him that when he opened his eyes, the autumn sun, such as it was, was already high in the sky. A weak light seeped in through the gap in his curtains. “I must be ill,” he mumbled. The shift clung to him as he struggled to push off the rough-spun woolen blanket, but eventually he managed to clamber out of bed.
If he moved wrong, his arm hurt like hell. All he had to warm himself with was the thought that he’d turned Sweyn’s scabby recruiter on to that bitch Helga. She could rot for all he cared, and her freak Norseman with her. Or not, as it were . . . He had only wanted to give her some kind of future, free her from scratching a living alone on that big farm. Maybe he could go again in spring, see if the old bird had thawed out some. A rattling cough set him to grimacing in pain.
“Boys!” he shouted. “Why did no one wake me up?”
It was oddly quiet for morning.
He pulled aside the curtain that covered his sleeping alcove and froze. The bodies of three young men lay sprawled on the floor of his chamber, scattered like broken toys, with bloodied hands and torn faces. It hurt to look at them. Words gathered in his mouth, then tumbled out all at once, along with the remains of last night’s dinner. The bile heaved out of him, followed by sobbing gasps for air.
Johan flailed around blindly for a moment, until he found what he was searching for—his ax. Clutching it in his left hand and wincing with every movement, he stepped out into the middle of the room. “Boys!” he shouted, his voice breaking.
Somewhere within the house, something clattered into furniture.
“Who’s there?” he shouted. “Boys!”
The sound of breaking timber grew closer. A fine sprinkle of dust drifted down from above. “It’ll start to snow soon,” Johan Aagard thought. “I must make sure we’re stocked with firewood.”
Something huge crashed through into the next room, and the light changed, as if someone had ripped a hole in the wall. A heavy, almost animal smell filled his nostrils.
Johan gripped his ax as hard as he could. “Come on, then,” he hissed between gritted teeth.
None of the farmhands had wanted to wake Johan up in the morning. Since he fell and broke his arm at Helga’s farm, he’d been even more ornery than usual, and he was always first up anyway. However, when noon came and went without the old man rousing, they drew straws. The youngest of them pulled the shortest one. He inched into the bedchamber.
Johan Aagard lay where he had gone to rest, his face contorted in pain, blood soaking his bed. He had gouged out his eyes with his fingers.
After much discussion they called on the elders at Skaer, who said Johan should be buried in a mound to fit a man of his stature, entombed in his bed so he had somewhere to rest in the afterlife. Besides, he’d clearly cared a lot for his bed, to commission such nice runework.
The farmhands didn’t recognize the runes, but they all agreed that they were very new.
When the day came, all of his neighbors showed up, except one.
“Where’s Helga?” Johan’s foreman asked the town blacksmith.
“It’s the strangest thing,” Skakki said. “We swung by Ovregard, but she’s not there. Must have been raiders or something. The whole place has been burned down—the horse has been stolen, and something’s dug up in the shed. It’s almost as if she never existed.”
From the cover of a stand of trees half a mile away, Helga stood and watched the ceremony, idly playing with a rune-carving knife. Beside her, Streak munched contentedly on some moss.
“You weren’t to know, Johan Aagard,” she said to the wind, “but I have seen a lot worse than you, and I’m still here.” In two swift movements she mounted the protesting Streak and guided the mare north, away from Skaer, her farm, and her former life.
UPPSALA, EAST SWEDEN
LATE NOVEMBER, AD 996
A dull pain behind Ulfar’s eyes blurred his vision. The beams in the roof above his head felt miles away. His backache told him he’d been lying on the ground. Someone had placed him on furs just thick enough to take away the cold of the earth, and blankets had been draped over him, wrapped tight enough to make him uncomfortable and sweaty. His head throbbed and his stomach hurt.