The White Raven

They were removed at once, for ice is water and the more you removed, the more powerful — and green — the drink that was left. The colder the weather, the more ice formed on the green wine, the more you removed and the stronger it got.

It had to be cold for ice to start forming on the green wine at all and that was a bad sign this early, as was the snow and the clear, cold air that promised more of the same. This year would produce some of the strongest green wine and only those who had drunk too much of it would head out on to the steppe now.

I had pointed this out to young Vladimir after we had been hauled out of the pit the morning Sviatoslav's death was announced in Novgorod and after I had told him of the hoard and how the Oathsworn were a benefit to him.

'If what you say is true,' he answered in his strong, high voice, 'then this man Lambisson from Birka is already out on the steppe and every day we leave him, the closer he comes to my silver hoard.'

And he looked at me with his clear blue eyes on either side of a frown.

His silver hoard. Dobrynya saw the sick look on my face and offered only a throaty grunt of a laugh from the other side of the table, where I had spent an hour explaining why we should not be staked like Danica, the thrall woman.

'By the time we have done with the rites for your father, the meetings with your brother's representatives and preparing for such an expedition,' Dobrynya then said gently to his young prince, 'it may well be so late in the year as to be better waiting for the thaw.'

Vladimir shook his head angrily. 'Uncle, my brothers may not wait.'

He had the right of it there, sure enough and all that Dobrynya had spoken of was simply time wasted for Vladimir, so that he was fretted like a dog's jaw with impatience.

It took two days of tough talking with the veche and a deal of promises here and there to get them to accept the thrall woman as their only victim. It was finally managed with some cunning from Dobrynya, who told the veche that young Vladimir would not sully the memory of his father with the blood of common criminals. That one they bowed to.

So we were released, but kept in the fortress, supposedly for our own protection, for the next five days. On the sixth day, as Vladimir and all Novgorod prepared to enter into the rituals to mourn the loss of Sviatoslav, Jaropolk's hounds appeared at the gates.

Sveinald and his son Lyut they knew them as here, the father a grizzled old Dane who had served Sviatoslav as a general and who had brought back the remnants of the army after his master's death. Now he advised Vladimir's elder brother Jaropolk, as Dobrynya advised Vladimir.

Jaropolk, though eldest of the three Rus princes, was barely into his teens and easily swayed. Sveinald and Lyut had always been an arrogant pair and now that they held their young prince in thrall they acted as if they ruled Kiev and not he.

They had arrived as Jaropolk's representatives, to honour the funeral rites for Sviatoslav — at least, on the front of it. In reality, they were here to find out what Vladimir would do and had brought at least a hundred men, seasoned druzhina warriors with their armour and big red shields marked with a yellow algiz rune, which had been the symbol of Rurik when he had founded Kiev. Shield, it meant, and alertness, too — but now the Kiev Slavs called it 'a golden trident' from the shape, which was like one of those three-tined forks.

It took four days to send Sviatoslav to the halls of his gods, four days of wailing and bowing and kneeling and bloody sacrifice round Perun's pole, where horse heads were stuck on stakes and young Vladimir exhausted himself, the gore dripping off his elbows. But everyone agreed he had done well for a boy of twelve.

At night he had no rest, having to preside over the feasts in the kreml hall, where his men and the druzhina of old Sveinald snarled at each other, barely leashed. Here, the high table was a tafl game of words as Sveinald tried to find out if Vladimir was going to acknowledge Jaropolk as Prince of all the Rus or resist him and young Vladimir and his uncle tried not to say one thing or the other. Oleg, the third brother, I noted, was not considered at all.

The rest of the Oathsworn had turned up by this time, summoned south from Aldeigjuborg and having brought the Elk with them. Gizur insisted on this despite the sweat and labour on a river already porridge thick during the day and iced over every night, for he did not want it left almost untended near Dragon Wings.

'Klerkon's crew is divided,' he reported. 'Dragon Wings is too laid up for winter to sail and the way out to the Baltic is frozen solid anyway. Half of them are swearing revenge on us, led by Randr Sterki. The other half is leaving, in twos and threes. Most of those are hoping to take service with Vladimir, so they are coming here. They wanted to sail down with us, for they knew we were crew light, but I thought it best to let them find their own way.'

I had all this to chew over — and Finn, scowling-angry because, he said, I had handed away the secret of Atil's tomb, without even a guarantee that we would get anything out of it. We had our lives, I pointed out to him and he grudgingly admitted that to be true, though it did nothing for his mood and it was a foolish man who crossed Finn at times like this.

There is always a fool when you don't need one. Lyut had been elbowing and snarling among his own druzhina on the last feast night. You could see that they were used to it, deferring to him because he was Sveinald's boy and had power over them as a result.

So, flushed and strutting, he made a mistake when Finn slid on to an ale bench to talk to someone he knew slightly.

'You are in my place,' he snarled and Finn looked up in surprise.

'Perhaps, though I do not see your name on it. I will not be here long — look, there is a place here and another over there.'

'Move,' Lyut answered, 'when your betters order it.'

Finn turned. There was silence now from those closest, a silence that spread slowly out, like the ripples from a dipped oar.

'Betters?' he said, raising an eyebrow.

'In fact,' Lyut said, sneering, 'so much better you should kiss my foot and acknowledge it.'

He put his foot up on the same bench Finn sat on. No-one spoke. Sveinald, grinning over his ale horn, looked at Dobrynya, then at Vladimir. It was a challenge, pure and simple and all the ruffs were up now. I did not dare speak; no-one did. The silence began to hurt.

Then Finn grinned, a loose, wicked grin. He inclined his head, as if in acceptance and Lyut smirked. Finn handed his ale horn to his neighbour, then placed both his hands on Lyut's ankle and raised the foot to his lips.

I was stunned. Most of us were. I saw Kvasir half rise in outrage — then there was a yelp from Lyut, for Finn had kept on going, straightening with Lyut's foot in his hands, forcing the man to hop like a mad bird to keep his balance.

With a final, dismissive gesture, Finn threw the foot in the air and Lyut went over with a yell and a crash.

'Kiss my arse, boy,' Finn said, dusting his hands. The hall erupted with hoots and bellows and catcalls and it was clear that half of Sveinald's men were drunk enough to be pleased to see Lyut sprawled in the sick and spilled drink.

Finn was no fool. A man with no clever in him at all would have turned back to his ale horn and the backslaps and appreciative howls of laughter and Lyut, coming off the floor in a scrabbling rush, whipping the seax from his boot, would have had him in the liver and lights.

Instead, Lyut found his knife hand slapping into the iron grip of Finn's left. When he swung a wild fist with the other, he found it shackled in Finn's right. Then Finn grinned his wolf grin and butted Lyut, so that the snarling boy's handsome beak of a nose splayed and blood flew.

Lyut fell backwards, over an ale bench and into the hearth-fire. It took no more than an eyeblink or two to realize he was not getting up on his own, but his hair was on fire by then. Those nearest dragged him out and beat out the flames.

Now Sveinald's men were roaring and growling with anger, for this was another matter entirely. Sveinald himself kept his seat, his knuckles white on the fancy gilt-rimmed horn.