Tim Severin - King's Man

There were no villages along the trail, only an occasional farmhouse set well back from the path. The land was so poor and grudging that these dwellings were no more than small log cabins with roofs of wooden shingles and perhaps a shed or two. I was expecting to encounter the farmers returning home, as it would soon be dusk. But I saw no one. Whenever I passed a house, and that was rare enough, the door was shut tight and nothing stirred. It was as if the plague had struck, and everyone had retreated indoors or died.

The chill in the evening air warned of a cold night to come, and I had already caught a glimpse of a wolf in the forest, so I left the track when I saw the next house and went towards it, intending to ask for shelter for the night. I knocked on the heavy wooden door planks and called out. For a moment there was no response. Then, from deep within the house, a low voice said urgently, 'Go away! You disturb us! Go away!' I was as shocked as if someone had struck me in the face. The country folk had always been hospitable. That was their tradition. They enjoyed hearing a traveller's news and they appreciated the small coins paid for food and lodging. To turn away a stranger on a cold evening seemed unthinkable. I knocked again, more insistently, and called out that I was a traveller, on my own, hungry, and would pay for my lodging. This time I heard the shuffle of feet, and very slowly the door opened, just enough for me to see that the interior of the cabin was in darkness. Someone had covered over the small windows. From the gloom within, a voice said, 'Go away, please leave. This is not the right time to visit us.'

Something about the atmosphere of the place made me say, 'In the name of Odinn the Roadwise I ask for shelter.'

There was a long pause, and then the door pulled back a hand's breadth and the voice asked softly, 'Tell me, stranger, what is the name of the steed who westward draws night over the glorious Gods?'

The accent was local and strong, but the rhythm of the words was unmistakable. The man, whoever he was, was reciting lines of poetry. Long ago my tutors in the Old Ways had taught me the next verse, so I answered:

'Hrimfaxi's his name who draws the nights

Over the glorious gods

Each morning he dribbles down the flakes of foam

That brings dew upon the dales.'

The heavy door eased back, just wide enough to allow me to step inside, and the moment I had entered, it was closed behind me. I found myself in total darkness.

A hand took my wrist, and I felt myself carefully guided forward. Then the pressure of the hand indicated that I was to stop where I stood. I felt something touch the back of my knees, and knew that someone had placed a stool behind me. I sat down quietly. Not a word had been said, and still I could see only blackness.

There, were people in the room: not many of them, though I could sense their presence. The floor beneath my boots was plain beaten earth. This was a humble home. I heard the rusde of clothing, light breathing. Then a point of dull red appeared a few feet away, close to the ground. Someone had uncovered an ember. I guessed that it lay in the family hearth. The glow vanished as a shadow moved between me and the fireplace. There was the sound of a person blowing gently on the ember, and then the shadow moved aside and I could see the hearth again. Now there was a small dance of flame in the fireplace, which gave just enough light for me to make out that there were half a dozen people in the room, three adults and three children, all dressed in the plain dun and brown garments of farming people. It was difficult to distinguish whether the children were girls or boys, but the adults were two women and a man. I guessed he was the person who had brought me into the house.

One of the women was moving towards the fireplace. She placed something on the ground in front of the hearth. It was a small bowl. She tilted a jug and I heard the splash of liquid. I sat completely still. Now I knew what was happening. This was the alfablot, the household's annual sacrifice to honour the spirits which live in every home. As landvaettir, they also exist among the trees and rocks and underground. They are the spirits of place, the ancient inhabitants who were there before men came, and they will be there long after men have gone. Their approval helps men prosper, their hostility brings ruin.

There were soft footfalls as the woman moved away from the fire, and her dark shape moved around the room, pausing in each corner. She held something. I guessed it was a small offering of food for the alfar.

I felt a nudge on my fingers. It was the rough crust of a hunk of bread. Then I was passed a wooden cup of beer. I tasted the bread. It was peasant's rye bread, coarse but wholesome. The beer was thin and watery. I ate and drank, taking care to move gently and carefully. Alfar are easily frightened away. I left a few dregs of beer in the cup, leaned forward when I had finished, and tipped the last few drops on the earthen floor. I knew that my offering had been observed by my hosts.

Not a word had been said from the moment that I had entered the house, and I knew that, out of respect for the spirits, all would be silent until daylight came. When the family completed their offerings, they retired to their communal bed, a wooden box against one wall, like a large manger. I wrapped myself in my travelling cloak and quietly lay down on the floor to sleep.

'WE ARE ALL pagans here,' were the first words of the farmer next morning. He spoke apologetically. 'Otherwise you would have had a kinder welcome.'

'Old Believers,' I corrected him gently.

He was a middle-aged man, unremarkable except for the bright blue eyes in his weather-beaten face and an unruly fringe of almost pure white hair around his bald scalp. He had the careworn look of someone who laboured hard to support his family. Behind him his wife, a handsome woman who also showed signs of an exacting life, was washing the children's faces. The second woman appeared to be her sister, for she had the same thick reddish-brown hair and fine bone structure, as well as a gracefulness in the way she was collecting up the small offerings that had been set out during the night. The milk that had been left in the bowl for the alfr, I noticed, was poured back into the jug after a few drops had been sprinkled on the hearth. There was no surplus food in this household.

'You are a devotee of Odinn?' the farmer asked in a deep, quiet voice. He was probing, wanting to know more about me and to establish some sort of common ground between us. I liked him.

'From childhood. I have followed Odinn since I was a boy. And you?'

'Here we worship Frey. We are farmers, not warriors or sailors. We need Frey's generosity.' I knew what he spoke of. Frey is the God of fertility. He multiplies the seed that is planted in the soil, brings the rain and warmth which ripens crops, and makes good harvests. With Frey's help the cattle thrive, lambs and calves are plentiful, sows farrow generously. Even the milk we were drinking we owed ultimately to Frey's bounty.

'Last evening you invoked Odinn Vegtamr,' the farmer continued. 'Do you travel far?'

'Only as far as the Danish lands, if the rain holds off for another week or so. I don't like squelching through mud.'

'Many berries on the bushes this year,' the man said. 'And the swallows left early. Snow will come sooner than rain, I'd say. Not that it means much to us in these parts. We don't travel except to the great Hof, and it's a three-day walk to reach anywhere worth visiting.'

'Yet I saw a memorial back along the road to a man who died in Serkland. That's a great distance.'

There was a sudden tension in the room. The farmer looked uneasy.

'Have you been to Serkland?' he enquired.

'I have, or at least close to it,' I said. 'I served with the emperor's guard in Miklagard, and he sent me to their Holy Land. That's close by. It's the place where the White Christ God lived.'