The Burning Land Part 17

"But we'd thought about that," Finan said happily, "and we'd hoisted the anchor stone on the sail yard." Our anchor stones are huge round wheels, the size of millstones, with a hole carved in their center, and Finan had hoisted Seolferwulf Seolferwulf 's anchor by using the sail yard as a crane, and the message of that poised boulder was plain enough. If either of Skirnir's s.h.i.+ps attacked, then the stone would be swung over that s.h.i.+p, the line holding it would be cut by an ax, and the stone would fall to crash through the attacking s.h.i.+p's bilge. Skirnir would gain one s.h.i.+p and lose another, and so, sensibly, he had pulled his s.h.i.+ps away and pretended he had never even thought about capturing 's anchor by using the sail yard as a crane, and the message of that poised boulder was plain enough. If either of Skirnir's s.h.i.+ps attacked, then the stone would be swung over that s.h.i.+p, the line holding it would be cut by an ax, and the stone would fall to crash through the attacking s.h.i.+p's bilge. Skirnir would gain one s.h.i.+p and lose another, and so, sensibly, he had pulled his s.h.i.+ps away and pretended he had never even thought about capturing Seolferwulf Seolferwulf.

"The anchor stone was a good idea," I said.

"Oh it was Osferth who thought of it, lord," Finan admitted, "and we had the thing ready before they even came out to us."

"And Skirnir believed your tale?"

"He wanted to believe it, lord, so he did! He wanted Skade, lord. He saw nothing but Skade, sir, you could see it in his eyes."

"And so you sailed to capture her."

"And so we did, lord," Finan said with a smile.

The three s.h.i.+ps reached the creek as both the day and the tide ebbed. I knew Skirnir would not come till the morning flood had deepened the water in the creek, but I still posted sentries. Nothing disturbed them. We slept, though it seemed we did not. I remember lying awake, thinking I would never sleep, but dreams came all the same. I saw Gisela smiling, then had a waking dream of men with s.h.i.+elds and of spears flying from their hands. I lay for a moment in the sand, watching the stars, then I stood, stretching the stiffness from my arms and legs. "How many men does he have, lord?" Cerdic asked me. He was reviving the fire, and the driftwood flamed bright. Cerdic did not lack bravery, but in the night he had been haunted by the memory of those large s.h.i.+ps coming to the coast.

"He has two crews," I said. I saw that I had been the last to wake and men now drew toward the fire to listen to me. "Two crews," I said, "so he has at least one hundred men, maybe a hundred and fifty?"

"Jesus," Cerdic said quietly, touching the cross he wore.

"But they're pirates," Rollo said loudly.

"Tell them," I ordered, pleased that Ragnar's man understood what we faced.

Rollo stood in the flamelight. "Skirnir's men are like wild dogs," he said, "and they hunt what is weak, never what is strong. They don't fight on land and they don't know the s.h.i.+eld wall. We do."

"He calls himself the Sea-Wolf," I said, "but Rollo is right. He's a dog, not a wolf. We're the wolves! We've faced the best warriors of Denmark and Britain and we've sent them to their graves! We are men of the s.h.i.+eld wall, and before the sun climbs to its highest Skirnir will be in his grave!"

Not that we saw any sun because the day clouded over with the gray dawn. The clouds ran swift and low toward the sea, shrouding the marshes. The water rose with the tide, flooding the margins of the land where we had our refuge. I climbed to the top of the dune from where I watched the three s.h.i.+ps come slowly up the creek. Skirnir was riding the flooding tide, rowing till his beast-headed s.h.i.+p grounded, then waiting for more water to carry him a few oar strokes farther. His two s.h.i.+ps led and Seolferwulf Seolferwulf followed, and I laughed at that. Skirnir, confident in his numbers and blinded by the prospect of regaining Skade, did not think for a moment that he had enemies behind him. followed, and I laughed at that. Skirnir, confident in his numbers and blinded by the prospect of regaining Skade, did not think for a moment that he had enemies behind him.

And what did Skirnir see? He was in the prow of the leading s.h.i.+p and he saw only five men standing on the dune, and none of the five was in mail. He thought he came to capture a bedraggled band of fugitives and so he was confident, and, as he drew closer, I called for Skade to stand beside me. "If he captured you," I asked her, "what would he do?"

"Humiliate me," she said, "shame me, then kill me."

"And that's worth silver to him?" I asked, thinking of the reward he had offered for Skade's return.

"Pride is expensive," she said.

"Why wouldn't he just keep you as a slave?"

"Because of that pride," she said. "He once had a slave girl killed because she betrayed him. He gave her to his men first, let them enjoy her, then he tied her to a stake and skinned her alive. He made her mother listen to her screams as she died."

I remembered Edwulf, skinned alive in his church, but I said nothing of that as I watched Skirnir's s.h.i.+p come still closer. The creek became too narrow to allow his oar-banks to dip in the water, so now his s.h.i.+p was being poled forward. The tide was rising slowly. As it neared its height it would rise more swiftly, and then Skirnir would know he had run out of water, but the creek, though narrow, was proving to have more than enough depth for his s.h.i.+ps. "It's time to dress," I said.

I went down the dune's far side, hidden now from Skirnir, and Oswi, my servant, helped me into my mail. The leather lining stank in my nostrils as I pulled it over my head, but it felt good to have that familiar weight on my shoulders. Oswi put the sword belt around my waist and buckled it. "You stand behind me," I told him.

"Yes, lord."

"If it all goes wrong, boy," I said, "you run like a hare. You go inland, find the monastery and ask for shelter."

"Yes, lord."

"But it won't go wrong," I told him.

"I know it won't, lord," he said stoutly. He was eleven years old, an orphan who had been found scavenging in the mud beneath the terrace of my Lundene house. One of my men had accused him of theft and brought him to me so I could order a whipping, but I had liked the fire in the boy's eyes and so I had made him my servant and was now teaching him sword-craft. One day, like my previous servant, Sihtric, Oswi would become a warrior.

I went to the dune's edge and saw that Skirnir's s.h.i.+p was pa.s.sing our beached and abandoned fis.h.i.+ng craft. He was near enough to shout insults and he was bellowing at Skade, who now stood alone at the dune's summit. He was calling her a wh.o.r.e, a t.u.r.d of the devil, and promising that she would scream her way into h.e.l.l.

"Time to show ourselves," I said to Rollo, and picked up my linden s.h.i.+eld, which had Bebbanburg's wolf's head painted around its iron boss.

Rollo carried a war ax and he kissed the wide blade. "I'll feed you soon, my darling," he promised the ax.

"They're close!" Skade called from the dune.

The island we had chosen was shaped like a crescent moon with the dune making the moon's high belly. The horns of the crescent touched the creek, and cradled in its belly was marshland. So the dune could be approached from either horn, while the marsh, about a hundred paces wide and fifty paces at its deepest, was an obstacle. Men could cross that marshland, but it would have been slow work. The horn nearest to the sea was the wider of the two, a natural causeway leading to the sandy island, but ten men could bar that causeway easily, and I led twenty, leaving the remainder under Rollo's command. Their task was to protect the farther horn, but they were not to show themselves until Skirnir sent men to use that second causeway.

And what did Skirnir see? He saw a s.h.i.+eld wall. He saw men in helmets and mail, men with bright weapons, men who were not the desperate fugitives he expected, but warriors dressed for battle, and he must have known that Finan and Osferth had lied to him, but he must have thought it was a small lie, a lie about weapons and mail, and his desperate hopes to regain Skade still persuaded him to believe the larger lie. Maybe he thought they had simply been mistaken? And still he was confident, because we were so few and he had so many, though the sight of a s.h.i.+eld wall gave him pause.

Skirnir's helmsman was nosing the foremost s.h.i.+p into the bank when we appeared, and Skirnir immediately held up his hand to stop the men poling with the long oars. Skirnir had thought he would have little to do on that overcast morning, merely storm ash.o.r.e and capture a small band of dispirited men, but our s.h.i.+elds, weapons, and close-linked wall made him reconsider. I saw him turn and shout at the men poling his s.h.i.+p. He pointed up the creek and it was obvious he wanted the s.h.i.+p taken to the farther horn so that he could surround us. But then, to my surprise, he leaped off the bows. He and fifteen men splashed into the creek and waded ash.o.r.e as the s.h.i.+p poled on. Skirnir and his small band were now about fifty paces away, but they would be swiftly reinforced by the crew of his second s.h.i.+p that was approaching fast. I stayed where I was.

Skirnir did not look back to see Seolferwulf Seolferwulf, and would he have been alarmed if he had? She was the last of the three s.h.i.+ps and her bows were filled with mailed and helmeted men. I could see Finan's black s.h.i.+eld.

"Uhtred?" Skirnir shouted.

"I am Uhtred!"

"Give me the wh.o.r.e!" he bellowed. He was a heavy man with a face as flat as a flounder, small eyes, and a long black beard that half covered his mail. "Give her to me and I'll go away! You can live out your miserable life. Just give me the wh.o.r.e!"

"I haven't finished with her!" I called. I glanced left and saw that Skirnir's own s.h.i.+p had almost reached the second causeway. That crew would start landing in a moment. Meanwhile his second s.h.i.+p had grounded just behind Skirnir and the crew were tumbling over the side. There was not sufficient room on the small beach for more than thirty of them, so the rest, maybe another thirty men, waited on the s.h.i.+p. Seolferwulf Seolferwulf crept closer. crept closer.

"Oswi?" I said softly.

"Lord?"

"Fetch Rollo now."

I felt the exultation of victory. I had seventy men, including those on Seolferwulf Seolferwulf, and Skirnir had done what I wanted, he had divided his forces. Sixty or seventy of his men were facing us at the first causeway, some still aboard their s.h.i.+p, while the rest had gone to the other landing place and though, once they were ash.o.r.e, they would be able to attack us from behind, I expected to be master of the island by then. I heard Seolferwulf Seolferwulf thump her bows on the grounded boat, then I gave the command. "Forward!" thump her bows on the grounded boat, then I gave the command. "Forward!"

We went as warriors, confident and disciplined. We could have charged as we had at Fearnhamme, but I wanted fear to work its wicked decay on Skirnir's men, and so we went slowly, the s.h.i.+elds of our front rank overlapping, while the men behind beat blades against their s.h.i.+elds in time to our steps. "Kill the sc.u.m!" I shouted and my men took up the shout. "Kill the sc.u.m, kill the sc.u.m!" We went step by step, slow and inexorable, and the blades between our s.h.i.+elds promised death.

We were just eight men broad, but, as the causeway widened, Rollo brought his men onto our right. Most of the front rank carried spears, while I had Serpent-Breath. She was not the best blade for the close work of s.h.i.+eld wall fighting, but I reckoned Skirnir's men would not stand long because they were not used to this kind of warfare. Their skill was the sudden rush onto a half-defended boat, the wild killing of frightened men, but now they faced sword-warriors and spearmen and behind them was Finan. And Finan now attacked.

He left just two boys on Seolferwulf Seolferwulf. The tide was still flooding, so the current was holding Seolferwulf Seolferwulf against the second of Skirnir's skull-prowed s.h.i.+ps and Finan led his men over her bows and up between the rowing benches, and they were yelling a high-pitched scream of killing, and maybe for a moment, just for a moment, Skirnir believed they had come to help him. But then Finan began the slaughter. against the second of Skirnir's skull-prowed s.h.i.+ps and Finan led his men over her bows and up between the rowing benches, and they were yelling a high-pitched scream of killing, and maybe for a moment, just for a moment, Skirnir believed they had come to help him. But then Finan began the slaughter.

And we struck at the same moment. "Now!" I shouted, and my s.h.i.+eld wall lunged forward, spears seeking foemen, blades driving into flesh, and I slammed Serpent-Breath under a Frisian s.h.i.+eld and twisted her long blade in the man's soft belly. "Kill them!" I bellowed, and Finan echoed the cry.

Spear-blades buried themselves in Frisian flesh. Men then dropped the spears' long ash shafts and drew swords or took axes from the men behind. Skirnir's men had not broken because they could not break. They were confined in a small s.p.a.ce and my attack pushed them back against their dark s.h.i.+p's bows, while Finan's a.s.sault on the s.h.i.+p drove the remaining crew toward the prow platform. We pushed forward, giving them no room to fight, and we did the grim work of s.h.i.+eld fighting. Cerdic was on my right and he used the blade of his ax like a hook to pull down the rim of the man to his front and, as soon as the s.h.i.+eld was down, I lunged Serpent-Breath into the enemy's throat, and Cerdic drove the ax blade against the man's face, crus.h.i.+ng it, then reached to hook down another s.h.i.+eld. Rollo was screaming in Danish. He had dropped his s.h.i.+eld and wielded his ax two-handed as he chanted a hymn to Thor. Rorik, one of the Danes who served me, was on his knees behind me, using a spear to rip open the legs of the Frisian pirates, and when they fell we killed them.

It was slaughter in a small s.p.a.ce. We had given hours, days, weeks, and months to practicing this kind of fight. It does not matter how often a man stands in a s.h.i.+eld wall, he will only live if he has rehea.r.s.ed it, drilled it, and practiced it, and Skirnir's men had never trained as we did. They were seamen, and some did not even have s.h.i.+elds because a great round slab of iron-bossed wood is a c.u.mbersome thing to carry in a fight aboard a s.h.i.+p where the footing is uncertain and the rowing benches are obstacles. They were untrained and ill-equipped and so we killed them. They were in terror. They did not see our faces. Most of our helmets have cheek-pieces and so the enemy saw men of metal, metal-masked, metal-clad, and the steel of our weapons lanced at them, and we went relentlessly forward, metal-clad warriors behind overlapping s.h.i.+elds, our blades remorseless until, on that gray morning, blood spread bright in the salt tide creek.

Finan had the harder job, but Finan was a warrior of renown who took joy in hard fighting, and he led his men up the dark boat and screamed as he killed. He sang the song of the sword, keening as he fed his blade, and Rollo, standing thigh-deep in the creek, ax swinging in murderous blows, blocked the enemy's escape. The Frisians, transported from confidence to bowel-loosening fear, began to drop their weapons. They knelt, they shouted for mercy, and I shouted at my rear rank to turn and be ready to face the men who had taken Skirnir's own s.h.i.+p higher up the creek to come around our rear.

Those men appeared about the dune just in time to see that the fighting was over. A few had sensibly jumped over the s.h.i.+p's farther side and struggled into the swamp beyond, but most of Skirnir's force were dead or prisoners. One of those prisoners was Skirnir himself, who was backed against the grounded strakes of his second s.h.i.+p with a spear-blade held at his beard. Cerdic was pressing the blade just enough to keep the big man still. "Shall I kill him, lord?"

"Not yet," I said, distracted. I was watching the newly arrived enemy. "Rollo? Keep them at a distance."

Rollo formed his men into a s.h.i.+eld wall. He shouted at the uncertain Frisians, inviting them to come and taste the blood already on his blades, but they did not move.

A man screamed. He was a Frisian lying at the sand's edge and his legs were thras.h.i.+ng in the shallow, blood-tinged water. He had been wounded, and Skade now knelt beside him and was driving a dagger slowly into one eye and so through to his brain. "Stop that!" I shouted. The man was mewing in a high, pitiable voice, the ooze of his punctured eye spilling down his blood-laced cheek.

She turned to look at me and there was a wildness in her face like the savagery of a cornered beast. "I hate them," she said, and edged the dagger in again so that the man screamed and lost control of his bowels.

"Sihtric!" I snarled, and Sihtric stepped to the man and drove his sword hard into his throat to end his misery.

"I want to kill them all," Skade hissed at me. She was shuddering. "And him!" She pointed to Skirnir. "Especially him!"

"She's crazed," Finan said softly. He had jumped down to the beach beside me and now dipped his blade in the water to wash the blood away. "Sweet Jesus Christ," he said, "she's as crazy as a b.i.t.c.h in heat."

My men were staring at Skade in horror. It is one thing to kill in battle, but an enemy is a warrior too, and in defeat he deserves respect. I have killed often, and the killing can go on long after the fighting has finished, but that is the blood l.u.s.t and battle fear that frenzies men who endure the s.h.i.+eld wall, and when the l.u.s.t dies then mercy takes its place. "You're not going to let them live!" Skade spat at me.

"Cerdic," I said, not turning around to look at him, "make it quick!"

I heard, but did not see, Skirnir die. The spear-blade was thrust so hard that it pierced his throat and then drove into the planks of the s.h.i.+p. "I wanted to kill him!" Skade shrieked.

I ignored her. Instead I walked past Rollo to approach the undefeated Frisians. These men were Skirnir's own crew, maybe sixty in all, who watched me come in silence. I had dropped my s.h.i.+eld so they could see the blood spattered on my mail and see the blood streaked across my helmet's mask and see the blood congealing on Serpent-Breath's blade. My helmet was surmounted by a silver wolf, my belt had plates of gold, and my arm rings shone through their gloss of blood. They saw a warlord and I walked to within ten paces of them to show that I had no fear of pirates.

"I am Uhtred of Bebbanburg," I said, "and I give you a choice. You can live or you can die."

Rollo, behind me, had started the s.h.i.+eld music. His men were beating blades against linden wood in the dark rhythm of death's promise.

"We are Danes," I told the Frisians, "and we are Saxons, and we are warriors who love to fight. In our halls at night we chant the tales of the men we have killed, of the women we have widowed, and of the children we have orphaned. So make your choice! Either give me a new song to sing or else lay down your weapons."

They laid down their weapons. I made them take off their mail, those that possessed it, or else their leather tunics. I took their boots, their belts, their armor, and their weapons and we piled that plunder in Seolferwulf Seolferwulf, and then we burned both of Skirnir's long s.h.i.+ps. They burned well, great plumes of flame climbing the masts beneath churning black smoke that drifted up into the low clouds.

Skirnir had come with one hundred and thirty-one men. We had killed twenty-three of those, while another sixteen were grievously wounded. One of Rollo's men had lost an eye to a spear thrust, and aelric, a Saxon in my service, lay dying. He had fought beside Finan and had tripped on a rower's bench and had taken an ax blow in the back, and I knelt beside him on the sand and held his hand firm around his sword's hilt and promised I would give his widow gold and raise his children as though they were my own. He heard me, though he could not speak back, and I held his hand until the noise rattled in his throat and his body quivered as his soul went to the long darkness. We took his corpse away with us and buried him at sea. He was a Christian, and Osferth said a prayer over the dead aelric before we tipped him into eternity. We took another corpse with us, Skirnir's, that we stripped naked and hung from our wolf's-head prow to show that we had conquered.

We poled Seolferwulf Seolferwulf back down the creek on the ebbing tide. When the creek widened we turned and rowed her, towing the small fis.h.i.+ng craft that I abandoned beside the village. Then we went out to sea and back down the creek on the ebbing tide. When the creek widened we turned and rowed her, towing the small fis.h.i.+ng craft that I abandoned beside the village. Then we went out to sea and Seolferwulf Seolferwulf shuddered to the first small waves. The gray clouds that had covered the place of slaughter were at last shredding, letting a watery sunlight beat down on the choppy sea. "You shouldn't have let them live," Skade told me. shuddered to the first small waves. The gray clouds that had covered the place of slaughter were at last shredding, letting a watery sunlight beat down on the choppy sea. "You shouldn't have let them live," Skade told me.

"Skirnir's men?" I asked. "Why kill them? They were beaten."

"They should all be dead," she said vengefully, then turned a gaze of utter fury on me. "You left two of his brothers alive! They should be dead!"

"I let them live," I said. Without Skirnir and his large boats they were harmless, though Skade did not see it that way.

"Milksop!" she spat at me.

I stared at her. "Careful, woman," I said, and she went sulkily silent.

We had brought just one prisoner with us, the s.h.i.+pmaster from Skirnir's own vessel. He was an old man, over forty, and years of squinting at the sun-reflecting sea had made his eyes mere crinkled slits in a face beaten dark by salt and weather. He would be our guide. "If my s.h.i.+p so much as touches a sandbank," I told him, "I'll let Skade kill you in her own way."

Seolferwulf touched no sandbank as we rowed to Zegge. The channel was intricate, and misleading marks had been planted to lure attackers onto shoals, but the prisoner's pure terror of Skade made him careful. We arrived in the early evening, feeling our way gently, and led by the corpse hanging at the bows. Spray had washed Skirnir's carca.s.s clean and gulls, smelling him, screamed as they wheeled in hungry frustration around our prow. touched no sandbank as we rowed to Zegge. The channel was intricate, and misleading marks had been planted to lure attackers onto shoals, but the prisoner's pure terror of Skade made him careful. We arrived in the early evening, feeling our way gently, and led by the corpse hanging at the bows. Spray had washed Skirnir's carca.s.s clean and gulls, smelling him, screamed as they wheeled in hungry frustration around our prow.

Men and women watched us pa.s.s through the crooked channel that twisted between two of the inner islands, and then we glided across sheltered water that reflected the settling sun in s.h.i.+vering gold. The watchers were Skirnir's followers, but these men had not sailed with their lord in the dawn, and now they saw our proud s.h.i.+elds that we had hung from Seolferwulf Seolferwulf 's topmost strakes, and they saw the corpse dangling white from the rope, and none wanted to challenge us. 's topmost strakes, and they saw the corpse dangling white from the rope, and none wanted to challenge us.

There were fewer people on Zegge than on the outer islands, because it was from Zegge that the two defeated crews had sailed, and where most of the dead, wounded, or stranded men had lived. A crowd of women came to the gray wooden pier that jutted out be neath the mound which supported Skirnir's hall. The women watched our boat approach, then some recognized the body that was our trophy and they all fled, dragging their children by the hands. Eight men, dressed in mail and carrying weapons, came from the hall, but when they saw my crew disembarking they ostentatiously put their weapons down. They knew now their lord was dead, and not one of them was minded to fight for his reputation.

And so, in the twilight of that day, we came to the hall on the mound of Zegge, and I stared up at its black bulk and thought of the dragon sleeping on his h.o.a.rd of silver and gold. The high-roofed hall had great wooden horns at its eaves, horns that reared into the darkening sky where the first stars p.r.i.c.ked the dusk.

I left fifteen men to guard the s.h.i.+p, then climbed the hill, seeing how the mound was made from great baulks of timber planted in a long rectangle that had been filled with sand, and on that first layer another smaller rectangle had been built, and then a third, and at the summit a final layer where a palisade stood, though it offered no defiance now, for its heavy wooden gate stood wide open. There was no fight left in Skirnir's men. Their lord was dead.

The hall's door was framed by a pair of vast curved bones that had come from some sea monster. I pa.s.sed beneath them with a drawn sword with Rollo and Finan flanking me. A fire burned in the central hearth, spitting like a cat as salt-caked driftwood does. Skade came behind us and the waiting servants s.h.i.+vered at the sight of her. Skirnir's steward, a plump man, bowed low to me. "Where's the treasure?" I asked harshly.

The steward was too frightened to answer and Skade thrust him aside. "Lanterns!" she called to the servants, and small rushlamps were brought and in their paltry light she led me to a door at the back of the hall which opened onto a small square chamber heaped with sealskins. "He slept here," she said.

"Above the dragon?"

"He was the dragon," she said scornfully, "he was a pig and a dragon," and then she dropped to her knees and scrabbled the stinking skins aside. I called for Skirnir's plump steward to help her. Finan looked at me, an eyebrow raised in expectation, and I could not resist a smile.

To take Bebbanburg I needed men. To storm that great stone wall and slaughter my uncle's warriors, I needed men, and to buy men I needed gold. I needed silver. I needed a treasure guarded by a dragon to make that long dream come true, and so I smiled as Skade and the steward pulled away the high pile of pelts that covered the hiding place.

And then, in the light of the smoking lamps, the door was revealed.

It was a trapdoor of dark heavy wood into which an iron ring was set. I remember Father Beocca, years ago, telling me how he had visited a monastery in Sumorsaete and how the abbot had reverently showed him a crystal vial in which was kept milk from the Virgin Mary's b.r.e.a.s.t.s. "I s.h.i.+vered, Uhtred," Beocca had told me earnestly, "I shook like a leaf in the wind. I dared not hold the flask for fear of dropping it! I shook!"

I do not think I shook at that moment, but I felt the same awe, the same sense of being close to something inexplicable. My future lay beneath that trapdoor. My hopes, my sons' futures, my dreams of freedom beneath a northern sky, all lay so close. "Open it," I ordered, and my voice was hoa.r.s.e, "open it."

Rollo and the steward took hold of the ring. The trapdoor was stiff, jammed in its frame, and they needed to tug it hard to move it at all. Then, abruptly, the heavy door came free and the two men staggered as they dragged it aside.

I stepped forward and looked down.

And started laughing.

There was no dragon. I have never seen a dragon, though I am a.s.sured they exist and I have heard men describe those awful beasts with their malevolent scarlet eyes, flame-shooting mouths, questing necks, and crackling wings the size of s.h.i.+p sails. They are the beasts of nightmare, and though I have sailed into the distant north, sailed to where the ice blanches the sky with its reflections, I have never been far enough north to the frost lands where dragons are said to roost.

There was no dragon in Skirnir's pit, but there was a skeleton and some rats. The rats looked up startled, their tiny eyes winking back the flames of our inadequate lanterns, then they scuttled into cracks between the elm planks that lined the pit. Two rats were inside the ribcage of the dead man and they were the last to leave, first wriggling between the bones then slithering fast into their hiding place.

And as my eyes adjusted to the gloom I saw the coins and the silver shards. I heard them first, c.h.i.n.king under the feet of the rats, then I saw them, dully gleaming, spilling from the leather sacks that had held them. The rotting sacks had been gnawed by rats. "What's the corpse?" I asked.

"A man who tried to steal Lord Skirnir's treasure, lord," the steward answered in a whisper.

"He was left here to die?"

"Yes, lord. He was blinded first, then his sinews were cut, and he was put in the pit to die slowly."

Skade smiled.

"Bring it all out," I ordered Finan, then pushed the steward toward the hall. "You feed us tonight," I ordered him, "all of us."

I went back into the hall. It had only one table, so that most men would have eaten on the rush-covered floor. It was dark now, the only light coming from the big fire that we fed with logs my men tore from the palisade. I sat at the table and watched as Skirnir's treasure was laid before me. I had laughed when the pit was first opened, and that laughter had been scornful because, in the feeble light, the treasure had appeared so paltry. What had I expected? A glittering heap of gold, studded with precious stones?