John Norman - Marauders of Gor

The Forkbeard freed Aelgifu of her gag.

"It seems," he said, "that last night was not the last night which you will spend in my bondage."

"You took ransom money!" she cried. "You took ransom!"

"I have taken more than ransom money," said he, "my large-breasted beauty."

"Why did you not free me?" she cried.

"I want you," he said. Then he looked at her. "I said only, you might remember," said he, "that I would take your ransom money. Never did I say that I would exchange you for those paltry moneys. Never did I say, my pretty one, that I would permit you, so luscious a wench as you, to escape my fetters."

She struggled, her head turned to one side, her wrists locked behind her in the black iron of the north.

Her ankles were bound. The coffle rope was on her throat. She was miserable.

"Welcome to the coffle," said he.

"I am free," she cried.

"Now," he said.

She shuddered.

"You are too pretty to ransom," he informed her, and turned away. To Gorm, he said, "Feed her on the gruel of bond-maids."

There was a great cheer from the men of Ivar Forkbeard. The serpent turned slowly between the high cliffs, and entered the inlet. Here and there, clinging to the rock, were lichens, and small bushes, and even stunted trees. The water below us was deep and cold.

I felt a breeze from inland, coming to meet the sea.

The oars lifted and fell. The sail fell slack, and rustled, stirred in the gentle wind from inland. Men of Torvaldsland reefed it high to the spar. The rowing song was strong and happy in the lusty throats of the crew of the Forkbeard. The serpent took its way between the cliffs, looming high on each side. Ivar Forkbeard, at the prow, lifted a great, curved bronze horn and blew a blast. I heard it echo among the cliffs. Amidships, crowded together, standing, facing the starboard side of the vessel, were the bond-maids and Aelgifu. She wore still her black velvet. They were in throat coffle; their wrists were fettered before their bodies. They looked upon the new country, harsh, forbidding, which was to be their home.

I heard, perhaps from a pasang away, up the inlet, between the cliffs, the winding of a horn.

Soon, I gathered, we would be at Forkbeard's landfall.

"Put her," said Forkbeard, indicating the slender, blond girl, "at the prow."

She was quickly removed from the coffle and unfettered. Gorm put a rope on her neck and pulled her to the prow. She was held by another crewman, he fastened her at the prow. Her back was bent over it. Her wrists and ankles drawn back, were tied at its sides. She was roped to it, too, at the belly and throat. Again Ivar Forkbeard winded the great bronze horn. In several seconds an answering blast echoed between the cliffs. The oars lifted and dipped. The men sang.

"Hang gold about the ship!" he cried.

Candlesticks and cups were hung on strings from the prow. Plates, with iron nails, were pounded against the mast. Golden hangings were draped like banners at the gunwales. Then the ship turned a bend between the cliffs, and, to my astonishment I saw a dock, of rough logs, covered with adzed boards, and a wide, sloping area of land, of several acres, green, though strewn with boulders, with short grass. There was a log palisade some hundred yards from the dock. High on the cliff, I saw a lookout, a man with a horn. Doubtless it had been he whom we had heard. From his vantage, high on the cliff, on his belly, unseen, he would have been able to see far down the inlet. He stood now and waved the bronze horn in his hand. Forkbeard waved back to him.

I saw four small milk bosk grazing on the short grass. In the distance, above the acres, I could see mountains, snow capped. A flock of verr, herded by a maid with a stick, turned, bleating on the sloping hillside. She shaded her eyes. She was blond; she was barefoot; she wore an ankle-length white kirtle, of white wool, sleeveless, split to her belly. About her neck I could see a dark ring.

Men were now running from the palisade and the fields down to the dock. They were bare-headed, and wore shaggy jackets. Some wore trousers of skin, others tunics of dyed wool. I saw too, fields, fenced with rocks, in the sloping area. In them were growing, small at this season, shafts of Sa-Tarna; too, there would be peas, and beans, cabbages and onions, and patches of the golden sul, capable of surviving at this latitude. I saw small fruit trees, and hives, where honey bees were raised; and there were small sheds, here and there, with sloping roofs of boards; in some such sheds might craftsmen work; in others fish might be dried or butter made. Against one wall of the cliff was a long, low shed; in that the small bosk, and the verr, might be housed in the winter, and there, too, would be stored their feed; another shed, thick, with heavy logs, in the shadow of the cliff, would be the ice house, where ice from the mountains, brought down on sledges to the valley, would be kept, covered with chips of wood.

There were only a few bosk visible, and they were milk bosk. The sheds I saw would accommodate many more animals. I surmised, as is common in Torvaldsland, most of the cattle had been driven higher into the mountains, to graze wild during the summer, to be fetched back to the shed only in the fall, with the coming of winter.

Men in the fields wore short tunics of white wool; some carried hoes; their hair was close cropped; about their throats had been hammered bands of black iron, with a welded ring attached. They did not leave the fields; such a departure, without permission, might mean their death; they were thralls.

I saw people running down the sloping green land, toward the water. Several came from within the palisade. Among them, white kirtled collared, excited, ran bond-maids. These, upon the arrival of their master, are permitted to greet him. The men of the north enjoy the bright eyes, the leaping bodies, the squealing, the greetings of their bond-maids. In the fields I saw an overseer, clad in scarlet, with a gesture of his hand, releasing the thralls. Then, they, too, ran down toward the water.

It would be holiday, I gathered, at the hall of Ivar Forkbeard.

The Forkbeard himself now, from a wooden keg, poured a great tankard of ale, which must have been of the measure of five gallons. Over this he then closed his fist. It was the sign of the hammer, the sign of Thor. The tankard then, with two great bronze handles, was passed from hands to hands among the rowers. The men threw back their heads and, the liquid spilling down their bodies, drank ale. It was the victory ale.

Then the Forkbeard himself drained the remains of the tankard, threw it to the foot of the mast, and then, to my astonishment, leapt from the ship, onto the moving oars. The men sang. The Forkbeard then, to the delight of those on the bank, who cheered him, as the serpent edged into the dock, addressed himself delightedly to the oar-dance of the rover of Torvaldsland. It is not actually a dance, of course, but it is an athletic feat of no little stature requiring a superb eye, fantastic balance and incredible coordination. Ivar Forkbeard, crying out, leaped from moving oar to moving oar, proceeding from the oars nearest the stem on the port side to the stern, then leaping back onto the deck at the stern quarter and leaping again on the oars this time on the starboard side, and proceeding from the oar nearest the stern to that nearest the stem, and then, lifting his arms, he leaped again into the ship, almost thrown into it as the oar lifted. He then stood on the prow, near me, sweating and grinning. I saw cups of ale, on the bank, being lifted to him. Men cheered. I heard the cries of bond-maids.

The serpent of Ivar Forkbeard, gently, slid against the rolls of leather hung at the side of the dock. Eager hands vied on the dock to grasp the mooring ropes. The oars slid inboard; the men hung their shields at the serpent's flanks.