Runestone (69 page)

Bright Sky laughed. “Kookooskoos is clever!” he noted.

“Yes,” answered Dove, “but not too clever. He was caught outside in daylight, when he should have been in his lodge!”

Nils smiled, pleased that their son was observant and that he was learning. What a wonderful teacher he had in Dove. Nils’s heart reached out to her, and he longed to hold her. In many ways, this canoe travel was frustrating. To be this close to the woman he loved, almost close enough to touch, for long periods of time, but unable to do so … He wondered if he could be so attracted to any other woman, ever.
Had
he ever been? He thought not. There was Ingrid, the blue-eyed goddess at Straumfjord. She had certainly impressed him at the time, but how fortunate that nothing had worked out with
her! In the wisdom of hindsight, he realized that a woman like Ingrid meant only trouble. She was seeking merely a way home, and would probably have slept with anyone who was able to accomplish that. Once more, he felt sorrow for Olaf the cooper, her miserable hardworking husband. But once home, what would she want next, and who could gain it for her, with the implied reward? Ah, he had been lucky to avoid her trap. He wondered whether she had snared someone. Probably, for she had been ready, willing, and certainly well equipped for the task. Ah, what a face and body!

I must stop such thoughts
, he told himself. Maybe the inactivity was a part of the problem. A person becomes bored and his mind wanders.

Such thoughts were interrupted by Odin in the other canoe. He drew out into slower water and let Nils drift alongside.

“My legs are stiff,” he called. “Shall we stop on that sandbar ahead?”

“It is good!” Nils called back, guiding his own canoe out of the main current. It would be a relief to stretch his legs. Sky, too, would benefit from a chance to run a little.

The two canoes nosed into the bar side by side. Snake and Dove jumped out and steadied them while the others stepped forward and onto the sandy strip.

“Ah, it feels good to stand up!” said Dove. “It is good, my brother.”

Odin was glancing at the sun. “It is a little past midday,” he noted. “Let us build a fire, eat a little.”

The fire, while not needed for warmth or cooking, was a way to establish their presence.
Here I camp
. It would help to appease whatever spirits might inhabit the place. Bits of food would be offered through the fire, and maybe a pinch of tobacco. One could not be too careful. …

N
ils lay awake, snuggled in the sleeping robes on a sandbar on the east bank of the Big River, Beside him, Calling Dove’s soft regular breathing told of restful sleep. He could clearly see the still forms of the others, around the coals of the dying fire.

He was unable to sleep. The moon was full, and was silvering the whole world with its soft light.
What is it about such a night?
he wondered. He had experienced such a feeling before, on calm moonlit nights at sea, or on the fjords at home. Something about the full of the moon, maybe. It was a time of excitement, of restlessness that he could not explain. It was as if he did not want to sleep, because something might happen in the magic of the moonlight. Something that would be so wonderful that it would open to him all the mysteries of the universe.

He wanted to shout, to howl at the moon, like his brother the wolf, heard in the far distance across the river. A band of coyotes answered from nearer their camp, the chuckling chortle that made two or three sound like a dozen. Odin would have been amused had he been awake, Nils knew. It was Odin who never let him forget the bizarre event, the berserk when Nils had earned his name, White Wolf. The one-eyed Skraeling, now his closest friend in the world, had teased him gently ever since about his affinity for the wolves.

“Your brother, the wolf,” Odin always said, when the spine-chilling song floated across the mountains and valleys. And Nils always felt that although Odin said this in mild amusement, he was quite serious. There had been a bond of spirit, somehow, since that day. It was an ethereal thing. There were times when Nils had observed Odin telling other
tribes they met about the incident. He knew that Odin’s main purpose was to impress the strangers with the power of the People’s holy men. But there were times when he thought that Odin actually believed his own story, that the light-haired Norseman
had
changed into a white wolf.

Sometimes he even wondered himself. Something
had
happened, that fateful day when death had come so near. It was mildly disturbing that he still had no memory of it. Odin always told him not to worry about it, or to try to understand it.

“Some things are not meant to be understood,” Odin had told him. “Just enjoy the results!”

Maybe it was like the night of a full moon, he now pondered as he watched the still yet exciting night around him. He remembered the old women back in Stadt talking of someone who was moonstruck, a little bit crazy. He felt that way tonight, but it was a wonderful, thrilling sort of craziness that made him feel he could do anything. He felt that way now. He rolled over and sat up, careful not to disturb the sleeping Dove. He wanted to see better, to experience this night. The moon was setting in the west, turning from silver to flame as it neared the dark treetops across the river. Its reflection fell across the water in a sort of pathway that seemed sprinkled with magic. The ripples in the water’s surface distorted the image so that it shimmered and danced, yet remained there, stretching all the way across the river to end at the sandbar under his feet. He had the strange feeling that he could set his steps on that silvery trail and walk across, clear over the river and up, over the dark trees on the other side, up and into the moon itself.

He almost decided to try it, but it was only a passing thought. He shook his head to clear it. Was he going crazy? Moonstruck, whatever that might mean? Or, in this strange land, so different from the land of his youth, did the moon affect people differently? He looked at the still forms around him, all resting peacefully. But he was the only Norseman here.
Does the moon here affect only Norsemen?
he wondered in his flight of fancy. But there lay young Bright Sky, sleeping peacefully beyond his mother. Sky was half Norseman, yet seemed unaffected.

Odin’s words came back to him.
Do not try to understand
…
just enjoy…
.

Maybe that was the answer. Nils had been raised to learn and understand the latest in Norse achievements as their ships probed the seas around Europe and the North Sea. He felt a need to understand everything he saw or did. The People, on the other hand, seemed to have a feel for things of the spirit. Not to understand, but only to enjoy. He envied Odin sometimes his ability to listen and enjoy stories of other tribes they visited, without wondering which story was right. Nils’s Christian teachers would probably have been scandalized by his own tolerance of others’ legendry. But his grandfather would have understood. Maybe that was what his grandfather had tried to give him, with all the tales of the Norse gods and goddesses. He had not fully understood at the time Grandfather’s reluctance to take the new Christianity too seriously. Now … yes, that must be it. … Grandfather was afraid that it would thwart the imagination. If only one story can be true, all other versions are lost. He was aware that his parents’ generation quietly disapproved of Grandfather’s stories, but was only now beginning to understand why. His grandfather had given him a rich legacy, which had stood him well in learning to live with the People.

“Thank you, Grandfather,” he whispered to the setting moon. He did not understand exactly why, only that he did not need to understand.

The moon was lower now, partly hidden by the trees. The silvery pathway had turned reddish and was now breaking up in dull rusty fragments as the moon disappeared. The gray-yellow of dawn was paling the eastern sky, and the day was coming, and it was good.

He looked again at the river, and it murmured gently to him. A fish jumped beyond a log that lay partly on shore downstream, and he heard the splash of a beaver from another area. The coyotes were silent now, ready to turn the world over to the creatures of the day. An owl passed soundlessly overhead, a ghostly form on soft-spread wings.

The river … his dream … He had not even thought about it for some time. Travel was going well, the weather had been good, and he had not dreamed at all. Could it be that,
having been warned, he was now to receive no more warnings? What a strange thought! He must be thinking more like the People,
expecting
spiritual help, or mystical information. He was sure that the priest would have disapproved, and muttered about demons. The priests seemed to worry a lot about demons.

But the river, and the dream. No one had mentioned the danger that old Broken Tail had warned about, since this voyage began. Nils had not thought of it, because he had not dreamed.
Should
they be worried? Or, at least, concerned?

As he was thinking these thoughts, Dove stirred behind him and sat up sleepily.

“You are awake,” she said.

“Yes,” he told her, “I was watching the moon.”

“But it is gone,” she said, puzzled.

“Yes. Just now.” He wished that he had wakened her to share the beauty of the night. He was afraid, though, that she might not have appreciated what he felt if she had been wakened from a sound sleep to experience it.

He wondered something else, now. At the time that Odin had talked to Broken Tail about the dream, Dove’s reaction had been strange. She had acknowledged that the dream meant danger. Yet she had been eager for the trip, and had not mentioned it again. Was he missing something here?

“Dove,” he began, “you remember my dream of the river?”

“Yes! You had it again?” She seemed concerned.

“No. I have
not
, and that is strange, too. But you said something. … Broken Tail warned of danger, but not to me, or to the dreamer. You remember Odin told him.”

“Yes,” she smiled. “That was clever of you and my brother.”

“It was his idea. It
did
lead to questions. Danger … to
whom?
Not to the one with the dream, we thought.”

“I remember.”

“But Dove, we have not spoken of this since, you and I. Are you not worried about the danger?”

“I had not thought about it,” she pondered.

Why not?
He wanted to shout.
You have been warned, but are not worried?
He decided to try another approach.

“Dove,” he said, “I wonder who is in danger. I dreamed the dream that Broken Tail heard, and he said the danger was not to me. Odin does not believe he is the one. Maybe it is you, maybe our son …”

Dove was quiet for a little while, and then answered, slowly and thoughtfully.

“My husband,” she began, “I know that you are a great holy man.”

“No,” he protested, “that—”

She waved aside his protest. “I understand that a holy man must be humble about it, even deny it, as you do. That is part of your gift, Wolf. And holy men among your people are probably different, too.”

Yes
, he thought,
you have no idea
.

“Now,” she went on, “think about this dream, and of any holy man trying to tell you of it, and of our journey.”

“What do you mean?”

“Remember when you told me of this, and we agreed that any journey has danger?”

“Yes, but—”

“It would be foolish for a holy man
not
to mention it. If someone is hurt or killed, the holy man should have warned him. He would lose the respect of others if he did not warn. So a holy man always says that, no? If nobody is killed or dies, it is forgotten. Maybe he is even praised for stopping it!”

Nils began to understand. It was a clever approach, and even more clever of Dove to have reasoned it out. But a question or two remained.

“Dove,” he persisted, “there is something else. Broken Tail warned of danger, not to the dreamer, not to me or maybe to Odin, but to someone else. How is this known?”

She smiled quizzically. “Let us think about that, Wolf. First, I do not know the ways of holy men, as you do. Maybe Broken Tail has a way to tell. But think about it. If you were explaining a dream, would you tell anyone, especially the party’s leaders, that they will die?”

He was silent, thinking hard, and Dove continued.

“Of course not. It would hurt the party’s success. But you
would
warn of death, in case someone is killed. If they are not,
the party is a success because it was avoided. If they
are
killed, the holy man has said so.”

“But what if the leader is killed?”

“Ah, then the holy man has warned of it, but did not clearly see
who
. Or, something else interfered. The holy man is still right.”

“You mean, Dove, that your holy men
have
no real powers?”

Her eyes widened in astonishment and alarm. “Oh, of course not, Wolf. Where did you get such an idea? Of course they have gifts of sight, and powers to make things happen and to tell what will happen. But they must also know how to explain, how to tell others. Is it not so with your holy men?”