Lion of Ireland (4 page)

“We have beaten these Irish in a hundred other battles, and taken their treasures and burned their books.

It is not like Northmen to let one temporary defeat keep them in check like leashed dogs. It is unhealthy, I tell you; we should be raiding again, viking again!”

Eyrik made an imposing figure, standing tall in the light of the lamps and torches. He was a man in the last bloom of his youth, with broad shoulders, and a heavy, muscled torso, but his face bore the beautiful, clean profile of his people. The gold had begun to tarnish in his hair, but the blue North Sea still glittered in his eyes as he hurled his challenge.

Nearest him sat Ilacquin, King Ivar’s youngest brother. Famed for his beauty and his love of women, Ilacquin had yet to risk himself in battle; his cleverness at avoiding sword cuts was his only proven skill.

“Eyrik,” he ventured in a soothing voice, “sit down and let Hulda fill your drinking horn. We are all healthy here, in spite of what you say, and there is scarcely any room in the hall now for all the loot piled about. Come, friend, sit with me and let us enjoy the evening in peace.”

“Peace!” roared Eyrik. “The son of Amlav the Ax talks to me of peace? If your father were alive he would have you thrown out the gates of his city, Ilacquin. You should have been exposed on the hillside at birth, a sacrifice to the elements!”

“Well, my father’s not alive, and my brother Ivar will not banish me because he’s gone to Cork to do some trading with Regner. So I shall have to stay, and you will have to calm yourself.” Ilacquin reached out a languid hand to caress the nearest round breast. A girl giggled; a man smiled.

Eyrik shook his head in disgust. “Aye, well, Regner’s another who has abandoned his heritage. He’s become a merchant and a city man, and soon he will be sending word that he needs charity, because he lacks the heart to go out and take what he wants.

“Great Odin All-Father never turns his back on us, Ilacquin, because we have always been strong where others are weak. We take and hold, asking nothing from any man but what we are able to win with our own might; and the gods have blessed us accordingly. See how the powerful’ animals get the best food, while the weaklings starve and die! That is the way life is intended to be: The strong breed and prosper, the weak die and feed the crows.”

Several men exchanged glances and nods of agreement.

“I tell you, it goes against the will of the gods when we sit idle and wait for age to cripple our sword arms! Already some of our kinsmen are listening to the talk of the Christmen; they will give up war for peace and be doomed. No man can reach Valhalla and sit with the gods unless he dies by the sword!” He paused in his oration to sneer at Ilacquin. “The only sword you will meet, boy, is the one some jealous husband will plunge into your back some night.”

A rowdy laugh swelled through the hall. Blood flowed! warmly into Ilacquin’s cheeks, and’ he saw that even the women were looking at him with unkind amusement in their eyes. “I am no coward!” he argued hotly.

“We have only your word on that, boy. Your brothers have proved their manhood; they have gone to sea in dragonships and brought back rich loot, but you still sit here in the king’s hall, pretty and safe, a charcoal-chewer who never leaves the hearth. In every litter there is a puny pup who needs drowning for the good of the breed. Even great Amlav seems to have gotten a runt!”

Ilacquin leaped to his feet in a fury. “You will not insult the memory of Amlav! He died a hero’s death when Callachan cleft him to the chin, through helmet and skull, and his spirit watches us from Valhalla this night!”

“Yes, Amlav died the good death, but ever since then the Norsemen of Limerick have paid tribute to Callachan, when all the gods know it should be the other way around. How can you sit here so smugly and let the Irish victory go unavenged?”

“My brother Ivar has made alliances with Callachan and the men of Munster,” Ilacquin reminded his tormentor.

“Alliances? Ha! I call it cowardice! If you had not all I turned into miserable geldings you would come viking with me this night; we would raid some Irish settlement and bring back boats full of riches to welcome Ivar with, when he returns. Then he would know that the men of Limerick are warriors once more, ready to fight Callachan and anyone else who tries to tax us. We would remind these Irish of the fury of the Northman!”

There was a rumble, an undertone in the hall. Men were pushing away their drinking horns and moving toward the walls, where great axes and coats of chain mail hung, silvered with dust. A power was building; a dragon was coming awake.

Eyrik picked up a goblet from the table in front of Torfinn the Tall. He held it up, turning it in the light.

“This is beautiful, is it not?” he demanded. “Some Irish craftsman spent a year of his life on this, shaping all these little wires and twining them into fanciful designs. But who has the cup now? We do! It is not enough to make a thing; the glory goes to him who can get it and keep it. You have all forgotten this, and I tell you, wolves will come in the night and steal away your spirits because you have ceased to be real men.”

It was not the first time these men had heard words that could lash them into the killing frenzy. Such speeches had lit the fires of battle since the first Norse chieftain struck his rival on the head with a rock and took his furs and his woman. They all recognized the thunder beginning in their blood.

“Eyrik Gunnarsson! Eyrik Gunnarsson!” rose the shout in the king’s hall.

The rectangular building that was the Norse palace in Limerick resembled nothing so much as a great warship, upended. The steeply pitched roof rose to meet a rooftree curved like the prow of a galley.

Around the symbolic vessel clustered the houses of the townspeople, the tradesmen and shopkeepers and families of the warriors. Crude streets of rough-hewn timbers led to the harbor, the heart and reason for the city, where many ships rode at anchor in perpetual readiness. All of the cities in Ireland had been built by the invaders from the land they called Lochlann, as strongholds and trading centers. The cities were foreign but the countryside was Irish, drowsing in a long green dream.

In their houses, behind the walls of wickerwork and mud the people heard the shouting in the king’s hall and exchanged meaningful glances. “They go raiding at last,” the) said to one another, “and when they come back there will be treasure to parcel out, and feasting. The good times are coming again!”

A mighty roar billowed out from the king’s hall, carrying clearly through the wet night air. The Northmen jostled each: other as they crowded through the doorway, brandishing swords and axes and shouting battle slogans. They paid in heed to the rain that slashed insistently across the town. only Ilacquin hesitated a moment, casting a wistful backward glance at the warm and glowing interior of the hall; then he settled his conical helmet firmly on his head and gritted his teeth as cold water dripped off the metal nose guard. To the others the elements were a challenge, another power they could outface and shrug aside. Stronger than ale, more intoxicating than mead, was the viking lust rising in them.

To hurl defiance at man and nature, to pit their strength against all corners and win, or to die in the rapture that preceded Valhalla!

Riding at anchor, the Norse boats waited on the broad breast of the Shannon. Torchlight reflected in wavering patterns on the water, stained at the river’s edge with the sewage of the town, stinking with rotten fish.

As the men clambered into the boats and began preparations for lifting anchor, Eyrik admired the heroic picture they made in the flare of the sputtering rushlights. A man could be proud to go viking with such a company! Great, sturdy fellows, all of them, with their golden hair worn long enough to cover their necks, their fierce mustaches and neatly pointed beards showing them to be of noble blood.

Each wore a woolen kirtle, fitted closely to his arms and waist and extending to midthigh. Below that, tight trousers clung to the leg, reaching downward to the warm, shaped leggings that kept a man’s muscles supple and ready for action. Heavy leather boots had been made of a cow’s hind leg, hair side out; the dewclaws were left on and lay to either side of the heel, giving the warrior sure footing on slippery ground. Some of the men wore tunics of chain mail; they were all wrapped in heavy woolen mantles, pinned at the shoulder with elaborate brooches of bronze, leaving the right side open and the sword arm free.

The boats were no less well designed for the task at hand. They were shallow-drafted riverboats, better suited to the inland waterways than were the fearsome dragonships that terrorized the seacoast. Built for either sailing or rowing, each swift vessel had twelve warriors and skimmed over the water as lightly as a swallow coming down from the north lands. Eyrik called his boat the River Serpent, and even with her low sides and thin keel he did not hesitate to take her out on the open sea when the weather was fair; never would River Serpent fail him. She was gorgeously painted in yellow and black, her soaring prow and stern carved into coiling snakes, and then stained crimson. He greeted her as a lover greets his beloved after a long separation.

“Hail, River Serpent! Praise to the All-Father that we are come together this night. We go viking once more, my trusted friend, and the gods themselves will sing the praises of our fearless deeds!”

The rain was lessening, and the wind was not as strong as it had been. Eyrik stood in the prow of his vessel and turned his face into the wind, testing it, weighing its strength with the flesh of his seaman’s face.

“Break out the oars!” he ordered his crew. “There is a community but a little way upriver, a place called Boruma; it is the home of the king of the Dal Cais tribe. No raiding party has visited them of late, and they have had ample time to grow fat and prosperous. Let us go now and relieve them of their trinkets and their women. It is time we had a change of women!”

They yelled in hearty agreement and put their backs into their rowing. The wind smelled of the river and the grassy meadowlands beyond, but they were thinking of the scent of women, the sweet, hot flesh of unfamiliar females. Gold was good and a viking attack stirred the blood; but each man could already see, in his imagination, rounded Irish thighs and full breasts waiting for him in Boruma. It was time to seize new girls and replenish the stock of Limerick. It was not the Norse custom to bring their wives across the sea from the mountains and fjords of Lochlann; it had proven easier to breed sons on native women and conquer by attrition, as well as by sword and ax.

Peering into the night, Eyrik flashed his broad white teeth in a savage smile. It was good to be a man in the company of men, living as the gods decreed. He stretched his arms wide, exulting. Seizing the great horn which hung by a thong beside him he blew a joyous blast, signaling the other boats to follow.

As they moved out into the river, one of the men in Torfinn’s vessel began an ancient song, in rhythm to the stroke of the oars: “Sons of Odin, sons of Thor,

fangs of the cold sea,

O gods, we go to do you honor.

Who -can stand against us?

See us; we go to feed the ravens with your enemies

and make the wound-dew run red upon the grass.”

In every boat, men took up the song, sending it ringing from bank to bank as they swept out into the current an< glided east in the night.

In the absolute velvet blackness of the night, one pure note of sound carried a great distance. It lanced into the sleeping chamber, penetrating the dreams of the sleepers. There was a slight stirring and then quietness again.

A second time, the high, eerie music came wailing to them on the night wind, and this time it could not be ignored. Behind the curtain, Cennedi turned over in bed and grumbled something to his wife; Lachtna and Dermott were both awake, lying tense and reluctant, anticipating the summons, “The wolves are near,” Cennedi’s phlegm-choked voice told them. “Wake up, you scoundrels! Can’t you hear them?”

“Ferdiad and Damon are on the night watch,” Lachtna said.

“And Oisin,” came Mahon’s voice, thick with sleep.

“You would remember Oisin,” Dermott teased, “or is it his daughter that keeps him on your mind?”

Before Mahon could reply they heard Cennedi shifting about as if he were going to get up. “No matter who stands the night watch, the cattle are my responsibility,” he reminded them sharply. “If a cow is killed, it is my tribe the wolves have robbed. Now, is one of you going to go out there and make sure everything is all right, or do I have to do it?”

“It’s Mahon’s turn,” came an immediate reply—not from Mahon.

“It’s your turn, Mahon!”

There was sighing and grumbling, but just a little, not enough to anger Cennedi. Mahon hunted about in the darkness and found his sandals and his bratt, a spear and a hatchet, then left the chamber as quietly as he could.

The wolfs call meant nothing to Brian, but the sound of his adored brother’s voice was a trumpet in his blood, bringing him to instant wakefulness. Mahon was up, going off in the night on an adventure! Brian held his breath as he assembled his own clothes in desperate silence, expecting to hear his mother’s voice challenge him at any moment.

But Bebinn had had a tiring day, and now that there were no babies in the house she was less receptive to night sounds than she had been once. She slept on, smiling a little in her dreams, as her youngest child sneaked out after his brother.

The night pasture lay in a valley north of the compound, ringed by sheltering hills and traversed by a stream running down to the Shannon. The rain had slackened, and there were glimpses of a moon to be caught through the ragged thinning of the clouds. The remaining hours of the night would be good hunting for the wolves.

Mahon tucked his hatchet in his belt and marched resolutely across the wet grass. Undoubtedly the night watch would have driven the pack away by now, but Mahon took his responsibilities seriously. Besides, there might be compensations. He balanced his spear neatly in his hand and climbed the hill separating him from the herd, unaware of the small figure trotting some distance behind him.