Taking Quester well into the shallows until it was nudging the beach, Cormac swung off, with Wulfhere and Brian. They moved up the strand, treading wet sand. Aboard the ship from Eirrin waited Bas and Samaire and Thulsa Doom, with the two from Daneira. They watched the trio of weapon-men move warily up glittering sand to the beached vessel. The beach twinkled as if strewn with gems, in the sunlight that struck white fire from helms and mail.
“Oh-what a beautiful ship!”
Wulfhere nodded. “Aye. None build ships better than those Norse fugitives from Hel’s domain, Cormac.”
Eyesight was sufficient to confirm the beauty of the knorr; only a few moments’ examination was necessary to ensure that it was unguarded and in perfect condition, a long curving sweep of seafaring beauty with a scarlet hull the height of Cormac’s shoulders. Her name was branded along her side; Odin’s Eye. The god of the northlands had but one, for he had given up the other in trade for great wisdom. The snarling wolf-heads of Odin’s Eye were in place at bow and stern, which meant they had been reset after the beaching, for they were removed ere a ship of the cold lands came in to shore, lest the spirits of the land be alarmed by the fearsome gaping wolf-mouths and resist the landing. None had; it was well inland that these men of Norge had met their weird.
“Be it likely that all the Norsemen went inland, and left none behind to mind this beauty?” Brian asked.
Wulfhere and Cormac, their eyes as if bedazzled and ensorceled by the vessel, nodded: “Aye,” the Gael said. “Such is their way, often. See you any sign of habitation on this isle? They saw none, either. But-it’s sure we want to be that no reavers remain.”
The two who’d sailed so long together, a-reaving, looked at each other.
“We must have her,” Cormac said. “Aye.”
They shouted then, above the liquid slapping of the surf. All three men clashed the flats of their blades on their bucklers to draw any who might have been left behind by Thorleif and Snorri, and who might now have fared into the forest.
“An any come,” Brian asked, “shall we tell them of the welcoming they’ll be receiving of those man-hungry maids of Daneira, and bid them go inland… provided they leave all arms here?-And armour as well?”
“No sensible man would agree to such a mad bargain,” Wulfhere said. “They’d show us refusal by attacking at once.” He thrust two knobby-knuckled fingers up into his beard. “I bathed not high enough! Umm… such seeming madness, I mean; I be sore tempted to remain and return to Daneira, myself.”
Cormac had shaken his head. “No, Brian. Armed or no, such wolves would soon eat the gentle lambs of Daneira, alive or dead. An any come in reply to our noise, it’s but one way there is to ensure the safety of Daneira.”
Beyond the ship, the trees rustled their tops in a breeze off the sea. Brian looked at Cormac, with his lip caught between his teeth.
“Aye, proper death-dealing,” Wulfhere rumbled, quietly for once.
“Murder,” Cormac said.
“We’d slay out of hand?”
“Oh, they’d make attack,” Cormac said. “But-aye. Daneira must be protected, and making sweet overtures to reavers is the fool’s way. Slay a few to protect a few hundred? Aye! An that goes against your feelings, Brian, lay you back. I and Wulfhere can handle any who come. And he’ll only begrudge ye those you account for, I-love-to-light.”
“Unnecessary chatter. None comes,” the Dane said.
Cormac sheathed his sword and rested a hand on Odin’s Eye by the slit that allowed an oar’s slim blade to be slid down into the round hole for its sweep. He gazed at the line of trees, from which no one emerged. The only sounds were of surf and treetops that seemed to rustle in a whisper.
“None comes,” he agreed. “Twoscore Norsemen fared here, on Odin’s Eye, and all found death here. Four by my hand, and the rest died of Cathbadh’s sorcery. As for yourself, Wulfhere, ye high-horned dreamer… remain then. It’s not a month ye’d last, in such an unexciting place.”
“Even a month,” Wulfhere said thoughtfully, and a smile twitched his beard. “I’d be the most popular man on the island, with the girls. And what fun to come back a year hence and see all the little redheaded offspring of Dane and Danu!” He grinned broadly, gazing inland.
Cormac shrugged. “Stay then, red bear of Loch-linn. It seems there be no Norse, as ye said, and it’s for Eirrin’s shores I am-with this ship.”
“Salvage.”
“Conquest!”
“Ye’d tow two craft, ye greedy Eirrisher?”
“Nay. The Daneirans want no ship. Nevertheless, it’s Amber Rowan we’ll be leaving with them, and all under the deck of Odin’s Eye. A Briton-built ship is best being pulled apart for whatever use the Daneirans have…”
He turned to hand-signal Quester. Immediately the two of Daneira swung over the side and came hurrying up the beach, with their staves.
“Your great Cathbadh slew all who fared here on this knorr,” the Gael told them. “The craft itself we take with us. All aboard her is yours. And that ship-the poor one made by the Britons, who learned naught of shipbuilding or much else in five centuries of Roman rule-it too is yours, for firewood or a clambering toy for Daneira’s children. Is it a good seafaring craft, Wulfhere?”
Wulfhere had come to Doom-heim on Amber Rowan-bound to the mast, a captive of Britons who’d learned of the spoils there from the Dane when he was deep in his cups. The Britons had little, save what the Romans had left behind eighty years agone when great Rome fell and they withdrew. Even now those Britonish shores were raided by Danes and Norsemen, Saxons and Angles, Frisians and Jutes, along with a few more from nearer to hand: Picts from other side Hadrian’s Wall, along with men of both Alba and Eirrin.
Wulfhere made reply: “Nay.”
“Remember that, sons of Danu. Now ye’ve had a taste of the sea, and it seemed marvelous to ye. But-the Daneirans are best where they are, living in peace and with hope that none find ye. Come, give us a bit of help now. We’ll see what the Norsemen are after bringing ye… aside from the metal melted in Daneira!”
The Daneirans stared at the painted heads on prow and stern, each with fangs meticulously carved in wide-open jaws; none of Daneira had seen a wolf, or even a dog.
Cormac and Wulfhere swung quickly aboard and raised the deckboards to bare the shallow space in which were stored those supplies that seafarers might need ashore, and they were forced to land and tarry, but had no need of while they voyaged. There was little; the ship stood not Cormac’s height from gunwale to keel and was only about twice as broad, amidships. The Gael and the Dane drew forth utensils that might or might not be of use to the Daneirans; the metal would be welcome.
Astern, the small chamber of the steering platform was empty; there had weapons been stored. Keel up on deck, a single afterboat was bound and secured with ropes of walrus hide. For it the Daneirans had no use; Cormac would leave it where it was, on his new ship.
“She seems a better craft than any we’ve sailed, Cormac.”
Cormac nodded. “So she seems. Come; we’ll be stripping. That Britonish craft will be easy to pull and push in.”
It was. The matter of coaxing and manhandling Odin’s Eye into the water was far more difficult. Samaire and Bas came to lend their strength. Without the prodigious strength of the Dane, they’d never have accomplished it and would have had to wait for the vessel to be floated by the tide. Then Odin’s Eye was partially afloat, and they tethered her behind Quester, as Amber Rowan had been. Cormac checked over every inch of the towline.
“I tell ye again, Wolf: If we encounter weather, real weather, ye’ll have to cut loose that leashed dog of a ship. She’ll be the death of us else.”