Viking Gold (32 page)

“But it is, I’m sure of it.
How many large islands can there be off the coast of
Greenland
?”

Redknee shrugged.

“I need to see the book for
myself. We can’t trust Sinead to tell us the truth. For all we know, she might
be lying too. She
is
a Christ-follower.”

“Why should I help you find
your husband? What’s in it for me?”

“I thought you wanted to
reach the Promised Land.”

“I did. Like you, I thought
someone I cared about would be there. But now I see it was a false hope. To be
honest, I wouldn’t care if we turned round and headed for home as soon as the
damage to
Wavedancer’s
hull is fixed.”

Astrid placed her hand on
Redknee’s arm. “You mustn’t do that,” she pleaded. “Don’t you see? We’re so
close to wealth beyond imagining. You think I still love my husband, and in
many ways, I do. But he left me. I don’t know if I can forgive him for that. I
ruled
Reykjavik
on my own for two years. Me – a mere slip of a girl!
I had to use cunning where I lacked strength, and it made me brave. The people
who settle this Promised Land with us will need leaders. It seems to me that
you and I … we would make a good team.”

The torchlight flickered in
the black depths of Astrid’s pupils as she reached up on tiptoe and placed a
kiss, gentle as falling rain, on Redknee’s lips.

Footsteps echoed down the
corridor followed by a loud gasp. Startled, Redknee pulled away. As he did so,
he saw the hem of a green dress disappear round the corner.
Sinead.

Astrid laughed. “Ignore the
slave girl. She means nothing.”

Redknee
stood in the doorway of the main hall. Long tables heaved under bowls of
pickled herring, smoked gull, chicken legs and platters of blackberries and
rosehips. Sinead sat halfway down one of the tables, in the middle of the
throng. She was laughing as she helped herself to the brightly coloured feast.
Silver sat nearby, a bone between his paws. Astrid was right – Sinead was
getting uppity for a slave.

Redknee slammed his hand into
the wall leaving a fist-shaped dent in the packed mud. By Odin’s eye, Astrid
was
right. They’d come so far, turning back when they were likely almost at the
Promised Land would be stupid. Worse still, it would be a waste of so many
lives, his mother’s and uncle’s among them.

You give up – you die.
That’s what his uncle had said. But look where it got
him!

Redknee shook his head.
Damn
, he had to know what the
Codex
actually said before he could
make a decision. There was only one person who could tell him that and he’d
seemingly just blown it with her. Making up his mind, he brushed the mud from
his fist and walked, casually as he could, towards the table in the centre of
the hall.

“So,” he said, his voice
wavering as he slipped onto the bench beside Sinead, “are we still on the right
course for the Promised Land?” Nothing like getting straight to the point.

The merriment disappeared
from her eyes. She popped a blackberry in her mouth and shrugged. “How should I
know?”

Ah. She was going to be
difficult. “Because
you
can read the book,” he said patiently.

“I thought you wanted to go
home now you know Erik isn’t your real father.”

Redknee faltered. “Well, yes,
I did decide that. But, now I’ve thought about it, I realise we’ve come so far,
it would be stupid to turn back.”

“What did
Her Royal
Highness
promise you?”

Redknee inhaled sharply. “If
you mean Astrid, she’s had nothing to do with my change of heart.” He lowered
his voice so the others at the table couldn’t hear him. “You’re the only one
who can read the book and you believe it tells the truth about the Promised
Land. That’s enough for me. But I need to know for certain before I commit the
others to going further. I need you to show me what the book actually
says.” 

“Before
you
commit the
others to going further – how do you know they’ll follow you? Olaf, for one,
seems set on his own plan.”

Redknee hung his head. She
was right. Who was he fooling?

Sinead folded her arms across
her chest. “And you make a poor liar.”

“Come on,” he said, changing
tack. “You know you need me if you want to reach this Promised Land.”

She contemplated him for a
moment. “First I want to know what will happen to Brother Alfred.”

“Because he lied?”

She nodded.

“The others are angry. Especially
Koll. But I doubt he’ll do anything about it, he’s still cut up about Thora.”

Sinead spun round to face
him, eyes alive with excitement. “I’ve been meaning to talk to you about that. I
came looking for you …” her voice trailed off and Redknee realised she was
remembering she’d seen Astrid kiss him.

“Go on,” he said, not wanting
her to ask about it.

“Well, it came back to me
this morning, after we left the fort. When Magnus returned with the herring for
our breakfast, it reminded me who provided the fish for the stew. All the other
ingredients Thora added herself. I saw her do it. But not the fish. It was
given to her fresh.”

“So who gave her the fish?”

“Two people. Olvir gave her a
fresh-caught salmon; Magnus, a brace of herring.”

Redknee looked over to where
Olvir and Magnus were sitting at the end of the table, their faces pink with
laughter and good ale. “You think one of
them
poisoned the stew?” he
asked, with more than a hint of incredulity.

Sinead bit her lower lip.
“Possibly
…”
As she spoke, Astrid crossed the room and sat between Olvir and Magnus.
She whispered something in Magnus’s ear. The steersman laughed and passed her a
plate of food.

Sinead
opened the
Codex
at the page with the unicorn. The gold leaf shone in
the flickering torchlight of the small chamber Thorvald had given them for
sleeping. Redknee took the remains of his mother’s linen square from his tunic
and placed it on the table beside the ivy border. The green trefoil shaped
leaves were identical to the ones circling the unicorn, right down to their
twisting stems and thick, splayed veins.

“I remember Mord talking
about a map. Have you found one?” he asked.

Sinead shook her head. “But
this page is interesting.” She traced the outline of the unicorn with her
finger. Her nails were short, chewed. Ground-in dirt etched the creases at her
knuckles. Redknee was struck by how different her hands looked to Astrid’s
smooth, white ones. Unlike Astrid’s lavender scent, she smelled vaguely of
chicken stock and vegetables; a hearty winter soup rather than a spring
blossom.

“In Christian mythology the
unicorn represents Christ. It’s said only a true maid can tame the unicorn and
entice it to lay its head on her lap.”

“Really?” he asked, unsure
what else to say. He had no experience of maids of any sort, true or otherwise.

“But here I think it relates
to finding what you seek – which in this case would be the Promised Land.”

“The unicorn is a clue?”

“I don’t know. If it is, it’s
not obvious. There’s lots in the text about the places Saint Brendan passed on
his voyage. Look,” she said, turning the page. As she did so, her hand brushed
his. Instinctively he snatched his away and immediately felt awkward without
knowing exactly why.

Seemingly unaware, she
pointed to a section of spidery black writing. “Here it mentions the
Island
of
Sheep
.”

“Read it to me.” His voice
sounded dry, croaky.

She looked hesitant.

“Go on.”

“All right, but I read
slowly.”

“I’ve got plenty of time.”

“So …  well, here it
begins about the sheep –
‘On the fourth day Saint Brendan and his men
reached an island. When they sailed round the island they saw large streams of
water, full of fish, and deep, rocky canyons hiding secret lagoons with water
the colour of newly hewn emeralds. Walking round the island, they found many
flocks of sheep – all of one colour, brown. The sheep were so numerous the
ground could not be seen at all.’”

“That’s the
Sheep
Islands
,”
Redknee said excitedly. “Where Ivar had his farm.”

She nodded. “There’s more.”
She flipped the pages of the
Codex
to about halfway. “Listen to this –
'There
appeared to the monks, through the clouds, a high mountain in the ocean, not
far towards the north.’
”

“The volcano on
Iceland
?”

She continued.
“'T
hen they looked at the island ainead, ally as he could,
towards the table in the centre of the hall.
he mountain spouted flames
up to the ether. The whole thing, from the summit right down to the sea, looked
like one giant pyre’”

“Does it say anything about
Greenland
?”

She turned the page. “It’s
not explicit; this is the closest description I can find:
'A pillar of
crystal appeared to them in the sea. When they tried to see the top of it, they
could not – for it was so high. It was higher than the sky.’
”

“That’s the icebergs off the
coast!”

“I can’t think what else it
could be.” She closed the book. “I think your uncle knew all this. I don’t
think he needed Brother Alfred at all.”

“But how?”

“I don’t know. But if he
didn’t, then the fact we’ve got this far is nothing short of a miracle.”

“What happens next? Are we
nearly there?”

“It seems we might be.” She
reopened the book a few pages from the end.
“
Listen to the description
of the last place they visit:
'They sailed for forty days towards the west—’
”

“Wait – that’s the same
number of years as Moses was in the desert. Do you think it’s significant?”

“I don’t know.”

“Is forty a magic number in
Christianity?”

“I don’t think so. Shall I go
on?”

He nodded. Forty days at sea
still to go! She’d better not tell Olaf.

“
'At the end of the forty
days, a great fog enveloped them. After the space of an hour, a mighty light
shone all around and their boat rested on the shore. On disembarking, they saw
a wide land full of trees bearing fruit as in autumn. They walked for many
days, and still they had not found the end of the land.

“One day they came upon a
great river, too wide to cross. A youth met them, embracing them with great joy
and calling each by name. The youth said: “There lies before you the land you
have been seeking. At its heart lies the White Pine. You have almost reached
it. Beneath it, you will find that for which you have been looking. The jewels
of this land are nothing as compared to that which lies beneath the White Pine.

“Return then, to the land
of your birth, bringing with you the fruit of this land and as many of the
precious stones as your boat can carry. In many years time this land will
become known the world over, when persecution of the Christians shall have
come.’ –
I think that means now,”
Sinead added, “with all the attacks on monasteries by you Northmen.”

“Perhaps – but go on.”

“'The youth continued:
“Just as this land appears to you ripe with fruit, so it shall remain always,
without any shadow of night. For its light is Christ.’
”

Redknee stared at Sinead in
silence; was this why King Hakon thought his leprosy would be cured? If even
half of what she said was true, it was worth sailing a little further west to
find this place. He was about to ask how they found the White Pine once they
landed, when—

“Come on you two lovebirds!”
Redknee looked up to see Koll standing in the doorway. His beard glistened with
wine and meat fat.

“You’re about to miss the
best part of the feast – a whole reindeer cooked in plum juice!”

Redknee edged away from
Sinead slightly. “We’ll be right with you.” Satisfied, Koll stumbled off in the
direction of the main hall.

Sinead closed the book and
put it inside the chest Thorvald said they could use to store their valuables.
Redknee could have sworn he saw a smile playing on her lips, but when she
turned back to him, her face was serious, all hint of humour gone. “Have you
thought any more about what your uncle said before he … before he died?” she
asked gently. 

“No. I’ve been trying not to.”

“Don’t you want to know who
your real father is?”

“Yes … of course. But without
my mother … it’s impossible.”

“We can’t hide down here
forever,” said Koll, spooning clumps of steaming porridge into his mouth.
They’d risen late after the feast and were taking breakfast in the main hall.