The Road To Jerusalem (2 page)

Arnas needed to be repaired and rebuilt. But it lay in the unclaimed borderlands along the edge of the forest; there was a great deal of common land and royal land that could be acquired by trade or purchase. Much could be improved, especially if she moved all her thralls and livestock from Varnhem.

This was not precisely the way the Holy Spirit had expressed the matter when He revealed Himself to her. She had seen a vision that was not altogether clear: a herd of beautiful horses shimmering in many colors like mother-of-pearl. The horses had come running toward her in a meadow covered with flowers. Their manes were white and pure, their tails were raised haughtily, and they moved as playfully and lithely as cats. They were graceful in all their movements, not wild but not free either, since these horses belonged to her. And somewhere behind the gamboling, frisky, unsaddled horses came a young man riding on a silver stallion. It too had a white mane and raised tail. She knew the young man and yet did not. He carried a shield but wore no helmet. She didn’t recognize the coat of arms from any of her own kinsmen or her husband’s; the shield was completely white with a large blood-red cross, nothing more.

The young man reined in his horse right next to her and spoke to her. She heard all the words and understood them, and yet did not grasp their import. But she knew what they meant—she should give God the gift that was now needed most of all in the country where King Sverker ruled: a good place for the monks of Luro to live. And Varnhem was a very good place.

When she came out onto the steps of the cathedral her head cleared with the cold, fresh air. She understood with sudden insight, almost as if the Holy Spirit was still upon her, how she would tell all this to her husband, who was coming toward her in the crowd carrying their cloaks over his arm. She regarded him with a cautious smile, utterly confident. She was fond of him because he was a gentle husband and a considerate father, although not a man to be respected or admired. It was hard to believe he was actually the grandson of a man who was his direct opposite, the powerful jarl Folke the Stout. Magnus was a slender man, and if he hadn’t been wearing foreign clothes he might be taken for anyone in the crowd.

When he came up to Sigrid he bowed and asked her to hold her own cloak while he first swung his large, sky-blue cloak lined with marten fur around him and fastened it under his chin with the silver clasp from Norway. Then he helped her with her cloak and tentatively caressed her brow with his soft hands, which were not the hands of a warrior. He asked her how she had managed to stand for such a long praise-song to the Lord in her blessed state. She replied that it hadn’t been any trouble, because she had brought Sot along to serve as support, and because the Holy Spirit had granted her a revelation. She spoke in the way she did when she wasn’t being serious. He smiled, thinking it was one of her usual jokes, and then looked around for his man who was bringing his sword from the church entryway.

When Magnus swept his sword in under his cloak and began fastening its scabbard, both his elbows jutted out, making him look broad and mighty in a way that she knew he was not. Then he offered Sigrid his arm and they made their way carefully through the crowd, where the most distinguished churchgoers now mixed with the common folk and thralls. In the middle of the marketplace Frankish acrobats were performing, along with a man who spit fire; pipes and fiddles were being played, and muffled drums could be heard over by one of the large ale tents. After a while Sigrid took a deep breath and bluntly told him everything at once.

“Magnus, my dear husband, I hope you’ll take it with manly calm and dignity when you hear what I’ve just done,” she began, taking another deep breath and continuing quickly before he could reply. “I have given my word to King Sverker that I will donate Varnhem to the Cistercian monks of Luro. I can’t take back my word to a king, it’s irreversible. We’re going to meet him tomorrow at the royal estate to have the promise written out and sealed.”

As she expected, he stopped short to give her a searching glance, looking for the smile she always wore when she was teasing him in her own special way. But he soon realized that she was completely serious, and then anger overcame him with such force that he probably would have struck her for the first time if they hadn’t been standing in the midst of kinsmen and enemies and all the common folk.

“Have you lost your wits, woman? If you hadn’t inherited Varnhem you’d still be withering away in the convent. It was only because of Varnhem that we were married at all.”

He managed to control himself and speak in a low voice, but with his teeth firmly clenched.

“Yes, all that is true, my dear husband,” she replied with her eyes lowered chastely. “If I hadn’t inherited Varnhem, your parents would have chosen another wife for you. I would have been a nun by now in that case. But Eskil and the new life I’m carrying under my heart would not have existed without Varnhem.”

Magnus did not reply. Just then Sot approached them with Eskil, who ran to his mother at once and took her hand, chattering excitedly about everything he had seen inside the cathedral.

Magnus lifted his son in his arms and stroked his hair lovingly as he regarded his lawful wife with something other than affection. But then he put the boy down and barked at Sot to take Eskil with her to watch the players; they would join her again soon. Sot took the boy by the hand and led him off whining and protesting.

“But as you also know, my dear husband,” Sigrid resumed quickly, “I wanted Varnhem to be my bridal morning gift, and I had that gift deeded to me under seal, along with little more than the cloak on my back and some gold for my adornment.”

“Yes, that is also true,” replied Magnus sullenly. “But even so, Varnhem is one-third of our common property, a third that you have now taken from Eskil. What I can’t understand is why you would do something like this, even though it is within your right.”

“Let’s stroll over toward the players and not stand here looking as if we might be quarreling with each other, and I’ll explain everything.” She offered him her arm.

Magnus looked around self-consciously, forced a smile, and took her by the arm.

“All right,” she said hesitantly. “Let’s begin with earthly matters, which seem to be filling your head the most right now. I will take all the livestock and thralls with me up to Arnas, of course. Varnhem does have better buildings, but Arnas is something we can rebuild from the ground up, especially now that we’ll have so many more hands to put to work. This way we’ll have a better place to live, particularly in the wintertime. More livestock means more barrels of salted meat and more hides that we can send to Lodose by boat. You want so much to trade with Lodose, and we can easily do so from Arnas in both summer and winter, but it would be difficult from Varnhem.”

Leaning forward, he walked silently by her side, but she could see that he had calmed down and was starting to listen with interest. She knew that they wouldn’t have to argue now. She saw everything as clearly before her as if she had spent a long time planning it all out, although the whole idea was less than an hour old.

More leather hides and barrels of salted meat for Lodose meant more silver, and more silver meant they could buy more seed. More seed meant that more thralls could earn their freedom by breaking new ground, borrowing seed, and paying them back twofold in rye that could be sent to Lodose and exchanged for more silver. And then they could repair the fortifications that Magnus was always worrying about, since Arnas was difficult to defend, especially in the frost of winter. By gathering all their forces at Arnas instead of dividing their efforts between two places, they would soon grow richer and own even more land with all the newly broken ground. They would have a warmer, safer house, and leave a larger inheritance to Eskil than they could have otherwise.

When they had made their way to the front of the crowd, Magnus stood silent and pensive for a long time. Out of breath, Sot appeared with little Eskil in her arms; she held him up in front of her so that people could see from his clothing that she had the right to push through the crowd. Then the boy jumped down and stood in front of his mother, who gently laid her hands on his shoulders, stroked his cheek, and straightened his cap.

The players in front of them were busy building a high tower composed of nothing but people, with a little boy, perhaps only a couple of years older than Eskil, climbing alone to the very top. The people shouted in fear and amazement. Eskil pointed eagerly and said he wanted to be a performer too, which made his father break out in surprisingly hearty laughter. Sigrid glanced at him cautiously and thought that with that laughter the danger had passed.

He noticed her sneaking a glance at him and kept laughing as he bent forward and kissed her on the cheek.

“You are truly a remarkable woman, Sigrid,” he whispered with no anger in his voice. “I’ve thought over what you said, and you’re right about everything. If we gather all our forces at Arnas we
will
grow richer. How could any merchant have a better, more faithful wife than you?”

With downcast eyes she replied at once, softly, that no wife could ever have a kinder, more understanding husband than she did. But then she raised her glance, gazed at him gravely, and admitted that she’d had a vision in the church; all her ideas must have come from the Holy Spirit Himself, even the clever part that had to do with business.

Magnus looked a little cross, as if he didn’t really believe her, almost as if she were making fun of the Holy Spirit. He was much more devout than she was, and they both knew it. Her years in the convent had not softened her in the least.

When the players finished their performance they went off to the ale tent to collect their free ale and the well-turned piece of roast they had earned. Magnus picked up his son and walked with Sigrid at his side, with Sot ten respectful paces behind, and headed for the town gate; on the other side of the fence their wagons and retainers were waiting. On the way Sigrid told him about the vision that she’d had. She also offered her interpretation of the holy message.

It was well known that a difficult childbirth was often followed by another difficult one, and soon it would be time again. But by donating Varnhem she was ensured many prayers of intercession, and by men who were particularly knowledgeable about such prayers. She and the new child would be allowed to live.

More important, of course, was that their united lineages would now grow stronger as the power and wealth of the Arnas estate increased. The only thing she was unsure of was who the young man might be on the silver horse with the thick white mane, its long white tail raised boldly in the air. Probably not the Holy Bridegroom, at any rate. He wouldn’t be likely to appear riding on a frisky stallion and carrying a shield on his arm.

Magnus was intrigued by the conundrum and pondered it a while; he began interrogating her about the size of the horses and the way they moved. Then he protested that such horses probably did not exist, and he wondered what she meant by saying that the shield had a cross of blood on it. In that case it would indeed be a red cross, but how could she know it was blood and not merely red paint?

She replied that she simply knew. The cross was red, and of blood. The shield was all white. She hadn’t seen much of the young man’s clothing because his shield concealed his breast, but he was wearing white garments. White, just like the Cistercians, but he was definitely no monk because he bore the shield of a warrior.

With interest Magnus asked about the shape and size of the shield, but when he found out it was heart-shaped and only big enough to protect the chest, he shook his head in disbelief and explained that he had never seen a shield like that. Shields were either big and round, like those once used when venturing out on Viking raids, or they were long and triangular so that warriors could move easily when gathered in a phalanx. A shield as small as the one she had seen in the vision would be more trouble than protection if anyone tried to use it in battle.

But no ordinary person could expect to understand everything in a revelation. And in the evening they would pray together, grateful that the Mother of God had showed them her kindness and wisdom.

Sigrid sighed, feeling great relief and serenity. Now the worst was over, and all that was left was to cajole the old king so that he wouldn’t pass off her gift as his own. Since the king had grown old, people had begun to worry about the number of daily prayers of intercession offered on his behalf; he had already founded two cloisters to ensure this would be done for him. Everyone knew about this, his friends as well as his enemies.

King Sverker had a ferocious hangover and was in a rage when Sigrid and Magnus entered the great hall of the royal palace. The king now had to settle a good day’s worth of decisions about everything, from how the thieves caught at the market the day before were to be executed—whether they should just be hanged or tortured first—to questions regarding disputes about land and inheritance that could not be resolved at a regular
ting
, the assembly of noblemen.

What made him more cross than the hangover was the day’s news about his next youngest son, the scoundrel, who had deceived him in a deplorable way. His son Johan had left on a plundering raid to the province of Halland in Denmark; that in itself was probably not so dangerous. Young men were liable to do such things if they wanted to gamble with their lives instead of just playing at dice. But Johan had lied about the two women he had abducted and brought home to thralldom, claiming they were foreign women he had kidnapped at random. But now a letter had arrived from the Danish king, unfortunately claiming something quite different, which no one doubted. The two women were the wife of the Danish king’s jarl in Halland and her sister. It was an affront and an outrage, and anyone who was not the son of a king would have been executed at once for such a crime. The king had reprimanded him, of course. But it wasn’t enough to send back the women as blithely as they had been stolen. It was going to cost a great deal of silver, no matter what; in the worst case they might have a war on their hands.