They Came On Viking Ships (4 page)

For a moment the two bodies lay on the grass, the fog sifting about them. Hekja dropped to her knees just as Snarf lifted his head, then struggled to his feet.

‘Is he alright?’ Banna raced from the sheiling, and knelt beside her. ‘Is the wolf really dead?’ Hekja nodded, too out of breath to speak. She ran her fingers over Snarf and he weakly licked her face.

‘I don’t think he’s hurt much,’ she panted finally. ‘His ear is torn. But the wolf…the wolf…’ Her voice choked.

‘He’s a hero,’ someone breathed. It was Reena. Hekja hadn’t noticed the other girls come out of the sheiling.

‘I’ve never known a dog fight a wolf all by itself,’ cried Raina.

‘Come on,’ said Reena decisively. ‘Let’s carry him inside. Janna, you get water to wash his wounds. Banna, we’ll put him on your bed, it’s warmest, and he can have my cloak. Hekja, do you think he’ll eat barley bread, if we sop it first in cream?’

‘Yes,’ said Hekja simply. Beside her Snarf almost smiled.

Raina and Reena skinned the wolf carcass, and hung it to dry over the rafters. The wolf skin would make a fine mat for Hekja’s hearth at home. Snarf ate the wolf meat, and this time the girls didn’t complain about the wolf stink on his breath, even when Janna tripped over the bones.

That night Snarf slept by the door again, but this time it was a place of pride. Snarf was the guardian, the protector from the wolves. And Hekja was the Queen of the Mountain, because he was her dog.

It was hard to tell which one was the proudest. Snarf drank his fill of milk every morning and evening after that, and the girls competed to scratch his ears or tickle his tummy. But Snarf was still Hekja’s dog, and hers was the only voice that he obeyed.

He began to bring some of his catch home now, and basked in the praise. ‘Good dog!’ they called, and, ‘Look what he’s found now!’

‘He’s a better hunter than any of my father’s dogs,’ asserted Reena, and Hekja agreed.

The girls plucked the feathers from the birds he caught to keep for bedding, or skinned the hares or squirrels and hung their skins up to dry for mats or blankets or to be sewn for clothes. But they left the meat for Snarf. There was no wood up on the mountain to cook anything nor any dried peat turfs either, and it was too far for the women to cart turf up the hill. But Hekja gave her ma some of the meat every few days when she came up with barley cakes and fish.

It was in those days that Hekja began to sing again. She’d sung by herself, sometimes, as she and Snarf watched the cows. The song floated up along the cliffs
until the eagles heard it, then drifted with the wind. But this was the first time she had sung when the other girls could hear it.

They were changing the cloths on the fresh cheeses. The cloths had to be washed after each new lot of cheese had been taken down the mountain, or the next lot of cheese might sour. The girls sat on the grass in the sunlight, and scrubbed the cloths back and forth in the milk buckets—if they washed the cloths in the spring the water would taste of cheese for days. The eagle soared high above them, and Snarf snored, and farted squirrel smells that no one now objected to.

Then Hekja began to sing.

This wasn’t one of her father’s songs, or one of the women’s songs about grinding the barley, or bringing home the cows. This was a song that came to her with the wind, so it almost seemed she only had to open her mouth and the wind would sing the words for her.

‘Mist on the hillside,
Mist on the ground,
The mist hid our cattle,
And swallowed all sound.

‘The wolf he came sneaking,
But Snarfari he growled,
He leapt at the wolf,
In one fearsome bound.

‘And there lay the wolf,
By the valiant hound,
His ear torn and bloody,
The bravest around.’

It was only as the song died away that she realised the girls were all staring at her.

‘I’ve never heard that song before!’ cried Janna.

‘Of course not, stupid,’ said Reena. ‘It was about Snarf. How could anyone have made up a song about Snarf before!’

‘Arf,’ said the valiant hound complacently, draped across Hekja’s lap and full of pride, as though he had understood every word.

‘You really made that up all by yourself?’ cried Raina.

Hekja nodded.

‘I’ve never met anyone who made up songs! Could you make up one about me?’ demanded Reena. ‘And sing it when we go back home?’

‘And one about me?’ added Raina jealously.

‘I’ll try,’ said Hekja.

Every evening after that Hekja would sing a song she’d made up during the day. They were songs about the girls bringing the cattle in from the mountain or about the cheeses hanging from the rafters or the chief’s daughters paddling the butter. Sometimes the girls would sing them too, though none had a voice as high and true as Hekja’s. Each day Snarf grew even bigger, till his feet were the size of hearth cakes almost, and Hekja’s face opened like a flower.

Mid-summer passed. The whole village trooped up the mountain to the sheiling for that—the men loaded with driftwood and burning faggots to light the fire, a whole bull calf to roast, and drinking horns and barrels of barley beer. The other dogs sniffed about, checking where Snarf had marked rocks and trees and walls, but he sat in the sheiling doorway and growled at them. This
was his territory. No other dog was allowed inside the hut, not even his ma.

Hekja sang Snarf’s song that night and everybody cheered. She sat with Bran by the fire, and even if the chief didn’t look pleased he didn’t object, for Hekja had sung a song about him too. It was about the time he took his boat out to search for the boys from the far hut, who had gone missing during a storm, even though the waves were washing in the wind. He found them clinging to their upturned craft and nearly drowned, and brought them safely to shore.

Most people had almost forgotten the day their chief had been a hero. But now the chief would be remembered as long as Hekja’s song was sung.

It was quiet after the mid-summer feast—just the girls and Snarf and the cows. But sometimes a party of hunters passed the sheiling, for now Bran made sure he took the hunt up the path to Hekja as often as he could. The chief would stop to chat to his daughters, and Bran and Hekja would talk together out by the spring, the sort of conversation that is mostly full of blushes and silences and stolen glances at one another then shy looks away.

Sometimes it seemed to Hekja that summer could never end, it was so good.

It was one of those mid-summer days when sea and sky seemed to be as one, each as grey as the other, the rain gusting with the wind. Even from the sheiling the girls could see the waves crash upon the shore and the white caps across the sea.

The cows hung around the sheiling, as they usually did when the weather was bad. It was the most sheltered spot on the mountain, which was why the hut had been built there. On some of the slopes the wind could almost blow a cow away.

The girls lay on their bracken beds with Snarf flopped across Hekja and Banna—he was too big now for one lap alone—while Banna scratched his tummy and Hekja scratched behind his ears. Hekja gazed out at the rain, as the wind lashed the walls and trickles of dirty water seeped through the roof. The women had been up the day before to take back the cheeses and the butter, so there was fresh barley cake to eat, and the chief’s wife had even brought a giant stuffed fish head, boiled in their big iron pot.

The rain eased as the day wore on but the wind still howled, as loud as Snarf when he decided he’d sing too. Reena and Raina shared out the fish head, and gave Snarf
the bones to chew, then Raina squelched out of the sheiling for a call of nature. But she had gone only a few steps when she flew back inside.

‘Ships!’ she yelled, her wet brown hair plastered to her face.

Her sister scrambled to her feet. ‘Where?’

‘Out past the islands!’ cried Raina.

None of the village boats should have been out in weather like this. The girls raced out the door and stared out to sea, their plaits blowing in the wind, and their dresses flattened against their bodies. ‘Look!’ ordered Raina.

Hekja stared at the grey ocean. Yes, there were ships out there, like no ships that she had ever seen. The village boats were round with a short stubby sail. These ships were long, with giant sails, and crowded with people. One even had a horse on board. Some sailors were leaping at the sails and others were bailing. The ships were making straight for the village harbour.

‘Vikings!’ whispered Hekja.

‘How do you know?’ asked Janna tremulously. ‘You’ve never seen a Viking ship!’

‘Who else would they be?’ demanded Hekja impatiently. ‘None of the island boats are as big as that!’

‘But why would Vikings come here?’ whispered Banna. It was as though she was trying to convince herself it wasn’t true. ‘There’s nothing here to steal.’

‘The storm must have blown them off course! Come on! We have to warn the village! They won’t have seen them yet!’

‘No!’ Reena’s voice held real terror. ‘We can’t go down there!’

‘We have to!’

‘You fool! You know what Vikings do to people!’

‘That’s why we have to warn the village!’ cried Hekja.

Reena suddenly sounded like a chief’s daughter. ‘Think!’ she yelled. ‘By the time we got there the Vikings would have landed. At least we’re safe up here. Better that some of our village survives than none at all!’

‘So we should wait up here in safety and let the village die?’ cried Hekja.

‘Better that than kill us all! And here we have the cows and shelter!’

‘No! We have to try!’ Hekja looked around wildly. ‘But you’re right. There is no need to risk all our lives! I’ll go!’ And with that she was flying down the mountain, her face against the wind.

‘Hekja!’ cried Reena.

But Hekja had gone, with Snarf bounding after her.

The path twisted and turned as Hekja ran down the great mountain. Soon she could no longer see the ships, or the village either, just hills and the grey distance of the sky and sea, and the sea eagle peering curiously as it balanced on the wind. Behind her Snarf leapt and pranced, as though he was sure it was a game.

Once Hekja slipped, but was back on her feet before Snarf had time to lick her face. Then he dislodged some rocks so they went crashing down below.

But mostly they just ran.

The path curved past the witch’s hut near the stream. The witch stared as Hekja ran past.

Hekja didn’t even pause. ‘Viking ships!’ she yelled.

‘Girl! Come back here!’ shouted Tikka, but her words were swallowed by the wind. Hekja had gone.

Finally the path curved again. The village was below them. Hekja stopped, and stared, and tried to still her breath. Beside her Snarf flopped down onto his tummy, and whined at the smell of blood.

Reena had been right, Hekja realised. She was too late. No one could help the village now.

Down in the shallows the giant Viking ships bounced on the waves, fat in the middle and long at each end, with smaller boats laden with goods bobbed behind them.

But mostly Hekja saw the men.

Big men, taller than she had ever thought a man could be, with bright hair, that streamed out beneath metal helmets. Bright eyes, in bearded faces, and bright swords too. They strode above the bodies of the villagers. Why do dead people look so much smaller than when they were alive, thought Hekja numbly.

The stench of death was everywhere, a strong sweet smell, overpowering even the smells of fish and salt.

Snarf whimpered again. He had killed a wolf, and hunted game. But even to him this smell seemed wrong.

Someone screamed, far away. Hekja could hear sobbing too, and a faint clang, clanging that she had never heard before.

Suddenly her mind fought free of shock. She had to get to Ma! But if the Vikings saw her they’d have her too. Hekja glanced around, then made for the shelter of a byre. She signalled to Snarf to follow her. He needed no urging, but clung close to her heels.

They slipped from wall to wall, from one hut to the next. They were by the chief’s hut now, and there was the chief’s wife, lying sprawled upon the stones, and Snarf’s mother too. The big dog must have tried to defend her mistress, for there was a great cut across her neck.

Hekja knelt by the chief’s wife and cradled her head in her lap. The women blinked at her, as though it was hard to see. ‘No!’ she whispered. ‘Don’t stay here, child. Run!’

‘Ma?’ whispered Hekja.

The chief’s wife groaned. ‘There is no way you can help her. Get away. Go!’

Snarf whined, and bent to lick the woman’s face. Hekja laid her hand on his head, and whispered, ‘Quiet.’ Her hand was steady, even though her voice was not. She laid the chief’s wife back gently on the stones, and crept back to the shelter of the wall.

They kept on going.

There was another body, Banna’s ma, bloody and white, but at least she was still breathing, although she didn’t move. Another body, not far away—the chief—his body wet with blood. His empty eyes stared at the sea. Three of his men lay about him. They were dead. They had to be dead. No man could live with wounds like that.

Hekja kept her hand on Snarf, to warn him to be quiet. But he didn’t need her warning now.

The clanging sounds were coming from the other side of the hut. Hekja peered around the corner.

‘Bran,’ she whispered. But there was too much noise for Bran to hear her.

Bran held a sword awkwardly in both his hands. It wasn’t his—there was no sword in the whole village, just knives and the chief’s big axe. Bran must have grabbed it from one of the Vikings.

A Viking stood before him, and they banged their swords together. But even to Hekja it was clear that the Viking was playing with the youth, letting him try to hit while the Viking weaved aside and laughed.

Then all at once the Viking seemed to lose his patience. He struck a blow at Bran’s head that sent him down.

Hekja’s pa had sung a song once, about a warrior who died gazing in his loved one’s eyes. But there was no time for Hekja to reach Bran now. He simply lay there, his blood spilling on the ground. Hekja gripped Snarf’s fur so hard that her fingers hurt. But still she made no sound, and neither did the dog.

There was nothing she could do for Bran now.

They crept along the wall, Hekja first, and Snarf following, reluctant. Another woman’s body, and another. They were nearly at Hekja’s hut now, and suddenly before them there was Hekja’s mother, sprawled on her back on the shingle stones, and two men too.

Hekja stared, but the scene wavered in front of her, as though water had washed over it. It was impossible…impossible. How could one person do that to another? Her skin prickled with the horror. Then suddenly her vision cleared, and she ran forward.

Hekja’s ma was white with terror and twisted with pain too. But she saw Hekja, just a glimpse as one man moved. She screamed out, ‘Run!’

That was the last thing she ever said. One of the men—the largest, with a chin like a cod fish and almost no beard at all—plunged his sword into her heart, then pulled it out, all bloody.

Hekja screamed. It was a scream that held all the horror of Bran’s death, of the devastation of her village, of grief and pain. She ran towards her ma’s body and knelt down. Her ma’s eyes stared at the sky and there was a froth of blood from her mouth.

The beardless man grabbed Hekja’s arm, and hauled her up to her feet. He grinned. His teeth were as white as a wolf’s.

‘This one is mine!’ he roared. The words sounded strange, but his meaning was plain.

The other man laughed. He had blood upon his hands and on his face and elsewhere too, but he could still laugh. ‘You’ve had your share, Finnbogi!’ he cried. He pulled Hekja away, so she stumbled against his body and half fell.

‘No such thing!’ the man called Finnbogi cried. For a moment the men glared, as though they were about to fight each other.

Hekja struggled, kicking and trying to bite. The man just laughed, then screamed. Snarf had leapt at him, silent as a spear, and bitten him behind the knee so deeply that his teeth met through the tendons.

The man yelled, letting Hekja go. He turned and grabbed at Snarf, but Snarf had gone, leaping across the shingle. Hekja raced after him, her breath sobbing, her face smeared with tears and her ma’s blood.

Snarf slowed down to let her catch up to him. Behind them the first man was examining his leg. But the man called Finnbogi gave a yell, and galloped after them.

‘What the—?’ A woman stepped out of the chief’s hut. She was a Viking, the first Viking woman Hekja had seen. She wore a dress, finer than any the village women wore, and a cap-like helmet like the men, with bright red hair beneath it. In her arms she held the chief’s best ale horns, carved and inlaid with bronze. They were the only good things in the hut, passed down from chief to chief. But the village had no chief now.

‘Run, Finnbogi!’ the woman called to the man, as though delighted by the chase.

Hekja swerved. She raced past the chief’s hut, then along the track that led to the sheiling. Then suddenly
she veered. That path led to the girls. She couldn’t lead the Vikings there! Reena had been right—the girls were safe, and Hekja had to keep them so.

The man Finnbogi was winded already. He carried his heavy sword and shield, and hadn’t spent the summer racing after cows on mountain slopes like Hekja had. She could hear him gasping, but there was no time to turn to see how close he was. Through the cow field they ran, past the chief’s bull, then over the stone fence. The man lumbered across the fence too, then leant against it, panting.

Hekja risked a glance. He’d given up!

Then someone yelled behind her, ‘You’re past it, Finnbogi! Leave it to those with proper beards!’

Another called, ‘Let me show you how it’s done, Finnbogi!’

The man Finnbogi growled. ‘You see if you can catch her, Leif. She must have feet like falcon’s wings!’

Suddenly another man’s footsteps joined the chase.

‘Go to it, Leif!’ It was the Viking woman, her voice high and clear above the men’s.

Down to the beach they fled and along the shingle. The man Leif’s leather shoes slipped on the wet rocks but Hekja and Snarf’s feet were sure. Around the bay, and up the other side. It seemed to Hekja as though the world had narrowed to her feet pounding on the pebbles, breath tearing at her lungs and the speedy beat of Snarf’s feet at her heels. The cliff reared up before them, with its path of dirt and stones.

The man was gaining now, as he was new to the chase and they were not. Even Snarf was panting, and Hekja’s breath seemed torn from deep within her body.
It was impossible to go any faster up the path—any misstep might mean she slid back down, into the waiting arms of the Viking. But if she had to go slowly, so did he, and she knew this path and he did not.

Up…up…For a moment Snarf’s feet slipped on the loose dirt, but Hekja reached down and hauled him up.

The man was nearly on them. His sword flashed down, just behind Snarf’s tail. But now the girl and dog had made the cliff top. The wind lashed at them, smelling of storm and sea and the distant tang of blood.

Back they ran, towards the village. Hekja tried to think. Which way now? There was one path that might lead them to safety, if only she could make it. It was a hunter’s path from the village, up into the hills. If she and Snarf could get up there they’d be safe, hidden among the cliffs and mountain crags.

Hope gave her strength. Her feet pounded along the path, sure footed as a hare. The man was further behind now. The gap grew bigger as she neared the village. Hekja thudded down the path, towards the chief’s. No time to glance at the bodies either, only time to run, to force her legs to keep on going.

Past the hut…Snarf was in the lead now, for he had four legs to Hekja’s two. Suddenly something slashed across her ankles. Hekja fell forward. Her knees crashed onto the ground, jarring her. Hekja had to scream. But there was only enough breath for a gasp of horror and despair.

Hekja tried to rise. A hard foot held her down. Strong small hands grasped her wrists and tied them roughly.

Hekja struggled to see who held her. Was it the man, Finnbogi, who had killed her mother? Would she suffer
the same fate, the last of her village to be slaughtered? But when Hekja turned it was a woman’s face—the woman she had seen before. One hand held Hekja’s hair, close to her scalp, to stop her trying to run. The other held a sword. It was this that Hekja had stumbled over, held out flat to trip her as she ran.

The man Leif was on them now. He leant over, trying to catch his breath, then looked up and grinned. ‘So you have caught my fish for me, little sister,’ he panted to the woman. He sounded his words strangely, but they were familiar enough for Hekja to understand.

The woman laughed, and let the sword dangle by her skirts. She was young, her hair the same bright colour as the man’s. There were rings on her fingers and a gold band on her arm and brooches on her dress, and a necklace too, with almost enough metal to make a cooking pot.

‘You’re getting soft, Leif. Too much time sitting on your bum while on board the ship. Your legs have forgotten what they’re for.’

The man—Leif—hauled Hekja up roughly by her hair. ‘She’s mine now, at any rate.’

‘She’s not,’ said the woman coolly. ‘I was the one who caught her. I claim her.’

Hekja gazed frantically from one to the other trying to follow their speech. How could she escape? And where was Snarf? Please, she thought, please, Snarf, go to Tikka or the girls. You’ll be safe there. Go, or the Vikings will get you too.

Leif stared at the woman. ‘Are you serious, Freydis? What do you want with another thrall?’ He looked at Hekja contemptuously. ‘She’ll be quite unskilled coming from a poor place like this.’

The woman, Freydis, laughed again. ‘Did you see how fast she ran? She’s a runner, Leif. Faster than your man Hikki.’

‘No one is faster than Hikki,’ said Leif, amused. ‘He was a present from the king himself.’

Freydis shrugged. ‘We will see,’ she said calmly. ‘Will you take the girl to my ship, dear brother, or will I?’

For a moment it looked like Leif would argue. Then he dropped Hekja suddenly, so again she sprawled on the wet ground. ‘Take her,’ he said abruptly, and walked off, down to the shore.

‘Please,’ began Hekja. Surely a woman would be kinder than a man. ‘Please let me go…’

There was a growl behind them. Snarf leapt, as he had leapt at the man Finnbogi and the wolf. His jaws met where the woman’s knees would be, underneath her skirts.

But the cloth got in the way. Snarf reared back, to strike again. But the woman was swifter. She lifted her sword, and struck him hard against his neck.

The dog collapsed.

‘No,’ whispered Hekja. ‘No.’

The woman glanced at her. ‘He was trying to protect you, wasn’t he? That dog has courage.’ She gestured to one of the passing men. ‘Carry him to my ship.’ She looked around the village contemptuously. ‘He’s worth more than anything else in this place.’

‘He’s…not dead?’ stammered Hekja.

The woman looked amused. ‘I used the flat of my sword on him, not the blade. Now, will you walk, or must you be carried too?’

Hekja tried to understand. But the accent was so strong. Her mind was numb with pain and exhaustion. But the word ‘walk’ at least was clear.

‘I’ll walk,’ said Hekja. She had no choice. Snarf had tried to save her. She couldn’t abandon him.

Besides, now he was all she had.

The big ships bounced on the waves far out in the harbour, but there were smaller boats pulled up on the pebbles in the bay. One of the men shoved Hekja roughly into the nearest one. It was already piled with bags of barley, and the iron pot that Hekja recognised as the chief’s.

It took two men to carry Snarf. They flung him into the bottom of the boat, then pushed it out into the waves.

Hekja knelt by Snarf. She wanted to hold his head in her lap, or stroke him, but her hands were bound too tight. She gazed about her. Ships, so many ships, and the shore growing more distant. Tears stung her eyes. She looked down at Snarf instead. Was he moving?