Robert Low - Crowbone

‘This ship it was,’ Hoskuld said wistfully. ‘The year before Eirik was thrown out of Jorvik and died in an ambush set by Osulf, who went on to rule all Northumbria.’

What was that — twenty-five years ago and more? Crowbone looked at Hoskuld and while the gulls in his head screeched and whirled their messages and ideas, his face stayed grim and secret as a hidden skerry.

‘Svein Kolbeinsson was taken at the place where Eirik of Jorvik died, but after some time he escaped thralldom and fled to Mann. It seems he turned his back on Asgard since the gods turned their backs on him, so he became a monk of the Christ in the hills of Mann around Holmtun, in the north of the island. He died recently, but before he did, he told this monk Drostan a secret, to be shared only with the kin of the Yngling line.’

The words spilled from Hoskuld like a stream over rocks, yet the last of it clamped his lips shut as he realised what he had said. Crowbone nodded slowly as the sense of it crept like honey into his head.

‘Instead, you went to Dyfflin,’ Crowbone said softly.

Hoskuld licked his cracking lips and nodded.

‘At Drostan’s request,’ he murmured hesitantly.

‘You are no fool, Hoskuld Trader, you got the secret from this monk Drostan, you know what he has to tell me.’

‘Only what it is,’ he managed, in a husked whisper. ‘Odin’s Daughter. Not where it lies, though.’

‘Eirik’s axe, Odin’s Daughter itself, still in the world and a monk has the where of it in his head,’ Crowbone said.

Now it was the turn of the Oathsworn to shift, seeing the bright prize of Eirik’s Bloodaxe, the mark of a true scion of the Yngling line — a banner to gather men under. That and the magic in it made it worth more than if it were made of gold.

‘Olaf Irish-Shoes, Jarl-King in Dyfflin?’ Crowbone mused, bouncing the axe in his fingers. ‘Well, he is old, but he is still a northman and no man hated Eirik Bloodaxe more than he — did they not chase each other off the Jorvik High Seat?’

Hoskuld bobbed his head briefly in agreement and those who knew the tale nodded confirmation at each other; Eirik had been ousted from Jorvik once and Olaf Irish-Shoes at least twice. Gorm muttered and shot arrowed scowls at his captain.

‘Well,’ said Crowbone. ‘You took the news to Irish-Shoes, then Orkney.’ Crowbone’s voice was all dark and murder now. ‘Not to Thorfinn, I am thinking.’

‘Thorfinn died,’ Gorm blurted. ‘His sons rule together there now — Arnfinn, Havard, Ljot and Hlodir.’

‘There is only one ruler on Orkney,’ Crowbone spat. ‘Still alive is she, the Witch?’

Hoskuld answered only with a choking sound in his throat; Gunnhild, Eirik’s queen, the Witch Mother of Kings. The tales of her were suddenly fresh as new blood in Hoskuld’s head: she it was who had sent her sons to kill Crowbone’s father then scour the world for the son and his mother. Now the hunted son stood in front of him with an axe in his hand and a single brow fretted above his cold, odd eyes. Hoskuld cursed himself for having forgotten that.

‘Arnfinn is married to her daughter,’ he muttered.

Crowbone hefted the little axe, as if balancing it for a blow.

‘So,’ he said. ‘You took the news to Olaf Irish-Shoes, who was always Eirik’s rival — did you get paid before you fled? Then you took it to Gunnhild, the Witch, who was Eirik’s wife. You had to flee from there, too — and for the same reason. Did you ken it out at that point, Hoskuld Trader? That what you knew was more deadly than valuable?’

He stared at Hoskuld and the axe twitched slightly.

‘You are doomed,’ Crowbone declared, grim as lichened rock. ‘You are as doomed as this Drostan, whom you doubtless betrayed for profit. Olaf will want your mouth sealed and so will the Orkney Witch. Where is Drostan? Have you killed him?’

Hoskuld’s brows clapped together like double gates.

‘Indeed no, I did not. Him it was who asked to go to all these places, then finally to Borg in the Alban north, where we left him to come to find Jarl Orm, as he asked.’

He tried to keep the glare but the strange, odd-eyed stare of the youth made him blink. He waved his hands, as if trying to swat the feel of those eyes off his face.

‘The monk lives — why would I kill him, then bother to come and find Orm — and you?’

‘Betrayal,’ Crowbone muttered. He leaned a little towards Hoskuld’s pale face. ‘Is that what this is? An enemy who wants me dead, or worse? Why sail to Mann if the monk is at Borg?’

‘He left something with the monks on Mann,’ Hoskuld admitted. ‘A writing.’

Crowbone asked and Hoskuld told him.

‘A message. I was to pick it up on the return and take it to Orm.’

To Orm? Crowbone closed one thoughtful eye. ‘And you delivered it?’

Hoskuld nodded.

‘You know what this message spoke?’ he asked and watched Hoskuld closely.

The trader shook his head, more sullen than afraid now.

‘I was to tell you of it,’ he replied bitterly, ‘when you asked why we were headed for Mann at all.’

Crowbone did not show his annoyance in his face. It was a hard truth he did not care to dwell on, that he had simply thought Mann was where Hoskuld wanted to go with his strange cargo. Either he was paid more after that, or Crowbone found a ship of his own was what the young Prince of Norway had assumed.

Now he knew — a message had been left by this Drostan, in Latin which Hoskuld did not read — he knew runes and tallied on a notched stick well enough, so he could carry it to Orm and not know the content.

And the thought slid into him like a grue of ice — there was a trap to lure him to Mann.

He said so and saw Hoskuld’s scorn.

‘Why would Orm set you at a trap?’ he scathed. ‘He knows the way of monks. They would not have written this message to Orm only once.’

That was a truth Crowbone had to admit — monks, he knew, would copy it into their own annals and if he went to Mann he would find it simply by saying Orm’s name and asking with a silver offering attached. For all that, he wanted to bury the blade in the gape-mouthed face of the trader, but the surge of it, which raised his arm, was damped by a thought of what Orm might have to say. He had fretted Orm enough this year, he decided — yet the effort not to strike burst sweat on him. In the end, the lowering of his arm came more from the nagging to know what this writing held than any desire to appease Orm.

‘Get me to Mann, trader,’ he managed to harsh out. ‘I may yet feed you to the fish if it takes too long a sailing — or if I find this message or you plays me false.’

‘We are sailing nowhere,’ Onund interrupted with an annoyed grunt, bent over the steering oar so that his hunched shoulder reared up like an island. ‘We are drifting until this is lashed. Fetch what line you have — I can get us to land safely and then we will need to find decent leather.’

‘I would hurry, hunchback,’ said Halk the Orkneyman, staring out towards the distant land. ‘It would seem the sharks have found their cod.’

He pointed, leading everyone’s eyes to the faint line, marked with little white splashes where oars dug, which grew steadily larger.

‘It is all of us who are doomed,’ Gorm hissed, his eyes wide, then jumped as Kaetilmund clapped him on the back.

‘Ach, you fret too much,’ he said.

Gorm saw the Oathsworn moving more swiftly than he had seen them shift since they had come aboard. Sea-chests were opened, ringmail unrolled from sheepskins, domed helmets brought out, oiled against the sea-rot and plumed with splendid horsehair.

‘Our turn to do the work,’ Murrough macMael grunted and hefted his long axe, grinning. ‘You can join in if you like, or just watch.’