Norseman Raider (The Norseman Chronicles Book 4) (12 page)

The farmer
had skidded to a halt, dazed, where several of Godfrey’s men hoisted him up by his shoulders.  He dizzily blinked and began his rambling pleadings.  Killian was crawling back to his feet, his robes torn and dirty, but appearing no worse for the wear.  Godfrey lay sprawled on his back.  His body was racking and shaking.  I thought I had killed the king and what I saw were his death throes.

Then I heard his laughter.  King Godfrey stared up at the underside of the forest canopy and roared.  It was too loud, but nobody was going to tell him that
and deprive him of his mirth.  The entire band then looked at me and joined him when he propped himself up on his elbows.  “That was one way to do it, I suppose,” the king said.  “When we conquer the bloody Scots of Dal Riata, I know who will be our first man to take part their games of strength.  I think Halldorr knows how to throw the weight.”

I still huffed from my exertion and a
nger and, ignoring their jest, ran to Aoife.  She had managed to roll over without assistance and with large eyes the girl watched me.  Aoife gathered up a great smile beneath those huge eyes.  Her face was dirtier than usual.  “We make a good team,” she said as if nothing had happened.  She even yawned.

The men now laughed at me over my concern for the girl.  “He’s never tried to save me like that,” Magnus
joked, as he walked back with Leif.

Embarrassed, I said, “She’s an investment.  I don’t want my property damaged by a Welshman.  Thralls are expensive enough.
  What did you find?”

“We weren’t as fortunate as we thought,” said Leif
, walking in behind Magnus.  “There was a swale where another half dozen workers toiled.  They were already running in the opposite direction when Magnus and I walked out of the trees.  They heard him and saw us.”

“But they saw just two of you,” I said.  “They’ll think that a simple group of highwaymen came through.”

“Perhaps,” said Killian in a way that meant he didn’t believe it.

“
We best get this man to tell us what he knows and then move,” said Godfrey, losing his sense of humor.  “If they saw the two of you with your long hair, mail, helmets, and swords, they know that Norsemen are afoot.  It won’t be long until a rider brings King Maredubb and his army, searching for a fight.”

And so began our race against time.

. . .

The farmer knew what and who we were, having heard tales, especially from his relatives who lived
nearer the coast, about what Norseman did when they came to visit Wales.  Despite his well-justified fear, he performed ably.  He led us into the heart of Anglesey, skirting many small villages and not once shouting out for help even when a mounted patrol trotted by.  Our captive seemed to believe Killian when the priest promised that we would set him free once we had our treasure.  He should have believed us.  We, especially Godfrey’s crew, were hardened men, but what we wanted more than anything from the farmer’s island was wealth.  Spilling a peasant’s blood might be good sport for the barbaric in the world.  It wasn’t, however, our objective.

We walked briskly, eating and pissing on the run. 
Sometimes the king would trot ahead on his dappled beast and scout out the beautiful countryside which had the bountiful green life of early summer growing from end to end.

Killian took the time to educate me on the island.  Anglesey, he said,
was part of some ancient kingdom called Gwynedd which included the island and a part of the mainland.  Maredubb tried to run it as a king of old, but faraway Aethelred of England was the true master.  Gwynedd, like the other Welsh kingdoms, had ceased being a sovereign power over a hundred years earlier.  Hundreds of years before that, those infamous Romans had a base or two on Anglesey and many forts dotting the whole of Wales.  Killian said he knew all these tales because the Romans left their stone ruins behind as permanent markers.  This fact amazed me since every human structure I had ever seen would have rotted away and been swallowed by the mud within a few score of years.  My people had no good stone with which to work.  I came from a line of woodworkers.

Even more astounding than the Romans supposed prowess at building things was that all their histories had been written down.  Why would anyone record the mundane events of life?  I wondered it then,
for I was an illiterate.  But here I huddle and write and write and write.  I write sentences that describe me cleaning my ears or killing a man while he evacuated his bowels.  My excuse is that I am well past the years where living is anything close to exhilarating.  By writing my tales, I hope to bring them back to my mind’s eye.  I’d relive them if I could.  Why the Romans of ancient Anglesey, most young soldiers, thought to pen anything still puzzles me.

As night fell around us, Godf
rey rudely told the priest and me to clamp shut our yapping mouths.  Our pace slowed as we moved from woods to woods, careful to not trample crops like a herd of escaped cattle so that if our quest took us into the next day, we’d not alarm any probing, curious Welshmen.  We weren’t afraid of a confrontation, but we weren’t certain where this King Maredubb was and what his army might look like.  We were confident, however, that by morning a runner from our captive’s village would alert the Welsh king and he would very soon send soldiers out to kill us.  Speed and stealth were our only weapons at that moment.

The moon had risen high and bright very early in the night.  Soon the few clouds that had covered the bright orb at dusk and beyond blew into the distance
, leaving a bluish-black sky that was devoid of stars.  It was then that the squawking farmer held out both hands and, I guess, told us to stop, for Killian immediately held up his hand. The farmer pointed out across a rolling terrain where several cows calmly chewed their cud, staring back at us.  Calves obediently stood next to their mothers.  In the center of their pasture was another copse of trees, like the one in which we then stood.  The priest talked to our captive, back and forth.

“He says our treasure is in there.
”  The priest pointed to the trees in the meadow.  “He asks that we not take him with us if we mean to unearth it,” said Killian, looking up at Godfrey.  “He’s pale with fright.  He’s heard the same stories that Eyvind shared with Halldorr.”

“What did you tell him?” asked the king.

“That a Christian has nothing to fear from a draugr army,” said Killian.

“Good.  He comes with us.”  The king
dropped down from his horse with a thud and handed his reins to the nearest man.  Godfrey scanned the pasture for prying eyes before boldly stepping out and marching toward the dark grove of trees.  The rest of us followed, careful not to clatter our weapons and tools against one another.  I patted one of the heads of one of the cows as I passed.  Its great tongue curled up to lick my hand.  I gave it a playful pop on its snout with my balled fist.  It retreated a half step and then followed me to the edge of the woods that hid the treasure.  It had the sense to halt.  We men did not.

When I entered the dark grove
from the west end, a chill racked down along my spine.  It radiated outward, even creating the visible bumps of geese on my bare arms.  I shivered.  I looked at Magnus who, though he had the brains to say nothing, appeared just as frightened.  Leif, on the other hand, went fearlessly in pursuit of Godfrey.  In moments we had reached the center of the small forest.  My young friend scrambled up an out-of-place looking mound in the middle of the isolated copse of trees.  Godfrey was already at the top, stomping on the ground and probing the earth with his sword to see if he could find an indication of where the best place to dig would be.

If either of our leaders, the young Leif or the experienced raider, Godfrey, was apprehensive, each hid it well.
  Godfrey was chuckling to himself, no doubt already counting his new found wealth and listing all the men and ships he could buy with it.  The Christians with us were mumbling prayers.  The followers of the old gods gripped their swords, readying for what might be their greatest quest.

Aoife dashed off around the perimeter of the large mound
which was a dozen fadmr in diameter.  She started at the base then quickly scaled a rim made of massive stones that rested on their sides and skirted the entire barrow.  Who put the stones there in the first place had to be the giants of yore.  Aoife skipped from one foot to the next and began humming a tune I’d not heard before.  She disappeared around the south side of the large circle, oblivious to the fact that we were in unknown territory with ghosts and kings and now maybe giants soon to be hunting us.

“Halldorr,” rasped Leif.  “I don’t think the king wants to chase your thrall around Wales.”

“My thrall,” I huffed and then immediately jumped up onto the immense stones and walked around after her.

While I chased my quarry, the king called out in a hushed voice.  “We dig here.”  He stabbed his sword down into the very center of the top of the burial mound. 
The blade rang as it swung back and forth.  “Take a moment to eat.  Then we dig until we uncover the treasure store.”  Godfrey gave Leif an appreciative grin, already acknowledging the young man’s part in the king’s ascent.

I looked over my shoulder and though none of the Christians were supposed to be afraid of the spirits
lurking in the barrow, to a man they all moved their hands up and down and across their bodies in the way Christians do.  The Norsemen relaxed their grips on their swords and kissed their mjolnir amulets if they had them or simply plopped down on their rumps to eat before their backs were broken digging up the ancient monument.

Horse Ketil
, who had thus far been remarkably quiet, was arguing with Killian for the priest to give him a second share of ale.  “You’ve had your allotted dose.  You drank it all!” protested Killian.

“Irish ass,” said Ketil.

“Manx traitor,” answered Killian.

I realized that I had walked all the way around the circumference of the grave
back to where I started.  That’s when I panicked.  This time it was not because of my love of, or care for, the little Valkyrie child, but rather I was afraid she had run off and would intentionally or accidentally warn a village or, worse yet, Maredubb himself.  I thought we could fight two times our number.  An army would be another story.

Without letting on that I may have just lost the girl, I circumnavigated the hill a second time.  I was more careful and peered out into the dark grove of alders
surrounding the barrow.  Once I saw a flash of dirty white and thought it was her, but a harmless bleat told me it was a lamb, probably owned by the same family who owned the cows.  I stopped on the northeast side of the circle and rested my hands on my hips.  I scanned the trees, this time with my ears.  A grunt and then a scratching sound reached out and surprised me from behind.

I faced the shadowed hillside.  Above, moonlight shined down on Leif’s and Godfrey’s position as if Thor marked out the location of the riches for us.  For the first time
, I noticed that this corner of the barrow had a rough stone path that cut toward the center from the large stones at the perimeter.  In the dark it looked like several more of the enormous stones had been stood upright and stacked onto one another in a disorganized fashion.  It was like a sealed door into the heart of the mound and into the world of the spirits beyond.  When the door again grunted at me, I jumped back off the stone walkway and drew my sword.  I nearly toppled over.  I was young and my sword shook in my hand.  My head conjured images of ghosts.

Leif and Godfrey ignored me
, chatting in hushed tones.  I thought that I must have already been killed by the first grunting draugr who escaped from the grave.  I just didn’t know it for certain.  I hadn’t felt it when the ghost reached into my chest and stopped my heart.  It was true after all, the girl had been my Valkyrie and she did lead me to my quick death.  All I had to do now was find her so she could help me finish my journey to Odin’s hall.  I relaxed at the thought of the immortal life of revelry that awaited me around the master god’s hearth.  My sword steadied.

“The little lying bastard.”  It was my Valkyrie’s voice. 
She’d come to lead me.  My head darted back and forth.  The sound came from the walkway.  I peeked over the perimeter stones and saw nothing.

Aoife’s tiny head
squirted out from under the shadows of one of the rocks.  The girl grunted and wriggled until I saw her shoulders.  Then an arm shot out from under the collapsed entranceway.  She carried a sputtering torch.  This caught the attention of the king, who called down harshly, “Put the light out.  We don’t need to call attention to ourselves!”

“Oh, tell the useless king to be quiet.  He dragged us all the way here for nothing,” grumbled Aoife.  “It’ll be a long while bef
ore I get excited about going a-Viking with the likes of you.”

“I said put the torch out!” screamed Godfrey as loudly as he dared.

“I’ll ram the torch into your mouth,” said Aoife.  Before the king could even rise to his feet, offended, the thrall shouted up to him again.  “There’s no treasure.  Unless you count part of a human skull, a few rotten wooden shields, and some tarnished copper jewelry, we came all this way for nothing.  King Maredubb will chop you down tomorrow and I’ll have a new owner to train.”  She looked at me, disgusted.