One of the other earls nodded. “Mine would tell me of travelers venturing into dark forests or over high passes, never to be seen again.”
“But not,” Olla said firmly, “whole armies out of thin air! Grandmothers’ tales? We’ll be talking of dark-elves and seidr-magic next!”
“Aren’t we already?” Hreyth asked. She rose and moved near the glowing hearth, turning in a slow circle to let them all see the strangeness of her mis-matched eyes — one blue as the fjords, one amber-gold. “Is that not why I’m here? Your king’s skald, in his wisdom, sent for me because folk do disappear, or worse.”
No one answered. Only a few — Valhild, Anbjorn, Njoth, and the king most among them — could long withstand her gaze.
“We may think we are mighty, with our kingdoms and oaths, our laws and law-speakers,” she went on. “We forget there are older places, and things, of this world.”
Njoth nodded vigorous support. “If they trespassed on a giant, a dwarf-cave, a troll-den… if they woke a dragon from its slumber… disturbed a grave-barrow…”
“There’s no knowing what they might have unleashed,” Hreyth finished for him. “And whether it will be satisfied with whatever it’s already done, or will come looking for more.”
In the town was the army of Gunnleif Guthnarsson, whose banner — a snarling yellow dog on a triangle of black — waved from the top of the walls. Shields hung there as well, round shields painted half black and half yellow. Spears leaned ranked against the ramparts, an iron-tipped forest.
But no one came out to challenge or follow as their company of eight rode from Jorfyn’s war-camp beside Langenvik’s broad bay.
With Hreyth and Egil were Valhild, of course, and Anbjorn, and four other warriors chosen by the earls.
The day was brisk and clear, the wind off the sea sharp as a blade’s edge. Eventually, as they rode amid idle conversations, a burly swordsman named Atli asked Egil what someone always seemed eventually to ask.
“Does she lay with you?” he whispered. “Is she your woman?”
He no doubt intended discretion, but Hreyth’s ears were keen. She hid a smile as Egil made his usual growling reply.
“Ask such again, and my fist will give answer.”
There was then a moment of cautious, considering silence. Then one of the others — called Thrunn — mentioned he’d heard it likely they’d see a rainy spring, and his friend Osig replied that a rainy spring meant a fair summer, and so the subject was safely changed.
Valhild, who’d also heard the exchange, grinned wryly at Hreyth and made more distance fall between their horses and those of the men. “Will your fist give answer if I ask you the same?”
“Oh? Have you an interest?”
She snorted. “Not in you. I only fight and drink like a man.”
Hreyth’s eyebrows rose.
“He seems tough,” said Valhild, as if by way of explanation.
“The toughest.”
“But that wasn’t my question.”
Hreyth released her reins with one hand, and made a fist — a rather small one. She looked at it, then looked at Valhild, and chuckled. “To what end, breaking my fingers?”
“You might land a lucky blow.”
“I’ll not chance it. As for the question beyond the question, Egil was brought orphan to the hall before I was born, and is as a brother to me.”
Again, the big woman snorted. “There’s a story told often enough. If I’d a sack of silver for each lovestruck fool I’d seen crying over his mead because of some girl who held him as brother or friend…”
“Tyr’s truth in that,” Hreyth agreed, rolling her eyes. “But, in this matter, it is as I say.”
“Very well, then. How came he by his distinctive scar?”
“When he was brought orphan. His village fell under attack. His family was slaughtered, he himself injured and left for dead, only a child. My mother tended him, took him in. She was a healer… of sorts.” She frowned; speaking of her mother was not something she often did, or found pleasant.
Most folk, realizing as much, let it pass. Not so Valhild.
“Of sorts?”
“She brewed potions. Both helpful and… otherwise. They say she poisoned her husband.”
“Did she?”
“I believe so. I was too young to know at the time. I remember he beat her, and they hated each other, and when he died, his kin accused her of murder.”
“Your mother murdered your father?”
“No,” she replied. “That’s why her husband beat her.”
“Ah,” Valhild said, nodding in worldly-wise comprehension. “What of your true father, then?”
Hreyth shrugged. “Of him, I can say only what was told to me, and it sounds the most terrible arrogance.”
“I like terrible arrogance.”
“You would.”
“Don’t make my fist give answer!” Valhild hefted hers, the knuckles callused, a design of Thor’s hammer marked into the skin with needle and ink.
They both laughed.
“As I was told it,” Hreyth said, “during a long year when the men and their ships were away a’viking, a stranger visited the hall. A lone wanderer who wore a grey cloak and a strip of cloth bound over his lack of an eye. He sought to discuss seidr-magic with my mother, staying three days and three nights as her guest.”
“And when he was gone…?” Valhild made a rounding gesture in front of her belly.
“And when he was gone.” Hreyth mimicked the gesture.
“A one-eyed wanderer in a grey cloak, eh?” She whooped, drawing the attention of the others. “You’re claiming Odin All-Wise himself —?”
“I do not claim so, only say as I was told, and I warned you it sounded a terrible arrogance.”
Just then, Anbjorn signaled urgently. “Tracks,” he said. “Hoof-prints. They must belong to Udr and those who rode with him.”
“Let us investigate,” said Valhild, testing how her great sword rested in its scabbard. She winked at Anbjorn. “Remember, if you’re leading us to some trap or our doom, I’ll cleave you from crown to crotch.”
“I assure you,” he told her earnestly, “I’ve not forgotten.”
They crested a rise and beheld the broad river-valley, green and peaceful, dotted with dark, coarse boulders and smoother grey standing stones. No carrion-crows circled, no scavengers roved, no stench of decay reached them on the mild spring breeze.
All that moved was the rippling current of the water, shining like glass; a few fish leaped, a few birds flew. Here and there, horses grazed.
Horses… many still saddled and bridled… the buckles glinting in the sun… other glints and flashes of metal showed from the grass… as if from sword-blades or bright-polished helms.
“I see no corpses,” Valhild said.
“I see no one at all,” added Osig. “They aren’t here.”
“But they were,” Anbjorn said. “I know these horses. I know this gear. That’s Kjarstan’s war-stallion! And, there, his banner, by those stones! Stefnir would never have let it fall so long as his arm held strength.”
“Unless they fled,” said Inglar.
“They did not flee!”
“What, then? Did they surrender? Were they taken, meekly, without a fight?”
“I’ll give you a fight, you—”
“Come and try—”
Valhild nudged her horse between them, a one-woman shield-wall with a dangerous scowl. “Settle it later,” she said. “Or I’ll settle it now.”
There were no corpses, no indications of struggle, only wandering, riderless horses; shields and spears and a banner-pole as if carelessly cast aside, dropped swords or cloaks simply strewn here and there among the random scatters of stones.