. Run home. Go quickly.” He slapped Wiglaf's back. “Run now!”

Wiglaf started, and stopped.

“Hurry!” Ulf said.

The two spearmen stepped toward Wiglaf, but he danced away.

As he ran he heard an iron bell chiming, far off on the other side of the camp. Lidsmod! He was running in the opposite direction, drawing pursuers away from Wiglaf.

There were shouts. These strangers had the fiercest voices! Wiglaf nearly fell at the sound. But he told himself: I will not stumble.

Wiglaf splashed into water for a moment, and veered. The river was nearly at his feet, but he could not climb through the wall of tree trunks at his right. He ran until tears streamed, and then collided with a tree in the dark. He forced himself up, through the claws of branches, the stalks of hazel wood and the teeth of brambles, up into the forest. There was starlight, and the dullest moon.

Suddenly branches crashed behind him, and breath hissed into his ear.

“I have you!” said Gorm.

Gorm's teeth were bright. His hands clutched Wiglaf's tunic, then his leg, then fumbled at Wiglaf's heel.

Wiglaf slithered. He leaped and ran hard into a tree. He rebounded, and dived into shrubs he could not even see, hoping they would be thick enough to hide him. Hadn't he always been Wiglaf the spider?

Gorm's hand closed around his foot. Wiglaf struggled to hang on to something with his stronger hand, but the man was much too powerful for him. Wiglaf felt stalks and leaves break between his fingers. He could not find a handhold among this young growth.

Gorm laughed, panting.

Wiglaf bit him. He did not know what limb he was biting exactly, although as his teeth sank and blood filled his mouth, he surmised that it was one of Gorm's arms. The man gasped, struck Wiglaf on the head, and flung him into the air.

Wiglaf sailed through the darkness. He fell into a cradle of branches and landed on his feet.

Gorm was just behind him. Once he felt Gorm's fingertips graze his shoulder and Wiglaf fell deliberately; he rolled through squelching mossy mud and then ran again. Hares don't run in a straight line, stone to wall to tree. They slant, swivel, scamper, and then, to cheat the hound, they run straight for awhile. Wiglaf raced one way, then another, and Gorm's hand snatched at air just past Wiglaf's ear. Wiglaf dodged, and then he was a rabbit, indeed.

This was Wiglaf the hare, and Gorm ran hard, slogging through the wet branches and splashing through puddles, but Wiglaf seemed to avoid the puddles—or perhaps there was a charm in his running that night. Perhaps the puddles shifted to avoid Wiglaf, and found Gorm's feet instead. Forests are not simple places. They lie beyond the word and ken of humans, and Wiglaf ran afraid of the trees around him as much as he feared Gorm.

There came a moment during the running when Wiglaf realized he was alone. Gorm was no longer behind him. The forest was silent around him, closing in, trees leaning over him with their great, dark heads.

At last Wiglaf walked. His breath thundered and his heart galloped, so he could not discern what was forest sound and what was the noise of his own body. He could not tell if Gorm followed him at a distance. He could hear nothing but himself. His nose was streaming, and he forced himself onward. He realized that he did not know where he was going.

He was lost, swallowed by forest. He hurried along what looked like a path, and then he realized that there was light. It was a poor, thumb-worn daylight, but it was not darkness. Birds answered each other, and Wiglaf worked his way along the path, praying that it paralleled the river. So long as Wiglaf knew where the river was, he was not lost.

But the river was nowhere. Forest slime glistened at his feet. There were trees, furry and green in places, smooth and sere in others. There were stones scaled and blistered with lichen. Tree-colored birds scurried, pin-sharp beaks and quick eyes all around him.

Wiglaf kept to the path. No one had walked this trail for many years, he believed. This path was a bad charm, the way into a witch's embrace.

37

As the sun rose, Wiglaf found the river. Or perhaps the path found it, or the river found Wiglaf. The dawn-bright water was sliced by the black trunks of trees. But it was an old friend, this river—Wiglaf knew where he was. He climbed behind a tree, exhausted, and prayed that Saint Peter would stand guard and let no harm find him.

He slept.

Wiglaf woke thirsty, hungry, and frightened. He hurried to look at the river. It was still morning. The current was busy and had more color now.

He ran again, but he did not run fast. It was a trot, like the pace a dog might try to maintain over distance. He had never dreamed that there were so many trees. This river no longer looked so much like the way home.

He walked all day, and at night he slept hard, dreamlessly.

It was when the earth turned gray that Wiglaf realized the sun was rising again. It was another day. But he had forgotten the names for things in his hunger and weariness.

He had forgotten his own name. He had forgotten where he was going, or where he had been. He knew only Going and Walking, one step after another. He would walk forever.

That was when he saw the wolf.

Like all such creatures, it was beautiful, and yet with the sort of beauty the eyes can scarcely believe. And it was following him, its slanted eyes invisible in the first light. It had long legs and silver-brown fur. It nosed forward, following Wiglaf more quickly as Wiglaf began to pant.

Wiglaf was shocked back into knowing. Where one wolf ran, dozens followed. Soon a wolf company would fill the path behind Wiglaf, and they would trot closer and closer, wolf slather flowing. There would be a mead hall of wolves. Wiglaf looked back every few paces and each time he looked the beast was closer. Its eyes were black, like fine nicks taken with a knife, not at all the open gaze of Stag.

The wolf was near now. Wiglaf sobbed, breaking into a shaky trot. He did not have the strength to run any faster. The animal was nearer yet, closing on him. When the path turned, the wolf disappeared for a moment, keeping to a straight line, reappearing when the path no longer crooked.

Wiglaf fumbled for a stone. He found one and flung it at the creature. The wolf lifted one paw and sniffed at the rock. He looked back at Wiglaf, his mouth open in a carnivorous grin.

At that moment, a bear climbed through the forest.

Wiglaf would never be certain about this. When he thought back on it later, there had been, he knew, a wolf. But the bear had not been like a bear at all, and Wiglaf would wonder as long as he lived what, in fact, had approached through the woods that morning.

It was huge, too big to be real, but it crackled the leaves and shoved saplings to one side. It stayed beyond the trees, so Wiglaf could only see its shadow—the size of an ale hall—where it rose and fell.

The wolf hesitated and whined. The bear snapped twigs, just out of sight. The wolf stepped sideways and sniffed again, and its muzzled wrinkled. The wolf bared its white teeth and growled.

Wiglaf scrambled down the path, and the bear grew closer, its slow paws crushing leaves, its breath chuffing in the cold morning. Or was it the spirit of all dead bears trailing him through the forest? Or a bear of magic, of divine power, come after Wiglaf to protect him? Sometimes it clambered ahead, and Wiglaf could just see the shag of his back fur above the bushes.

The bear stayed with Wiglaf and did not leave him. All day the great animal accompanied him on his journey. Wiglaf spoke to it, but he would never be able to recall what he said to it, or why it seemed that the bear answered.

Wiglaf approached the landmark and did not know it. He was not seeing the world anymore; he was only walking. Breath came out of him, a silent cry, and he stopped.
I know this place
.

It was the
aldwark
, the stone ruin beside the road.

But it couldn't be. Surely he had not traveled far enough yet, he thought. Sun spilled through the trees. Birds lifted their voices, like the broken voices of children. Wiglaf would walk forever, he believed. Stride after stride—it was all he had ever done. Now he was walking to the place he remembered, but of course it was all burned to ashes, and all the people were gone.

The familiar one-two note of a cuckoo drifted from across an empty field. Scattered sheep droppings and sheep-cropped grass stretched all the way to the forest. The flock was gone. He took a breath to call out the name of his dog, but of course there was no familiar dog—nothing living remained.

His legs collapsed and he lay still on the soft earth of the road. He would rise again soon and trudge the road through the charred places where his mother and father had lived, and his brothers, and Aethelwulf.

Wiglaf wondered if this was what it was like to die—warm sun kneading his body, a voice calling his name.

38

Gorm returned along the riverbank slowly and quietly. He had believed that someday he would sit beside the quick, stunning-cold white water and be happy.