‘This,’ said Ma Disa, holding open a small bag of mushrooms and dried flowers, ‘is what the berserks use. Boil it with water and drink it as hot as you can bear.’
Vali was going to protest, to say he didn’t want anything to do with berserker magic. He couldn’t really see a situation where he would have time for what amounted to cooking before a fight but, he thought, best take it and be grateful.
Jodis came in, smacking him hard over the back of the head.
‘I heard. You’re a fool, prince, and the gods help the Horda if you ever become their king.’ Ma Jodis was a big bustling woman with arms like pork hams and the blow hurt. Vali accepted it, though. He’d known her since he was a small child and almost regarded it as her right to cuff him around the ears if she wanted to.
The women exchanged a long look.
‘Begin?’ said Jodis.
Disa nodded.
The women went to the centre of the room and started work, stoking up the fire, moving goats, chickens, benches and stools out of the way, pushing the curious to where they would cause least interference.
They brought in a table, which was positioned very close to the fire. On the table was placed a chest, pulled through the throng of onlookers. As this was done Disa shook down her hair. Jodis caught it up in her hands, tying it at the back in three tight knots. Vali shivered. He knew what they were — the hanging knots of the dead lord’s necklace — symbol of Odin, the god he had come to hate.
The women’s actions were accompanied by a whispered commentary, as those who could see passed news of what was happening to those who could not.
‘She’s tying her hair.’
‘She’s becoming the bride of Odin.’
‘If she hangs herself then the god might save the girl.’
‘That terrible fellow wants someone to swing, no mistake.’
‘He is lord of the hanged, a mighty god indeed!’
‘Don’t be so stupid — Ma Disa’s death won’t save the girl.’
Some voices praised Odin almost ecstatically. Others were quieter but disapproving of what they saw. The poorer people, those who had the hard pasture and mean dwellings, thought that destiny lay in the hands of the gods. The richer farmers, or those who had enjoyed successful raiding, were more inclined to say they had made their own luck and put less trust in the divine.
Jodis pushed the chest to the front of the table and Disa sat on it, her head slightly above those of the standing crowd, her feet only just above the fire. Jodis took Vali by the arm and sat him on the floor on the other side of the fire, looking up at Disa.
Vali glanced around at the watching faces, long in the light of the flames. It was as if he was at the centre of some strange clearing in the forest, the people hanging over him like twisted trees.
‘Them that don’t have to be here, shouldn’t be here for the next bit — you’ll be in for a long night,’ said Jodis, but no one moved. She pushed through the crowd, took a pot from a shelf at the back of the room, removed a stone serving as its lid and shook something into her hand that looked to Vali like kindling.
Jodis threw the stuff onto the fire and it began to burn, releasing an acrid and unpleasant smoke. Most of those nearest to it, Vali included, pulled their tunics up over their mouths and noses, but Disa breathed deeply and intoned in a strange high voice: I speak the rune of the spell god I howl the rune of the hanged god Odin, who lost his eye for lore Odin, waiting mind blown by the well.
Disa then produced a piece of wood and marked something on it — Vali couldn’t see what — with three strokes of her knife. She put the wood on her knees and held the knife to her palm. She drew in breath, steeling herself, and then made the same three strokes in her hand, but much quicker. Vali recognised the Ansuz rune and was fascinated. He could carve runes himself and knew they were said to have magical properties. He’d asked Disa to tell him what they were, but she had just said that kings and warriors made their magic cutting runes on the bodies of their enemies and had no need for further knowledge.
The blood dripped from Disa’s hand down onto the wood. She smeared it into what she had carved there and then threw it onto the fire.
‘What am I? I am a woman. Where am I? At the hearth. What am I? I am a woman. Where am I? At the hearth. What am I? I am a woman. Where am I? At the hearth. What am I? I am a woman. Where am I? At the hearth.’
Jodis came to Disa’s side and bound her hand, but she seemed not to notice. She continued to chant, eyes vacant and staring into space. Her voice seemed to deaden Vali’s sense of time. He saw the fire restocked both with logs and with the strange herbs by Jodis and then old Ma Sefa returned with more of each.
‘What am I? I am a woman. Where am I? At the hearth. What am I? I am a woman. Where am I? At the hearth.’ Again and again she said the words, rocking slightly on the chest as Vali looked up at her through the fire and the smoke. Sometimes his mind wandered and he thought that she had stopped, but when he came back to himself she was still chanting, How long had he sat there? He couldn’t tell but his legs were numb and his head was heavy.
The smoke filled up Vali’s senses. Tiredness descended on him but he was not allowed to sleep. Every time he began to drift off, Jodis or Sefa would shake him, as they roused Disa. The purpose of her seat became clear. It was uncomfortable and precarious — virtually impossible to doze on. Then Vali noticed the room was lighter and colder. Some people had left; in fact many people had left. Looking over to the doorway, he realised he had completely missed the brief night and the light was that of the dawn.
Around them the farmers came and went: chatting, speculating on how Disa worked her art, wondering what enchantment she was laying on Vali. Some said that she was trying to make him invulnerable to weapons, some that she would turn him into a bird to scour the land for the wolfmen, some that she was pleased her daughter was going to Odin and would frustrate Vali in his quest. A couple began to play at dice; others picked up Vali’s King’s Table set and played that, bored by the ritual but afraid they might miss something if they went home. Two young men even started to mock Disa, repeating her words in silly high voices. Jodis sent them packing with a whack from a broom. Late arrivers, religious women of the outlying farms, came and joined in the chant, hoping to gain the blessing of the god Disa was seeking.
‘What am I? I am a woman. Where am I? At the hearth. What am I? I am a woman. Where am I? At the hearth.’
The chanting never stopped. The light outside grew brighter. It was hot again and then it was cold again. More people came in. Others left. Jodis shook Vali awake, shook Disa awake, steadying her on her platform, throwing more herbs on the fire.
‘What am I? I do not know. Where am I? In the dark. What am I? I am a raven. Where am I? On the field of the slain. What am I? I am ravens. Where am I? Where I can see.’
Was she really saying that? Vali wondered. The ground seemed to rock as if he was on a ship. The air seemed thick and clinging. The light outside was weakening once more. Neither Vali nor Disa had slept in three days. Disa’s voice was cracked, hardly audible.
Something cut through the fug of his thoughts. Disa was coughing and spluttering, then she let out a scream and began to shiver violently. Jodis and Sefa leaped to her side, holding her on the chest. Disa’s body went rigid — it seemed almost as if she would lift off her seat.
‘These pins are so sharp in my skin.’
Disa had spoken but in a way that Vali had never heard her speak before, slow and deliberate, much higher than her normal tone and with a strange accent.
Vali looked up at her, his legs stone with sitting, his mind like a boulder.
‘A rune I took from the tormented god.’
It was a tremulous voice, almost like that of a child, thought Vali. On some sounds it seemed to draw and suck like the sea on shingle but on others cracked and choked like the noise of a dog with a chicken bone.
Disa threw herself back and sat down heavily on the table, the chest going crashing to the side. Her body convulsed but then the shivering subsided, and she became calm. Jodis and Sefa let her go and she stood on the table looking out across the room. The temperature in the room plummeted and Vali felt his skin prickle into goosebumps. His breath froze on the air in front of him. There was something in Ma Disa’s manner that was quite unlike her. She stood tall and proud, surveying her surroundings like a queen. The people drew back from her, a
