Yet, that day, the day I thrust the challenge into all their faces, the memory of my mouth clotted with the throat of a berserker was still young and no-one had stepped forward; now the bets were all off.
Alyosha had told me straight away that he would not take the Oath, for he was service-bound to Vladimir and, besides, his gods were proper Slav ones. Yet he would come with us, for he was charged with looking after Crowbone — and, truth was, half the crew who sailed with Crowbone only did so because they knew Alyosha guided Crowbone.
Crowbone’s men were all free Svears who had fought for King Eirik until released to find blade work with Vladimir. They had followed Crowbone for the plunder in it — and because Alyosha was there to make the sensible decisions — and thought there would be buckets of silver now that they were in the famed Oathsworn of Orm Bear Slayer.
Styrbjorn, of course, had not been given the offer to take the Oath — and was now dragged along with us whether he liked it or not; it was clear he did not like it at all.
‘You can stay in Joms,’ I had said to his scowl, ‘but Pallig may not be as friendly as before and may work out that keeping you as a hostage is a waste of food and ale; Eirik might be daft enough to pay to have you back, but Pallig may not have the patience for it. You are safer with us — unless, of course, you trip over that petted lip and fall in the water.’
Finn, of course, had not been able to suppress a look and laugh at that, for he knew the truth of why we had rescued Styrbjorn and only wondered why the youth was still alive at all. So, I suspected, did Styrbjorn — and the truth of it was that the bearcoat’s throat was still so uppermost in my mind that it stole any stomach I had for red-murdering the boy.
He came with us all the same, wary as a wet cat and dragging his heels, a hand on the hilt of his eating knife — Eirik had sent him a fine sword, as proof of his forgiveness, but I had it snugged up in secret — and nursing all his grievances to him until he could pay everyone back.
I was thinking he would run for it first chance he got and was in two minds whether to let him or not, for if some skin-wearing tribesman killed him along the Odra, I could hold up my hands to the king and honestly say it was no fault of mine.
It was clear now that any who had designs on jarl matters were still stunned by what I had done and, taken with all the other legends that swirled round me, were too afraid to speak up — even Crowbone, who might have tried it, for all his size and lack of years.
The truth of it all was clear to me and worse, of course, than Finn thought. Crowbone did not need to challenge me for the jarl torc. He knew the Oath bound us all, as it said, one to another; if it meant he had to sulk in the stern now and behave himself, one day he would call on us and we would be reeled in like fish in the net of that Oath, to go and help win him a throne in Norway. That I had stuck myself in that net was what irritated me, for I needed Crowbone’s ship and his crew.
All day we rowed and I took my turn at the oar like everyone else, so that I ached by the end of the day, a hot bar from shoulder to shoulder and my arse rubbed raw on my own sea-chest. Yan Alf saw it when I squatted over the lee side for relief and laughed.
‘Orm is truly a great jarl,’ he yelled. ‘Look — he even prepared for a coming fog by making a beacon.’
They hooted and slapped thighs at the sight of my arse which, if it glowed like it felt, was indeed a fair light in a mist.
‘I went into a red forest,’ Bjaelfi intoned, waving a wax-sealed little pot. ‘In the red forest was a red house and in the house was a red table, and on the table was a red knife. Take the red knife and cut red bread.’
But I refused Bjaelfi’s potent charm against the rash on my cheeks, since it was accompanied by an offer to smear salve on the affected part. The men, enjoying the sight of their jarl so put out, hooted and guffawed and slapped themselves and each other, which was, I knew, as good a way as any of braiding them together. Unlike them, though, I could not put the bearcoat’s throat behind me.
I caught sight of Crowbone watching me, appraising and not the least put out. Another lesson learned for him, I thought, for I was no more than one of the spears he practised with each time we made landfall, throwing them with either hand and getting better all the while.
At night we lit fires and ate horse beans and bread, the bought stuff first before it got too moulded. After a week of this there were moans, which did not surprise me. Those with the skill wanted to hunt, Kuritsa among them.
‘If I eat any more horse beans,’ he grumbled, ‘I will blow the boat up the mountains to where this river begins.’
I said anyone who fancied it could hunt and saw the delighted looks among those who saw a way out of rowing; folk were even doing it in their sleep and elbowing their neighbours on the cramped boat.
Then I reminded everyone of the Redars and Czrezpienians, the Wengrians, Glomacze, Milczians and Sorbs, all of whom would be pleased to find Northlanders hunting their lands and would surely offer proper hospitality.
‘With a stake up the arse,’ Finn added and Red Njal flung back his head and laughed, the cords of his neck standing out.
‘Gefender heilir,’ he intoned a moment later, ‘gestr er inn kominn. Greetings to the host, a guest is come.’
‘Hvar skal sitja sja? Mjok er bradr, sa er brondum skal, sins um freista framr — Where must this one sit? He is very impatient, the one who must sit on the firewood to test his luck,’ Styrbjorn finished and those who knew the old Sayings Of Odin howled with laughter at their own cleverness.
That was the night I tried to talk sensibly with the Mazur girl. She was sitting, quiet as a hare and her eyes, those dark, seal eyes, were never still. They looked large and brimmed with fluid in her thin face, too big for it, too big for the small shoulders over which she had drawn a cloak given to her by Queen Sigrith, too large certainly for the legs that came out of the oatmeal-coloured shift and ended in small, clumpy turn-shoes, another gift.
For all that, the great hairy Svears and Irishers raised their brows and rolled their eyes at her, watching her when they could while she stared at nothing, like a little carving of wood. At night, I had men I could trust guard her, Finnlaith and Ospak usually; she was young and small but these were vik men and if some had not humped a dying woman on a dead ox it was only from lack of opportunity. They would hump a knothole if the mood took them.
I sat beside her and smiled. Her eyes flicked to my face and she said nothing; I saw the heads of the rowers we sat behind twisting themselves off to try and see what the jarl was up to.
They knew the girl was no thrall, was highly prized and that I had told them all to keep away, no talking to her, no hands on her or, by the Hammer, I would tie those who did to a tree with their pricks hanging and leave them for the Sorb women.
‘I hope you have some comfort and are not afraid,’ I said slowly, knowing her Norse was poor; I could speak neither Wend, nor Polanian, which she might know and certainly not Mazur. ‘You are worried about why I have brought you, no?’
‘No.’
The reply was flat and soft, surprising enough to make me blink, but her face did not change and the eyes, those eyes, were deep as a fjord. I felt there was some old wisdom gliding in the dark water of them; for a stabbing moment I was reminded of Hild, the mad woman who led us all to Attila’s hoard and, at the same time, caught sight of Crowbone, a shadowed shape looking at me, though his face was all darkness and I could not see his eyes.
Something about that disturbed me — but, then, I was all disturbance, like a cat in a high wind, fur-ruffled this way and that and made uneasy and twitched. Having your doom laid on you will do that. Ripping the throat from a man with your teeth will do that.