Illugi Godi came up, carrying a live hare by the ears. It hung from his hands, trembling and quiet. He moved to a large, flat rock, which had clearly been used before, and set the hare flat, stroking it gently. It gathered itself into a huddle and shook.
He cut the throat expertly, holding it up so that it kicked and squealed and the blood poured over its front and flew everywhere with its flying, desperate attempts to leap in the air.
Illugi gave it to the sea god, Aegir, in the name of Kalf, who had died in the black water without a sword in his hand, in the hope that the Aesir would consider that a worthy enough death, and to Harald One-eye and Haarlaug. Men stopped, added their own prayers, then moved on, humping sea-chests on their shoulders.
It came to me then that the Oathsworn had done one journey, from south Norway, round between Wessex and the lands of the Norse in France, north to Man and Strathclyde, then back and on eastwards to Birka. A journey without trouble and a soft raid, according to the salt-stained men of the Oathsworn. And yet three men had died.
Illugi gutted the hare while it kicked feebly, examined the entrails and nodded sagely. He left the red ruin of it aside, started a small fire from shavings, fed it to life and caught me watching. ‘Get me dry wood, Orm Ruriksson.’
I did – with difficulty on that wet beach – and he built the fire up, then laid the remains of the hare on it. The smell of singed fur and burning flesh drifted blackly down to the traders, some of whom crossed themselves hurriedly.
When it was done, Illugi Godi left it on the rock, picked up his own meagre belongings and both of us stumbled up the shingle to the coarse grass and on towards the dark huddle of Birka. On the Traders’ Green, which sat opposite the tall, timbered stockade and the great double doors of the North Gate, was a sprawl of wattle-and-daub huts.
Two substantial buildings squatted there, too, made of age-blackened timbers caulked with clay. One was for the garrison that manned the Borg, the great fortress which towered over to our left, and the other was for those like us, visiting groups of armed men who had to be offered hospitality, without the good burghers of Birka having to invite them into their protected homes.
At the gates, two bored guards with round leather caps, shields and spears made sure no one entered the town with anything larger than an eating knife and, since no sensible man would simply leave his weapons with them and hope to get them back later, there was much cursing from those unused to the custom as they traipsed back to dwellings to secure them with people they knew.
Illugi Godi, busy pointing things out to me as we trudged towards the Guest Hall, stopped suddenly at the sight of one of the Oathsworn, walking up from the beach in a daze, as if frozen.
Puzzled at first, I suddenly saw his face as Illugi Godi took him by the shoulder and turned him to face us. Eyvind, his name was, a thin-faced, fey-eyed man from Hadaland in Norway. My father said he was touched, though he never said by what.
Something had touched him, for sure, and it made the hairs on my arms stand up; he was pale as a dead man, his dark hair making him look even more so and, above his beard, his eyes looked like the dark pits of a skull.
‘What happened to you?’ demanded Illugi as I looked around warily. The wind hissed, cold and fierce, the night came on with a rush and a last, despairing gasp of thin twilight and figures moved, almost shadows. At the gate and up at the fortress, lamps were lit, little glowing yellow eyes that made the dark more dark still. Nothing was out of the ordinary.
Illugi asked again and the man blinked, as if water had been thrown in his face.
‘Raven,’ he said eventually, in a voice half wondering, half something else. Dull. Resigned. ‘I saw a raven.’
‘A crow, perhaps,’ Illugi offered. ‘Or a trick of the twilight.’
Eyvind shook his head, then looked at Illugi as if seeing him clearly for the first time. He grabbed Illugi by the arms; his beard trembled. ‘A raven. On the beach, a rock with the remains of a hare sacrifice on it.’
I heard Illugi’s swift intake of breath – and so did Eyvind. He was wild-eyed with fear.
‘What was in your head?’ demanded Illugi Godi. Eyvind shook his own, muttering. I caught the words ‘raven’ and ‘doom’ as they were whipped away by the wind. I shivered, for the sight of one of the All-Father’s birds on a sacrifice offering was a sure sign that you would die.
Illugi seized the man in return and shook him. ‘What was in your head?’ he demanded in a fierce hiss.
Eyvind looked at him, his eyebrows closed into one, and he shook his head again, bewildered. ‘Head? What do you mean …?’
‘Were you remembering, or just thinking?’
‘Thinking,’ he answered.
Illugi grunted. ‘What thought?’
Eyvind screwed up his face, then it smoothed and he looked at Illugi. ‘I was looking at the town and thinking how easily it would burn.’
Illugi patted him on the shoulder, then indicated the pile of dropped gear. ‘Get to the Guest Hall and don’t worry. It was Odin’s pet right enough – but not with a message for you. For me, Eyvind. For me.’
The eagerness in him was almost obscene to watch. ‘Really? You say true?’
Illugi Godi nodded and the man scrabbled to collect his things, then stumbled off towards the butter-glow of the Hall.
Illugi leaned on his staff a moment, looking round. I was annoyed; Eyvind thought he had seen one of Odin’s ravens, herald of death, and had then gone off, not the least bothered that the doom of it was claimed by another. I said as much and Illugi shrugged.
‘Who knows? It could have been Thought … That raven is as deep and cunning as Loki,’ he replied. Then he looked at me, his fringe of grizzled, red-gold beard catching the lamp glow. ‘On the other hand, it might have been Memory – Birka has burned before.’
‘You think it a warning, then? Since it came to your sacrifice for the dead?’ I asked, shivering slightly.
‘On yet the other hand,’ Illugi Godi said wryly. ‘Eyvind is Loki-touched. He loves fire, is mad for fire. Twice before people have stopped him lighting one on the Fjord Elk. Oh, he always had good reason – hot food for us all, dry boots and socks – but he was also the one who wanted to torch all the buildings at St Otmund’s chapel, after we knew the fyrd were roused.’
I remembered – so it had been him who had called for it.
‘So he was mistaken?’ I asked as Illugi hefted his belongings and, with no other word, led me to the Guest Hall.
I wanted to ask him what would happen when Eyvind told the others, but should have realised what Illugi already knew: that Eyvind would say nothing. He would now, as the fear and relief fell away, realise what a nithing he had become at that moment and would certainly tell no one how his bowels had turned to water.
The Guest Hall was spacious, clean and well equipped, with a good hearth pitfire and a lot of boxbeds – not enough for us all, so it was a chance to see who was who in the Oathsworn.
Of course, I ended up on the floor near the draughty door, but that was no surprise. My father got a good boxbed, as did Einar and Skapti and others I had expected. To my surprise, Pinleg got one, too and, after a moment of raised hackles and growling, Gunnar Raudi forced Steinthor out of his. Chuckling, Ulf-Agar watched the archer slouch off, scowling.
‘Watch your back, flame-head,’ he advised. ‘You may be picking arrowheads out of it.’
‘Watch your mouth, short-arse,’ Gunnar growled back, ‘or you will be picking my boot out of it.’
At which all those who heard it laughed, including Steinthor. Ulf-Agar bristled, thought better