Mark Lawrence - Prince of Fools

They told me I spent the best part of a week insensible. Sleeping twenty-two hours in twenty-four, half-waking to let Tuttugu spoon warm gruel down my throat-some of it down the inside, some down the outside. A quin had to hold each arm when nature called me on infrequent trips to the side, or I’d have pitched in and not have been seen again. We crossed the open sea, then followed the Norsheim coast day upon day, heading north.

“Wake up.” The angel’s only instruction this sunrise.

I opened my eyes. Grey dawn, flapping sailcloth, the cry of gulls. Baraqel silenced. The angel spoke true. I always know what is right. I just don’t do it. “Are we nearly there yet?” I felt better. Almost good.

“Not far.” Tuttugu sitting close by. Others moved about the longship in the dimness.

“Oh.” From behind closed eyelids I tried to imagine terra firma, hoping to stave off a prebreakfast vomit.

“Snorri says you’re good with wounds,” Tuttugu said.

“Christ. This voyage is going to kill me.” I tried to sit and fell off the bench, still weak. “I thought it would be the undead horrors and mad axe-men out on the ice. But no. I’m going to die at sea.”

“Probably for the best.” Tuttugu offered a hand to help me up. “Good clean death.”

I almost took his hand, then snatched mine back. “Oh no. Not falling for that one.” It wouldn’t be long before I couldn’t beat a leper out of my way without curing the bastard. “You don’t look injured.”

Tuttugu buried his fingers in the ginger bush of his beard and scratched furiously, muttering something.

“What?” I asked.

“Brothel rash,” he said.

“Whore pox?” That at least made me smile. “Ha!”

“Snorri said-”

“I ain’t laying on hands down there! I’m a prince of Red March, for God’s sake! Not some travelling apothecary-cum-faith-healer!”

The fat man’s face fell.

“Look,” I said, knowing I’d need all the friends I could make once we hit dry land. “I might not know much about wounds, but whore pox I know far more about than any man ever should. Do you have mustard seed aboard?”

“We might.” Tuttugu furrowed his brow.

“Rock salt? Some black treacle, tanners’ acid, turpentine, string, two needles, very sharp ones, and some ginger. . well, that’s optional, but it helps.”

A slow shake of the head.

“Ah, well, we’ll pick it up in port. I can cook it up to an old family recipe. Apply as a topical paste to the affected regions and you’ll be a new man within six days. Seven tops.”

Tuttugu grinned, which was good, and gave me the Norse punch of friendship, which hurt a lot more than the traditional manly shoulder punch down south, and that was that. At least until he frowned and asked, “And the needles?”

“Well, when I said ‘apply’ what I really meant was ‘smear on a needle and jab in.’ You’ll need more than one as the mixture corrodes them.”

“Oh.” Little remained of Tuttugu’s grin. “And the string’s to hang myself with?”

“To tie the bag on. . Look, I’ll explain the gory details when you’ve got the stuff.”

“Land ho!” One of the quins from the prow, providing a welcome distraction.

My nightmare at sea was all but done.

Mist shrouded Norsheim, offering me only glimpses of wet black cliffs and menacing reefs of rock as we closed the last mile or so to reach the shore. We came in past other Norse vessels plying their trade. Fatter-bodied boats in the main, trailing nets or laden with cargo, but all with northern lines to their construction. We saw other longships too, most of the dozen or so at anchor, one heading out to open sea, red sails already too small to make out the device set upon them.

Coming in closer still, we saw the port of Trond rising from a shoreline of black stone to crowd the lower slopes of mountains that stepped wet-footed from the sea. I had thought Den Hagen looked dour and uninviting, but compared to Trond the port of Den Hagen was a paradise, practically open-legged with welcome. The northmen built their homes of slate and heavy timber, turf-roofed, windows mere slits to defy the slim fingers of the wind that already had filched most of my warmth. Rain started to fall, lacing the wind and stinging like ice where it hit my cheeks.

“And this is summer? How can you tell?”

“Glorious summer!” Snorri spread his arms beside me.

“You can tell because in the winter there are no midges,” said Arne behind me. “Also, the snow is six foot deep.”

“And you could walk to the port from here,” Snorri said.

“I didn’t even know the sea could freeze. .” I went to the side to consider the matter and leaned out between two of the shields the men had fixed there in preparation for our arrival. “At least it would stop it bobbing about all the time.”

We rowed in the last quarter mile, sail down. I say “we.” I provided moral support.

“How is it the Broke-Oar got his name?” I asked, seeing them all bending to their task.

“The first time he went to row a longship.” Quin Ein.

“He must have been fourteen, or fifteen.” Quin Tveir, probably.

“Hauled on the oar so hard he broke it.” Quin Thrir, possibly.

“Didn’t know his own strength, even then.” Fjórir, his arm still scarred.

“Never seen anyone pull an oar that hard.” Fimm, by process of elimination.

“Is he stronger than you, Snorri?” I found the thought unsettling.

Snorri pulled back on his oar, keeping rhythm with the others. “Who can say?” Another stroke. “The Broke-Oar doesn’t know his own strength.” Another stroke. “But I know mine.” And the look he gave me, all ice and fire, made me very glad not to be his enemy.

• • •

At the dockside I was pleasantly surprised to find the North wasn’t all hairy men in animal skins. There were also hairy women in animal skins. And, to be fair, also some townsfolk in cloaks woven from wool, with tweed or linen jackets, trews cross-bound from ankle to thigh as is the fashion in the Thurtans.

We disembarked and I staggered at the unfamiliar feeling of something solid and unmoving beneath my feet. I could have kissed it, but didn’t. Instead I followed on, burdened by my pack, now adorned with tightly bundled winter gear, more to be added soon. Snorri knew the port well and led us up towards a tavern that he held a good opinion of.

Trond, unlike many of the smaller towns and villages along the coast and fjords, wasn’t the fiefdom of some jarl, dominated by his mead-hall and with every arrival noted, taxed, and subject to his approval. Trade ruled in Trond. The port’s external security balanced upon a number of well-financed alliances, and its internal security depended on a militia paid in Empire coin by the collective of merchant lords who governed the place. As such it presented an ideal landing spot and place to resupply. Snorri planned to travel overland to the Uulisk, a journey of two days or so across mountainous terrain. To limp up the fjord on a badly undermanned snekkja would lose the only advantages a small band possesses, namely agility, speed, and surprise. It sounded a sensible plan given that we were determined foolishly to head into trouble, and Snorri even credited me with helping to formulate it during my more lucid moments on the long voyage, though I had no memory of it.

As we’d pulled into harbour I’d made out storm clouds louring across the ranges to the north, lightning deep inside them as if Thor himself were present. Somewhere out there beyond those peaks, Sven Broke-Oar waited for us in the Black Fort, and beyond him the Bitter Ice with its frozen dead, necromancers, and the unborn. My chances to escape had all but slipped away, and our long journey was at last closing on what would likely prove to be a short sharp end.