The Extremely Epic Viking Tale of Yondersaay (9 page)

Dani leaned over to Ruairi, who was a little distressed at this news, and whispered, “I still think he’ll see her again.”

“Well, as it happens,” said Granny, sighing, “the next day King Dudo was feeling much stronger and decided to go for a walk outside. He wanted to have a look around the island. He came out of the dwelling place into the light of the morning, and who should he see but a red-haired, blue-eyed, pale-skinned woman!”

“
I knew it
!” Dani shouted, and both Dani and Ruairi leaped up onto their bakery chairs, which were surprisingly bouncy, and started jumping up and down shouting and screaming,

“Yay! He’s found his Heart’s True Love!” Ruairi shouted.

“ He’s found his Heart’s True Love! We knew he would. We knew he would,” Dani echoed.

Mum shushed them.

Granny ignored them and continued with her story. “Dudo was frozen to the spot. He stared at the woman. She was carrying an empty pail toward the dwelling place. She glanced at him as she approached and turned away again as though she hadn’t even noticed him. She walked straight past, an inch from him, and into the dwelling place and out of his sight.”

“Oh,” said Dani, and stopped jumping.

“It’s her twin sister!” Ruairi said and sat down on the chair. “Her
evil
twin sister.” He narrowed his eyes.

Granny went on. “She came back out of the dwelling. This time her pail was filled with garments. She walked by King Dudo without even looking in his direction, around the back, and out of sight again.

“King Dudo was startled and a little embarrassed. Even if she didn’t have feelings for him, she should at least remember him, no? King Dudo walked in the direction the woman had gone and saw she had walked to a gargling brook at the back of the property. She was up to her knees in the brook, her skirts hitched high and fastened by a ribbon at her waist. She was singing a little tune and washing the garments she had carried there. King Dudo approached the bank of the brook and called out, ‘Well, hello there!’

“The woman looked up at King Dudo, politely smiled, said, ‘hello,’ and went back to her washing.

“The king was bewildered. He really had expected more of a reaction than that. He was King Dudo the Mightily Impressive after all! Lord over all Denmark, the glorious King of all Danes! He was a handsome man and brave and known throughout the world as being Mightily Impressive. Mightily Impressive, I tell you! And brave! He was not used to this sort of reaction from a woman, especially a peasant woman who washes her own clothes. He was used to women blushing coyly when he approached them. They were, as a rule, only too delighted to have the king say such pithy things to them as ‘well, hello there.’ The king was confused and a little bit angry. He turned around and stomped off to find the jarl.

“King Dudo found the jarl at the harbor shooting the breeze with some of the local men. Jarl Olaf greeted him warmly and introduced him to the men. ‘This is Soxolf the Unshod,’ the jarl began.

“‘Very pleased to meet you, Soxolf,’ King Dudo said, holding out his hand to shake. Soxolf folded his arms, stuck out his chin, and turned his head away. The jarl continued introducing the men in quick-fire succession. ‘Bling of Brand Island, Magnan the Generous, Avorage the Ordinary, Thorar the Smoldering, and Pal the Friendly.’

“The men were a surly bunch, except for Pal the Friendly who smiled and waved until Soxolf kicked him in the shin and Avorage poked him in the ribs with his elbow. Dudo noticed Pal was a little unsure of himself. He adopted the posture of the other men—he folded his arms and stuck his nose in the air. All the same, he did glance back at Dudo every now and then and smile at him. Magnan grunted, and Bling spat on the ground near Dudo’s feet.

“The king noticed all this of course and was more than a little put out by it. He was sorely tempted to say ‘Don’t you know who I am?’ and he almost did. The jarl, however, noticing that King Dudo was getting angry, got up and told the king he would take him on a walk and show him the island.

“‘You must understand,’ said the jarl as they walked away. ‘Everyone is frightened that you will try to sack and pillage the island. They think you may be their enemy, and they do not think I should have welcomed you to my home.’

“‘Ah!’ said King Dudo. ‘Now I understand. Thank you, Jarl Olaf.’ They walked on, and Jarl Olaf took King Dudo through the shaded valley of the Crimson Forest, which was filled with bushes and shrubberies and the prettiest little flowers, just like it is now. Back then, of course, there were also thousands and thousands of trees of all kinds.

“As they walked, King Dudo had turned to the jarl a number of times as though he was about to say something.

“‘Do you have a question to ask me, my lord?’ the jarl asked King Dudo. Dudo was at this moment kicking an imaginary stone in front of him and whistling in a most tuneless manner.

“‘No, not a thing, not a thing. Whatever could have given you that impression?’ King Dudo said. ‘But if you insist,’ he continued, ‘I suppose I could come up with some random thing to ask you—nothing important, you understand. Nothing I’ve been thinking about all morning or anything like that.’

“‘I understand, my lord, but yes, please, if you could grasp some random query out of thin air, I would be very happy to try to answer it. I love answering random unimportant questions,’ the jarl said.

“‘Oh, good,’ said the king. ‘Well, in that case, just to please you, you understand, could you tell me …’

“‘Yes?’

“‘Do you know …?’

“‘Yes?’ The jarl waited patiently.

“‘There’s a girl,’ the king said.

“‘A girl?’ the jarl asked, nodding sagely and stifling a grin.

“‘Yes, I was just wondering who she was and if she also might think that I’m a grotesque enemy just out to plunder and pillage.’

“‘We have many beautiful girls here on Yondersaay. I, of course, know every single one of them, as I know all people on my island. We are all one big loving community,’ the jarl said and swirled his arms around in the air to demonstrate this closeness. ‘Describe her for me.’

“‘She has skin the color of polished ivory.’

“‘Pale skin. Yes.’

“‘And eyes reminiscent of bluebells.’

“‘Blue eyes. Yes.’

“‘And hair the strangest color of red I have ever seen. It is the color of a sunset over the oceans of sand, the color the sea goes before a rain, the color—’

“‘Red hai—
No
!’

“‘No?’

“‘No. I know no one like that.’

“‘But—’

“‘Nope. I’m afraid not. Nuh-uh.’

“‘But you just said you knew everyone on the island, that you were just one big loving community.’ The king swirled his arms in the air the way the jarl had done. ‘Besides, you must know her; she was in your house just now.’

“‘Oh,
that
red-haired girl. Oh, yes,’ said Jarl Olaf, looking a little defeated.

“‘Yes?’

“‘Yes. But she’s no one.’

“‘
Really
?’ King Dudo said, narrowing his eyes.

“‘Just a servant girl, a mere peasant,’ the jarl continued. He leaned toward the king and said to him in a low voice, ‘It is widely believed that she has, um, very hairy toes. And she’s not a good sort. And she has smelly knees by all accounts. You are not interested in her. No, no, no. We’ll forget you even saw her. Very hairy toes.’ And Jarl Olaf Barelegs the Balding on Top led King Dudo the Mightily Impressive through the forest to a spot under a taut young oak where a luscious picnic had been laid out in preparation for them.

“‘I wish to introduce you to someone,’ the jarl said to the king as they sat by the picnic. All of a sudden, he heard a voice from above him.

“‘Hello,’ said the voice. King Dudo was startled. He looked up but could see no one. He looked all around—no one. He got up and walked around the tree—no sign of a living person who could have spoken.

“‘I have decided,’ the jarl said, ‘to be utterly forthcoming with you about the island, King Dudo. I think it is right that you should have answers to your questions about Yondersaay’s secrets. It is for this reason that I am introducing you to Rarelief the Splendiferous.’

At that, the jarl looked straight up. King Dudo also looked straight up. Just then, the tree moved forward and down as though taking a bow.

‘I am very pleased to make your acquaintance, Your Kingship.’

“Now,” Granny said, “let’s do the rest of the shopping!” She made to heave herself out of her comfy chair.

“But, Granny, that’s not the end of the story, is it?” Dani said.

“It can’t be,” said Ruairi.

“In truth, it is not the end of the story. But it is getting very late,” Granny struggled onto her feet. “And we still have oodles of shopping to do. I’ll tell you what. If it’s all right with Mum, you can stay up late tonight, and I’ll tell you what happens next.”

Dani sneaked a glance out through the shop’s front window. The coast was clear, so she gave a quick nod to Ruairi. They both turned to their mother.

“We’ll be very good all day,” Ruairi promised.

“Yes, and we’ll help with the dishes,” Dani said.

“And we’ll brush our teeth,” Ruairi added.

“Well it
is
the night before Christmas Eve,” Mum said, and Ruairi could almost see the cogs going around in Mum’s head as she weighed up the dangers of lack of sleep and overexcitement. “Oh, all right then,” she finally said, and Dani and Ruairi gave a cheer.

The three redheads and the one ex-redhead all said good-bye to Lewis MacAvinney, who raised a hand in a shy wave to Mum. Granny shot Mum a sly look, and Dani shot her a worried one, and out they spilled into Yondersaay Village.

Dani came out of the shop first, puffing herself up and doing her best to make sure Ruairi couldn’t be seen behind her. She glanced left, then right, and walked out, falling into step on the outside of Ruairi and just ahead of Granny and Mum.

“I see what you’re doing,” Ruairi said.

“What do you mean?” Dani avoided Ruairi’s eye.

“You were trying to block me out, like a big bodyguard. You do know we’re pretty much exactly the same size.” Ruairi rolled his eyes.

“I’m
much
taller than you,” Dani said.

“I bet if we measured again tonight, I’d be slightly taller than you now.” Ruairi smiled as he spoke.

“Complete rubbish! I am at least one sixteenth of an inch taller than you.”

“You won’t mind if we measure then?” Ruairi raised one eyebrow.

“Fine. But just remember, even if you do end up taller than me one day,” Dani switched into a sing-song voice, “you’ll always be my wickle brother!”

“But only for three hundred and sixty-two days of the year! For the other three, I’ll be the same age as you
and
taller than you!”

“Dream on, little man!” Dani chanted. “Dream on!”

“Anyway …” Ruairi said, coming closer to Dani so Mum and Granny couldn’t hear. “That butcher guy was looking at me funny back there, wasn’t he?”

“Maybe he just needed a loaf of bread, but I highly doubt it. There was nothing stopping him from coming in to get it, and why was he pointing you out to those two others? Besides, he was looking at you in an extremely odd way when we were in his shop too.”

“That’s what I thought. Are you sure? I mean, definitely, totally sure?” Ruairi started to fidget. “They couldn’t possibly have gotten a good look at us last night,” he assured himself.

Dani thought a moment. “Maybe that’s not why he was looking at you like that.”

“Then why?” Ruairi asked.

Granny swung open the door to the greengrocer’s at the bottom of the village. If Dani and Ruairi had been thrilled and delighted with the changes they found in the bakery since they had last been on the island, their reaction was equal and opposite when they walked into the greengrocer’s.

This was the place Dani and Ruairi liked most on the island because of the “Thing” Eoin Lerwick had. They were not quite sure what the “Thing” was, and they knew not to ask for details. Dad had winked at them and put a finger to his lips when he had told them about it years ago, so they knew it was all hush-hush. He had whispered to them that Eoin Lerwick had a “Thing” for Granny Miller.

Every time they went into the shop, Eoin Lerwick would get them whatever sweets they wanted from the rows of jars on the shelves behind the counter and let them play with all the toys. Ruairi’s favorite sweets were the grape gobstoppers that took a week of sucking to get to the purple liquorice in the center. Dani could not be doing with something that took a week to get to the good bit. Her favorites were the lemon sherbets—the sticky ones with the powdery sour center—that you could suck for a bit, or crack in one go if you wanted.

Eoin Lerwick would sit the two of them down and tell them the most amazing stories. They were always terrifying or hilarious, sometimes both. He would often act them out as well. It was lovely to see Granny laughing so hard. They had been best friends growing up and knew each other inside out. Eoin had two pet ravens called Thought and Memory, and he could make them do tricks. He could speak to them, and they understood him. At least that’s what it looked like. They would rest on his shoulders and swoop around the shop like synchronized swimmers in the air, and they would fetch anything Eoin asked them to fetch. Once, in the middle of summer, he asked Thought to fly out, find a snowflake, and bring it back for Granny Miller. Thought was gone a very long time, and they’d all but forgotten about her and were about to leave when in she flew, the tips of her wings covered in snowflakes. She had hovered just above Granny’s head and beat them softly, a tiny blizzard of snowflakes fluttering down onto her upturned face.