Troll Blood (4 page)

“I know.” Bjorn grinned suddenly. “That’s why I say he’s crazy!”

Peer nodded.
And that’s why Hilde likes him
, he thought, as a black-edged cloud slipped over the sun. The hills and the shore and the flashing water lost their colors. The jetty he had taken such pride in suddenly seemed a rough-and-ready thing of no interest. He wished he could do something exciting or brave.

How was it that Arnë always managed to do things that would impress Hilde? Of course, it helped that he was tall, strong, and good-looking. And seven years older than Peer: Girls took older men more seriously.
If he’s sailing off to Vinland, I won’t get a word in this evening, then. She’ll be talking to Arnë all night.

The big ship came nudging up to the jetty. Seven or eight men were busy on board, stowing the yard fore and aft, lifting the oars in, collecting their gear. Arnë threw a rope up to Bjorn. “Nice new jetty,” he called, laughing. “Did you build it specially for us? It’s good, this’ll be easier for Astrid.”

“Astrid?”

“The skipper’s wife.”

Everyone stared. Peer got a glimpse of a girl in a blue cloak, huddled under an awning that had been rigged up behind the mast. Arnë climbed onto the jetty and wrung Bjorn’s hand. He clapped Peer on the shoulder and said,”Fancy a voyage to Vinland?” before turning to offer a helping hand to the girl. She was finding it difficult, clutching some kind of pouch or bag. A giant of a fellow with a shock of almost white fair hair tried to boost her up from the ship.

Peer watched scornfully.
Hilde wouldn’t need helping out of a boat. She’d just kilt up her dress and jump out, laughing!

Hilde, Hilde! She teased Peer, bossed him about, and drove him crazy. Last spring, he’d made the mistake of impulsively kissing her, and she’d laughed at him. He hadn’t dared to do it since, except in dreams.

We belong together
, he thought. She’d been his best friend and ally for years, ever since he’d come to Troll Fell as an orphan to work for his two brutal uncles at their dilapidated mill. Peer had helped to save Hilde’s young brother and sister from the trolls, and her family had taken him in and treated him like a son. Hilde was fond of him, Peer knew that. But she kept him at arm’s length.

One day
, he swore to himself,
one day when the time is right, I’ll go to Hilde and ask her… or perhaps I’ll say…

No, I’ll tell her: “We just belong together.”

But would she agree?

“Hey! You!”

Lost in thought, Peer didn’t notice the voice hailing him from the ship.

“You there—Barelegs!”

“Peer!” Einar jogged him in the ribs. “The young lord’s talking to you.”

“What?” Peer woke up. Had he heard what he thought he’d heard?

“He means you,” Einar chortled, pointing. “Anyone else around here with no breeches on?”

Barelegs?
Peer turned around and met the light, cold gaze of a boy his own age—a youth of sixteen or so, wearing a dark checkered traveling cloak wrapped around his shoulders, pinned with a large silver brooch. Because the jetty was higher than the ship, his head was currently at about Peer’s waist level, but this disadvantage didn’t seem to bother him. He tilted up a tanned face as smooth as a girl’s, but wider in the jaw, heavier across the brow. Loose golden hair fell about his shoulders and cascaded in a wind-whipped tangle halfway down his back. But his eyes … they reminded Peer of something. Einar once had a dog with eyes like that, odd milky blue eyes—
wolf eyes
, he’d called them. And the dog was treacherous; you couldn’t get anywhere near it.

The boy snapped his fingers. “Are you deaf? I told you to help my father up onto the jetty. He’s not well.”

He took the elbow of a man standing beside him. This must be the skipper, the famous Gunnar Ingolfsson. He was a
powerful figure, short-legged and barrel-chested, but he did look ill. His face was flushed and glistening. When he glanced up at Peer his eyes were the same pale blue as his son’s, but the rims were slack, and the flesh under them was pouchy and stained. Impatiently he stretched up his hand. Gold arm rings slid back to his elbow.

Peer hesitated, but the boy’s rudeness didn’t seem enough reason to ignore his father. He reached down. Gunnar’s grasp was cold, and slick with sweat. And then Peer saw with a shock that Gunnar’s other hand was gone. The left arm swung short; the wrist was a clumsily cobbled-together stump of puckered flesh with a weeping red core.
One hand, look, only one hand. …
The whisper ran through the crowd as Gunnar dragged on Peer’s arm, trod hard on the ship’s gunwale, and pulled himself onto the jetty with a grunt of effort. He let go of Peer without a word, and turned immediately to join his wife.

The boy sprang up after him. “That’s better, Barelegs,” he said to Peer.

“My name’s not Barelegs,” said Peer, his temper rising.

“No?” The boy’s eyebrows went up, and he glanced deliberately around at the villagers. “Does he actually own a pair of breeches?”

Einar snorted, Gerd giggled, and Einar’s eldest boy made things worse by shouting out, “Yes, he does, and they’re over there!”

There was a burst of laughter. Peer went red.

The boy smiled at Peer. “Now why did you have to take
those trousers off in such a hurry? Were you caught short? Did our big ship scare you that much, Barelegs?”

Peer struck out, completely forgetting the hammer in his hand. The boy twisted like a cat, there was a swirl of cloak and a rasping sound. Something flashed into the air. With a shout, Bjorn grabbed Peer’s arm, forcing it down. He wrenched the hammer away and hurled it onto the beach.

Peer bent over, rubbing his numbed fingers. “I’m s-sorry” he stammered to Bjorn. “I lost my—I wouldn’t have hurt him—”

“No,” said Bjorn in a savage undertone, “you’d have been gutted.” And he nodded at the boy, who stood watching Peer with dancing eyes, holding a long steel sword at a casual slant.

Peer gaped. He’d never actually seen a sword before. Nobody in the village was rich enough to have one. Subtle patterns seemed to play and move on the flat steel surface. The frighteningly sharp edges had been honed to fresh silver.

That could cut my arm off.

At the edges of vision he half saw the crowd: Gerd disapproving; Harald worried; Einar and Snorri, their grins wearing off like old paint; the sailors from the ship edging together, watchful, glancing at their leader, Gunnar; the tall girl, Gunnar’s wife, looking on with cool disdainful eyes, as if nothing surprised her.

Then the boy pushed the sword into its sheath. He tossed his hair back and said in a light, amused way, “He started it.”

“And just who are you?” demanded Bjorn before Peer could reply.

The boy waited for a second as if he expected Bjorn to add, “young master,” and Gunnar interrupted. “He’s my son, Harald Gunnarsson, my firstborn.” His voice was gruff, thick with pride, and Peer saw, without surprise this time, that he too was wearing a sword. “My young lion, eh, Harald?” Affectionately he cuffed the boy’s head with his sound right hand. “I’ll get me other sons one day, perhaps, but none to equal this one. Look at him, pretty as a girl, no wonder they call him ‘Harald Silkenhair.’ But don’t be fooled. See this?” He lifted his left arm to show the missing fist, and turned slowly around, grinning at the villagers. “Seen it? All had a good look?” His voice changed to a snarl. “But the man who did it lost his
head
, and it was my boy here who took it off him.”

There was scattered applause. “A brave lad, to defend his father!”

“A fine young hero. And so handsome, too!” Gerd clasped her red hands.

“‘Bare is back without brother behind,’”
old Thorkell quoted in pompous approval.

“Well said, Granddad.” Gunnar nodded. “And a good son will guard your back as well as any brother. Quick with his sword, and quick with his tongue, too; he can string you a verse together as fast as any of the king’s skalds.”

“A little too quick with his tongue, perhaps,” said Bjorn drily.

Gunnar hesitated. Then he burst out laughing, his red face darkening as he fought for breath. “All right,” he coughed, “all
right. We can’t let the young dogs bark too loudly, can we? Harald—and you … What’s your name—Peer? No more quarreling. Shake hands.”

“Yes, Father,” said Harald, to an appreciative mutter from the villagers. He stepped forward, holding out his hand. Peer eyed him without taking it. His heart beat in his throat, and his mouth was sour with tension as he met Harald’s bright gaze.

Harald grinned unpleasantly. “Hey, come on, Barelegs. Can’t you take a joke?”

Peer nearly burst. He turned his back and shouldered his way along the jetty, leaving Bjorn and the others to deal with the newcomers. Down on the shingle, he hastily pulled on his breeches while Einar’s little boys peeped at him around the posts of the jetty, giggling and whispering, “Barelegs, Barelegs.” He pretended not to hear, but it was the sort of name that stuck. He would never live it down.

Bjorn called to him, “Arnë’s taking Gunnar up to Ralf’s farm. Why don’t you go with them? It’ll be sunset soon anyway.”

“No,” said Peer gruffly. “I’ll be along later. I’ve work to finish here.”

He watched them pick their way across the beach, heading for the path to the village. Gunnar’s young wife, Astrid, clung to his arm, mincing across the pebbles. Probably her shoes were too thin, Peer thought sourly. How would she ever make it up to the farm, a good two miles of rough
track? But perhaps they’d borrow a pony.

He walked slowly back along the jetty, taking his time, unwilling to talk even to Bjorn. The tide was full.
Water Snake
had risen with it.

Against the sky the knob of the dragonhead stood black, like a club or a clenched fist. The angry wooden eyes bulged outward as if likely to explode. The gaping jaws curved together like pincers. An undulating tongue licked forward between them, the damp wood splitting along the grain.

The ship was empty—the crew had all disappeared to the village. Peer glanced about. No one was looking. He quietly jumped on board.

The ship smelled of pinewood and fresh tar. The rope he clutched left a sticky line on his palm. There was decking fore and aft. The waist of the ship was an orderly clutter of crates and barrels: luggage and supplies. A white hen stuck its head out of a wicker crate and clucked gently.

Fancy a trip to Vinland, Peer?

He clambered across the cargo and up the curve of the ship into the stern, where he stood for a moment holding the tiller and gazing out westward. The sun was low over the fjord, laying a bright track on the water: a road studded with glittering cobblestones. It stung his heart and dazzled his eyes.

And Harald Silkenhair, no older than Peer, had traveled that road. Harald had sailed across the world, proved himself in battles, been to places Peer would never see.

He thought of Thorolf’s ship, his father’s ship, the
Long
Serpent
, beached on the shores of Vinland far across the world, and felt a surge of longing. Life was a tangle that tied him to the shore. What would it be like to cut free, shake off the land, and go gliding away into the very heart of the sun? He closed his eyes and tried to imagine he was out at sea.

“What are you doing?” Bjorn looked down at him from the jetty. Peer snatched his hand off the tiller, feeling every kind of fool for being discovered playing at sailing like some little boy.

“Looking at the, oh, the workmanship.” He made an effort. “I don’t think the dragonhead’s as fine as the one my father made. But it’s still good work.”

“Mm,” said Bjorn. After a moment he said, “And what do you make of Harald Troublemaker?”

Their eyes met. Peer said, “He just picked a fight with me. For no reason at all.”

“I know.”

“What was I supposed to do? Stand there and take it? Did you hear what he said to me?”

Bjorn blew out a troubled breath. “Peer, better to take an insult than a sword in your guts. You don’t have to play Harald’s games.”

“How can your brother sail with someone like that?”

Bjorn shook his head. “Arnë can be a bit of a fool sometimes.”

“Let me get off this boat.” Peer climbed over the side and onto the jetty, feeling
Water Snake
balance and adjust as his weight left her.

“Don’t play Harald’s games,” Bjorn repeated.

“I won’t.” Half comforted, Peer straightened and stretched. “You’re right,” he added. What was the point of letting Harald get to him? Let him strut. Let Arnë have his evening with Hilde. Tomorrow they’d both sail away.

CHAPTER 3
“Be Careful What You Wish For…”