The Long Hunt (The Strongbow Saga) (4 page)

"Ase, Ubbe's wife, had been in the byre when Toke and his men had burst in. There was a sickly calf she had been tending to.  Just as Toke and his men were leaving, she came into the longhouse—no doubt she'd heard the women screaming. She ran to where Ubbe was lying in a pool of blood, but he was already gone. She grabbed a spear off the wall and headed out the door, after Toke and his men, screaming, ‘Murderers!'

"Two of Toke's men launched their spears at her as she drew near, and knocked her down. By then I and the few men with me were coming out through the longhouse door, and others of our men were running in from the fields. Ase was already dead by the time we reached her. More spears flew back and forth, from both sides, but no one else was killed. They boarded their ships—Toke and Sigrid were on the
Red Eagle
—backed them away from the shore, raised sail, and were gone."

We held a feast of sorts that night. Enough food for a feast was prepared and served, at any rate. I ordered that two young steers be slaughtered and roasted, to provide a meal of beef such as a king might serve, to feed the chieftains and warriors who had come to help capture Toke. I felt it was the least I could do. They'd come, of course, for Hastein—not for me. I had no illusions about that. But they'd come to help hunt Toke, and for that, I wished to thank them.

Gunhild protested the extravagance, and she was correct—the estate did not have so many cattle that two could lightly be consumed at a single feast. But I boldly told her that these were my lands now, and my cattle—although in truth, my claims were more bluster than words I truly believed. I told her the men here were my guests, that they were mighty chieftains and seasoned warriors, and that they would be fed and honored properly. She glared at me, but did not argue further—perhaps she, too, was not sure where my rights lay—but she gave the necessary orders and began the preparations for the meal.

That evening, when the food was ready, the chieftains—Hastein, Ivar, Bjorn, Hrodgar, Svein, and Stig—all took places at the head table, closest to the long, raised central hearth, as was their due. I had expected Hastein to take his place in the center, as he was the highest ranking among them, so I told the women-folk working at the cook-fires to serve him first, and serve him there. But when he heard what I told the women, he just stood beside the table, staring at me, with an amused look on his face. The rest of the men in the hall stood, too, waiting for Hastein to sit. After a moment, he spoke.

"This is your hall now, is it not? This is your feast. Are you offering me the high seat this night?"

I had told Gunhild these were my lands now. But coming back here, I felt I was still viewed by the folk of this estate as a thrall, or at best a former thrall. How could a slave, even a freed slave, claim such a rich holding? I was Hrorik's bastard, nothing more. Did that make me now the heir to all of his lands?

I felt my face turning red, as Hastein waited for my answer. Had I already made a fool of myself? I searched my memory, trying to recall feasts Hrorik had held in this hall. Had he ever offered the high seat to any guests? I could not remember.

"Yes," I finally said. "I wish you to have the high seat this night."

"Hail, Hastein," Ivar smirked. "In a chieftain's longhouse, such an honor is usually bestowed only upon the king." After a moment, he added, "When it is offered by the chieftain."

If my face had blushed red before, no doubt it was crimson now.

Hastein ignored Ivar and spoke to me, nodding his head. "Then I thank you for the honor you show me. You will, of course, sit here beside me, at my right hand," he added. I appreciated his kindness, as well as the hint, though I would have felt more comfortable slinking away and hiding in a dark corner.

As a feast—the first I had ever hosted, in a longhouse hall I'd had the presumption to claim as my own—the evening was not a success. There was none of the mirth of a feast. No tales were told, no poems recited, no songs sung. The mood in the hall was subdued. The men ate and drank and talked quietly among themselves. After the food was finished, few lingered long at the tables, even though ale was still available. Most retired early to where they would make their beds for the night—either in the ships' tents which had been pitched on the grounds around the longhouse, or on the long wall benches and the floor inside the hall. Eventually, even those at the high table bade me and each other a good night and retired, leaving me alone.

I sat there, in my seat at the high table, late into the night, long after the only sound within the hall was the low rumble of many men snoring. I felt restless and uncomfortable, and knew I could not sleep. For so many months I had dreamed of being able to return here, of coming home, but now that my dream had become real, I found I did not feel at home. This was where I had grown up, the place where I had lived for most of my life. But none of those who had made it a home for me—my mother, Harald, Sigrid, even old Ubbe—were here. They were all gone, and I was changed.

Finally, I arose from the table, stiff and sore from sitting for so long, and stumbled toward the door to relieve the discomfort that had been building in my bladder from the feast-ale I had drunk. Afterward, I wandered aimlessly through the great hall, lit now only by the flickering remnants of the fire burning on the central hearth, until I reached the small, enclosed private sleeping chamber that had once belonged to Hrorik and Gunhild. Toke had apparently taken it over, forcing his mother to move out to a bed-closet. Ironically, she'd taken the one that had been where my mother, Derdriu, had slept, the one Hrorik had given her, a mere thrall, scandalizing the household and enraging Gunhild. I found it somehow fitting that she had ended up there. But now that Toke was gone, no one was using the sleeping chamber. I decided that if I was claiming the longhouse to be mine, I should sleep there.

When I pushed open the door, the sleeping chamber was pitch black inside. I remembered that Hrorik had kept a small clay lamp, filled with seal oil, in a niche just inside, next to the door. Feeling blindly for it in the dark, I discovered that it was still there. Making my way carefully back across the darkened hall, I lit the wick with an ember from the central hearth, then returned to the sleeping chamber, holding the lamp in front of me to light my way.

The furs that once had covered the floor of the chamber had been pulled up and thrown in a heap in one corner, and the earthen floor beneath was now pitted with holes and littered with piles of loose dirt dug from them. Toke must have believed Hrorik or Harald had buried their wealth there. Perhaps they had. I recalled that Harald had spoken of how he, Sigrid, and Gunhild had each taken a share of Hrorik's treasure as their inheritance after his death, though I had never seen it, nor known where it was kept. Had Toke taken Harald's share of Hrorik's treasure, and Sigrid's too, when he had fled?

I tossed several of the largest furs into a heap along one wall, and lay down upon them. I had no desire to sleep in the bed that had once been shared by Hrorik and Gunhild, and more recently in which Toke had slept. I closed my eyes and tried to sleep, but found my thoughts filled with memories, and peopled by the faces and voices of too many who were now dead. Eventually, though, even the ghosts from my past could no longer overcome the exhaustion I felt, and I slept.

I was awakened by a hand tapping me lightly on the shoulder. With difficulty I opened my eyes. It was still dark within the sleeping chamber, but through its open door I could see, out in the main hall, sunlight streaming down through the smoke-hole in the roof. I had slept late into the morning.

"Master Halfdan? The jarl is asking for you."

Fasti was kneeling beside my makeshift bed, watching me anxiously.

"I am not your master, Fasti," I told him, as I sat up.

"But Master Hrorik is dead, and Master Harald, too," he replied. "With Toke gone, are you not now the master?" A look of alarm crossed his face. "Do you not intend to stay? Are you leaving again?"

Fasti asked questions to which I did not know the answers. My imagined homecoming had not included this day. I had thought we would catch and kill Toke here. That was as far into the future as my dreams had ventured. I did not know what to do now, for Toke was gone, he had escaped. And worse, he had taken Sigrid. How would I—how could I—find him now?

"Master Halfdan?"

I shook my head, trying to clear the fog from it. This, too, I had not foreseen. With Sigrid gone, was this estate now mine, and mine alone? If so, then its thralls were now my slaves, my property, and I their master.

"Do not call me that," I said gruffly.

At the tone of my voice, Fasti recoiled as if he feared I might strike him.
You are much changed, Fasti,
I thought.

"What has happened here, Fasti?" I asked. "Since Harald and I sailed for the Limfjord. After we did not return."
You are a thrall,
I thought.
I know what it means to be a slave, for I, too, was one. But you were not so broken then.

He hung his head, but said nothing.

"Fasti?"

"There were beatings. Many of them."

Of course there had been. Neither Hrorik nor Harald had been harsh masters. Though they considered the estate's thralls to be their property, they did not treat them cruelly. A thrall who angered Hrorik or Harald might expect a tongue lashing, but rarely worse. In some ways, the female thralls who worked in the household had it harder, for Gunhild had a hot temper, and would often slap a thrall who angered her, or sometimes even whip her with a switch. My mother had often been the recipient of Gunhild's anger.

But Toke had always been free with his fists, even when he'd still lived on the estate, before Hrorik had disinherited and banished him. I could well imagine how he would have treated the thralls without Hrorik or Harald to intervene. For certain Gunhild would not have stopped him.

"By Toke?" I asked.

Fasti shrugged, then nodded. "He angers easily. And some of his men, too. It took little for them to find fault, or take offense. The big one, with one eye, was almost as cruel as Toke. And after a while…" Fasti paused, as if hesitant to continue.

"After a while?" I asked.

"Even a few of the carls here. Some of them would laugh at the beatings. Some of them joined in."

"Things are changed now, Fasti," I told him. "The one-eyed man is dead.
I
killed him. And Toke will not be coming back here. I will see to it."

Fasti was silent for a long time. Finally he raised his eyes to mine, and spoke again.

"Do you remember Huginn?"

In truth, at first I did not—I did not even understand what Fasti was asking. Huginn was the name of one of the two ravens who serve All-Father Odin. What should I remember about him? But it was plain that Fasti believed the name should have some meaning to me. I searched my memory from the time before I was free, when I was still a thrall, like Fasti.

"Do you mean the chicken? The black one?" I asked.

Fasti nodded, and he smiled.

The chickens roosted in a corner of the byre. Fasti was in charge of caring for all the beasts, and seeing to their needs. Each morning, before he cleaned out the stalls, he would collect the eggs from the hens, and bring them scraps and leavings from the kitchen. When I did not have other duties, I would join him and help him clean the byre.

Whenever Fasti entered the byre, the hens would run up to him, eager for more of the treats he sometimes brought. We would laugh together at the way they competed for the scraps—they loved to steal from each other. It was a rare happy memory from that time, for there is little humor in a thrall's life. And there had been one black hen who grew especially attached to Fasti, and would follow him around the byre as he worked, flying up onto the edges of the stalls and perching there, chattering away at him in her funny voice—
brr, brrr-brrr-brrp
—as if he understood.

"
This is my Huginn, Halfdan,
" Fasti would say. "
She tells me all that has happened in the byre, just as Odin's ravens tell him what is happening across the wide world.
" Sometimes he would pick her up—she was tame enough to allow it—and hold her close to his chest, stroking her breast for a few moments, while murmuring, "
How is my girl today? Did you give me an egg?
"

"I remember her," I told him. Fasti seemed pleased that I did.

"One day I was in the byre, bringing the chickens the scraps from the kitchen. I was kneeling, feeding Huginn out of my hand. I did not know Toke had come into the byre, or that he had been watching, until suddenly he was there, standing over me.

"'The black hen,' he told me, 'Give her to me.'"

"I was frightened. I did not want to anger Toke. Huginn let me pick her up." Fasti closed his eyes and sighed. "I gave her to him. She trusted me."

"You had to," I told him. Fasti continued.

"He held her for a moment, and looked at me. He smiled at me. Then he grabbed one of her wings, and ripped it off of her body.

"Did you know, Halfdan, that chickens can scream? Huginn screamed. I can hear her still."

There were tears streaming down Fasti's cheeks now. He honored the chicken he had loved with his tears. I had not grieved so openly when my mother had died. I felt shamed by his grief.

When he continued, his voice was barely more than a whisper. "He grabbed her head in his fist, and twisted and pulled until he ripped it off her neck. Then he handed her back to me. ‘Pluck this bird,' he told me. ‘I will eat it this night.'"

*   *   *

Ivar and Bjorn were the first to decide to leave. That morning, not long after I'd awakened, they told Hastein they were going.

"My men have been away for months in Frankia," Ivar said. "They have lost many of their comrades. They wish, now, to spend time with own folk, to be in their own homes."

"Do you really intend to carry on with this?" Bjorn asked Hastein.

"I do not like to leave unfinished what I have begun," he responded. It struck me that his answer did not necessarily mean "yes."