The Wolf Sea

One of the cavalry horses suddenly reared up and threw the rider and the rest wheeled round and galloped back, just as someone yelled: 'Water.'

It surged round my boots and I almost sobbed to hear it. Behind me, peeling off one by one, men slung their shields on their backs and splashed out towards the boats, while those on board, using the few short bows we had, plunked arrows enough to keep the horsemen cautious.

Something spanged off my helmet and my head rang like a bell. There was a hiss-shunk and an arrow whacked itself on my shield — on the inside. I snapped the shaft off with my sword and yelled at those in the Elk to watch their shooting, then turned and ran back into the surf, shield over my back.

I heaved myself over the rail of the Fjord Elk, hearing forlorn splashes as the last arrows missed. On the beach, the horsemen waved bows in triumph and screamed their la-la cries, as well as 'pig- eaters' in Greek.

Kvasir, beaming, dragged me upright and banged me heartily on one shoulder. 'Aye, a good steady defence right enough, Trader.'

`How many?' I managed to gasp as, around me, men groaned and sat, heads hanging and lips wet with drool.

`Four dead,' Finn answered, scooping water over his head. He spat towards the horsemen. 'Another six wounded, the boy among them.'

`Boy?' I asked, confused. Not the Goat Boy. .

It was. He had taken an arrow smack in the side and Brother John was kneeling beside the little figure, poking carefully round the wound. The shaft had been trimmed off down to the flesh and the Goat Boy was limp and lolling and pale as milk.

Brother John muttered a prayer and looked at me, his face hard and sweat-gleamed.

Gizur came up and said, 'We have a west wind, Trader. Do we run with it?'

I nodded, then turned back to Brother John, who was examining the wound again. The Goat Boy moaned.

Odin's arse, priest,' snarled Finn, 'do you know what you are about?'

I am about this close to smacking you in the mouth, Finn Horsehead. Fetch some water and shut your hole.'

Finn stamped off, roaring, and I felt the Fjord Elk heel over, heard Kvasir chivvying tired men into hauling the sail full up.

`Do you really know what you are about?' I asked and Brother John shot me such a look I thought he was about to snarl at me, too. Then he wiped dry lips and I saw the fear and uncertainty there.

It is in deep and barbed. I can't push it through, for I think it is near his vitals. If I try to get it out I will make more of the wound than his body can take, perhaps.'

If you leave it?'

'Coniecturalem artem esse medicinam.'

Medicine is the art of guessing. I looked at the figure, shrunken even now; I wanted no more little corpses and said so. Brother John, agitated and fretting, nodded and licked his lips, then started to pray even more.

I stood, feeling the wind in my face, turned to the prow and saw Radoslay.

`Timely message,' I said, then told him what had happened and that the boy they had sent it with was dead. Radoslav shook his silver-bound braids, then looked at the little figure on the deck, Brother John hunched over him like some ragged Crow.

`His mother will be cursing the day we sailed into the harbour, I am thinking,' Radoslav said, then spat.

'Not that we can go back. Your Starkad threw a fox in that hen coop right enough.'

He told it swiftly and simply. They'd seen the ship arrive and were puzzled, because it was a big Greek knarr, but coming in from the east and labouring against an offshore wind. Then, as it came round the headland, they saw it was full of Norse and Kvasir put it together fast enough for them to raise sail and catch the same wind out that made hard work for Starkad to get in.

Radoslav was still furious that the Volchok had been left, with Arinbjorn and Ogmund on board, who would have no chance. Worse, in his eyes, was that most of the cargo was on board, too.

I am sorry for that,' I said.

Radoslav shrugged. 'No matter. The treasure will pay for it when we get it.'

I said nothing, for I knew now that Radoslav was still convinced we were off to find the hoard — that, after all, was what this chase to get the runesword was about. Yet there was a storm in me, tossing my resolve like a leaky knarr. Driven by oath to get the sword, I had no wish to go back to Atil's howe.

Eventually, I would have to decide and matters would get uglier than Short Eldgrim.

`Where too, Trader?' demanded Gizur. I had long since worked this out and only the starting point was changed.

`North and then east, round the island and set a course to Seleucia,' I said. I had listened to all the gossip and knew that Antioch was in the hands of the Miklagard army. It wasn't the first time they had taken the city and, like all the other times, they'd probably have to give it up and fall back on Tarsus. I just hoped they still held it when we got to Seleucia, Antioch's port, which was a safer haven than some lonely beach in Serkland.

Short Eldgrim hefted my shield and fingered the stub of the arrow, visible on the inside, up near the grip.

He looked at me and lifted what remained of one of his eyebrows.

Aye, just so,' I offered wryly. 'An inch to the left and I'd be picking the back of my teeth with the point of it. Anyone would think you did not like me, wee man.'

Short Eldgrim fetched his tin-snips later and worried the point out of the wood, but there was no way of telling who had loosed it — for which Radoslav and Short Eldgrim and a couple of others were greatly relieved. I pitched it over the side and laughed.

We swept on, looking backwards for signs of Greeks and rubbed raw with the frustration of it, for Starkad was also there. I prayed that Balantes would not release his own ships to the north, that he would think we were scudding back to Miklagard with our prize, perhaps that we were even in the pay of the Basileus and about to expose him. I knew Starkad would not think so. I knew he would come our way alone and it was starting to irritate me that, every time we got close to him, our chances of making red war on him seemed to be furthest away.

Of course, I was heading straight into the arms of Red Boots, who commanded the Great City's army in the east, but I hoped to have slipped away from him before Balantes sent word to watch for Orm Bear Slayer.

If Odin held true to us, Starkad would follow and then we could trade — or fight; at the moment, either way was fine with me.

We turned east with no wind and crept like a water insect along the Anatolian coast, rowing until the snot and drool ran in our beards.

It was a good hafskip, this new Fjord Elk, and Gizur was well pleased, though the mast had checked in the heat of five untended summers and sprung cracks and some of the planks were a little less tight than was safe. As long as there wasn't a blow and we had men bailing, he thought we'd make Antioch.

Brother John had worried and teased the arrowhead out of the Goat Boy without sign of fat on the end, then fed him a broth of leeks and found no smell when he sniffed the wound, both of which were good signs.

I came on him while he was looking at Ivar, whom we called Gautr for his wit and Loki tricks. Ivar had taken an arrow through the cheek, which was a clean enough wound, but it had nicked his gum and a tooth as well, which bothered him.

`How is the boy?'

Alive,' Brother John said, clapping Ivar on one shoulder and straightening. 'I cannot be after saying how long that will last, all the same. I have cleaned it with vinegar and sewn it with fishing line and poulticed it with malva and wheat bran wrapped in a vellum strip of my best prayer.'