Katherine Langrish - Troll Blood

For all my family

Many thanks to:Phil Scott for telling me about the Viking Ship Museum,

the staff of the Viking Ship Museum, Roskilde, Denmark,who showed me how to sail a reconstructed Viking-age ship,

Diane Chisholm of the Mi’kmaq Resource Centre,University of Cape Breton, Nova Scotia,who patiently answered my many enquiries,

Dr Ruth Holmes Whitehead, who kindly read the manuscriptand made many invaluable suggestions concerning Mi’kmaq lore.

As always, any remaining mistakes are my own responsibility.

Cover Page

Title Page Troll Blood Katherine Langrish

Dedication For all my family Many thanks to:Phil Scott for telling me about the Viking Ship Museum, the staff of the Viking Ship Museum, Roskilde, Denmark,who showed me how to sail a reconstructed Viking-age ship, Diane Chisholm of the Mi’kmaq Resource Centre,University of Cape Breton, Nova Scotia,who patiently answered my many enquiries, Dr Ruth Holmes Whitehead, who kindly read the manuscriptand made many invaluable suggestions concerning Mi’kmaq lore. As always, any remaining mistakes are my own responsibility.

Map

CHAPTER 1 Murder in Vinland

CHAPTER 2 Water Snake

CHAPTER 3 “Be careful what you wish for”

CHAPTER 4 The Nis Amuses Itself

CHAPTER 5 The Journey Begins

CHAPTER 6 The Winter Visitor

CHAPTER 7 Ghost Stories

CHAPTER 8 The Nis at Sea

CHAPTER 9 Lost at Sea

CHAPTER 10 Landfall

CHAPTER 11 Spring Stories

CHAPTER 12 Serpent’s Bay

CHAPTER 13 Seidr

CHAPTER 14 Disturbances and Tall Tales

CHAPTER 15 A Walk on the Beach

CHAPTER 16 Single Combat

CHAPTER 17 Losing Peer

CHAPTER 18 “A Son like Harald.”

CHAPTER 19 Down the Dark River

CHAPTER 20 Thorolf the Seafarer

CHAPTER 21 War Dance

CHAPTER 22 The Fight in the House

CHAPTER 23 Death in the Snow

CHAPTER 24 Peace Pipe

The Background to Troll Blood

Glossary

BEYOND THE BOOK

Also by Katherine Langrish:

Copyright

About the Publisher

The Mist Persons are busy, crouching on wave-splashed rocks out in the gulf, blowing chilly whiteness over the sea. Their breath rolls like a tide over the beach and the boggy meadowlands near the river mouth, and flows far up the valley, spreading into the dark woods on either side.

A birch-bark canoe comes whirling down river through the wet fog. Kneeling in the prow, Kwimu braces himself against the cross-piece. He lifts a long pole like a lance, ready to fend off rocks. Each bend, each stretch of rapids comes as a surprise. Even the banks are hard to see.

The canoe bucks. Kwimu feels the river hump its back like an animal. The canoe shoots over the hump and goes arrowing into a narrow gorge, where tall cliffs squeeze the water into a mad downhill dash. Spray splashes in, and Fox, curled against his knees, shakes an irritated head. Fox hates getting wet.

A rock! Kwimu jabs the pole, swaying to keep his balance as the canoe swerves lightly away. It hurtles down a sleek slope and goes shivering and bouncing into roaring white water at the bottom. Again and again Kwimu flicks out the pole, striking here and there, turning the canoe between the rocks. Sometimes a whirlpool catches them, trying to hold them back and pull them down, but Kwimu’s father Sinumkw, kneeling behind him, gives a mighty thrust with his paddle and sends them shooting on.

A bend in the river. More rocks. Kwimu throws back his wet hair, every muscle tense. They dart down, twining into the curve, hugging the base of the cliff where the water is deeper and smoother. It’s cold here; the wet, grainy stone drips, and the mist writhes in weird shapes. There’s a splash and an echo, and it’s not just the paddle. The canoe tilts, veers. Fox springs up, snarling, showing his white teeth and black gums, and for a heartbeat Kwimu sees a thin muddy hand clutch at the prow. A head plastered with wet hair rises from the water. It winks at him with an expression of sullen glee, and ducks under.

Cold with shock, Kwimu flings a wild glance back at his father. But Sinumkw simply shouts, “Look what you’re doing!” And they’re snatched into the next stretch of rapids.

They hurtle into the cross-currents, Sinumkw paddling grimly. Kwimu thrusts and fends with dripping hair and aching arms until the gorge widens, the cliffs drop back, and the canoe spills out into calm water flowing between high banks covered with trees. On either side, the grey-robed forest rises, fading into mist.

Kwimu twists round, panting. “Did you see?” he bursts out. “Did you see the Water Person—the Grabber-from-Beneath?”

Sinumkw frowns, but says calmly, “I saw nothing but the rocks and the rapids.”

“He was there,” Kwimu insists. “And Fox saw him too.”

His father nods. “Maybe. But if you’d taken your eyes off the water for a moment longer, we’d have capsized. So his trick didn’t work. Anyway, well done! That’s the worst stretch over. No more rapids between here and the sea. And we’ll land here, I think.”

He drives his paddle into the water. The canoe pivots towards the shore.

“But I thought we were going all the way down to the sea. Can’t we go on in the canoe? It’s so much quicker than walking,” Kwimu pleads as they lift the canoe out of the water.

“Quicker, yes,” says Sinumkw drily. “Speed isn’t everything. Just look around. Somebody’s been cutting trees.” Kwimu looks up in surprise, and his father is right—the bank is littered with chips of yellow wood, and studded with stumps like broken teeth. Piles of lopped branches lie in the trampled undergrowth.

Sinumkw picks up some scattered chips. “These aren’t fresh. This was done moons ago, before the winter.”

“Who would need so many trees?” Kwimu asks quietly. His scalp prickles.There are Other Persons in the woods. One of them cuts down trees. Sometimes, in lonely parts of the forest, hunters hear the sound of an axe, chopping—and a tree comes crashing down, though no one is visible.

But his father is thinking along more practical lines. “See here. They rolled the trunks into the river and floated them downstream. Who did it? It could be enemies: the Kwetejk, perhaps. What if they’ve built a stockade at the river mouth, in just the spot we want to use?”

“Oh!” Kwimu thinks with a shiver of their fierce rivals from the north-west woods. “What shall we do?”

His father shrugs. “This is why we came, n’kwis, ahead of everyone else, to find the best place for the summer camp, and to look out for danger. Imagine if the whole clan was with us now—grandmothers, babies, cooking gear and all! No. We’ll leave the canoe and come back for it later. We’ll circle into the woods and climb the bluffs above the river. We can look down on the bay from there.” He turns, setting off on a long uphill slant into the forest.

Kwimu follows. The encircling fog fills the woods with secrets. It’s a shape-changer, turning the trees into looming giants that drip and tiptoe and creak and murmur. Anything might lurk there, or stealthily follow them at the edges of sight. But if there was danger, Fox would sense it; Fox would warn them. Reassured by the thought, Kwimu strokes Fox’s cold fur, and hurries after his father.