The White Raven

glared at each other and I saw, in that moment, that Kveldulf was more afraid than the boy.

'That was a harsh wind,' noted Hauk Fast-Sailor.

'If it had not been for the timely warning, it would have been harsher still,' growled Gyrth, slogging heavily up through the snow which lay hock-deep in the V of the balka. His tattered furs trailed behind him like tails.

'Worth an armring,' I said, turning to Morut, who was grinning into the tangle of lines his journey had ploughed into his face. 'Which I promise when I can get it off my arm in the warm.'

He acknowledged it with a bow and then turned his grin on the scowling Avraham.

'See? I have returned, as I said I would,' he declared. 'The steppe cannot kill me and I hear you have been seeking a way across the Great White, you who could not find your prick with both hands.'

Avraham, eyes ringed in violet in a face blue-white, had not the strength to answer, nor hide his relief that Morut was back.

Led by the little tracker, we hauled the horses down the balka to where it shallowed and opened out into a great expanse of opaque ice, tufted with rimed grass and across which the new snow of the buran drifted in a hissing wind. This let us backtrack to where the carts were, but so many horses were dead that a score of carts were abandoned and anything that could be was left with them.

No horses remained for the druzhina and even little Vladimir was on foot now Cleverest of us all were Thorgunna and Thordis, who had the frozen horse carcasses chopped up and loaded on to a cart, with the smashed-up wood from several others. Now we had food and wood to cook it with, even if Finn said he was hard put to decide which of the two items would be more tasty.

'I thought you could make anything tasty,' Thorgunna chided, her wind-scoured cheeks like apples as she smiled and Finn humphed with mock annoyance, staring with a rheumy eye at one stiff, hacked off pony haunch.

'You boil it in a good cauldron with one of its own horseshoes,' he growled. 'It will be tasty when the shoe is soft.'

The rest of the carts we burned that night, making camp there and hauling out the large cooking kettles to boil more meat in, as much as we could. Horseshoe or not, we had heat and full bellies that night, enough to stitch us together again. We, who seemed set to die this day or the next, even started to talk about what lay ahead.

'Another storm like that will end us,' growled Red Njal and little Prince Vladimir scowled at his elbow, for we were all one sorry band now, leaching the same heat from the same fire.

'We will succeed,' he piped and no-one spoke until Morut fell to telling us of his journey.

He had tracked the Man-Haters a long way, down a balka filled with ice to a big frozen lake with an island. All the way, he had come upon ruined carts, dead horses and dead men; those of Lambisson. He had seen no women, though — but the brass-coloured horse, he said, was dead of cold and hunger, as were others that were clearly steppe ponies. Avraham groaned at the loss of the heavenly horse.

That, I offered up, was a good sign, for surely now it meant all the Man-Haters had died. Save one, I thought to myself, for you cannot kill the fetch who owned that sheened horse, or swung the twin of my sabre. I had not planned to say anything, but reached up one hand to touch the rag-wrapped bundle of the sabre on my back and caught Finn's knowing eye across the fire.

He growled and would have spat his disgust, save that he was nestling Thordis in the crook of his arm and thought better of it.

'There's no Hild-fetch, Trader,' he said. 'That bitch-tick is long dead.'

He knew I did not believe him and I looked for Kvasir to take my shieldless side in this argument, but he was wrapped in the arms of Thorgunna and asleep.

'Well, at least I know it isn't Fimbulwinter,' I offered them.

The I told them of my dream. A few, Gyrth among them, simply shrugged; they wanted to say that it was only a dream brought on by a dunt on the head, but kept their chapped lips together out of politeness to me. Others, though, were stronger in their belief.

'A witching form often brings the wise,' Red Njal declared, 'as my granny used to say. It seems to me that Trader Orm has just made a good deal with Odin.'

He beamed, but Finn had the look of man more concerned that his jarl talked with gods in his dreams, while Klepp Spaki was interested in the riddle, but added that thinking it out was like trying to row into a headwind.

'A sea-farer at last, are we?' growled Hauk, though he grinned when he said it. Klepp, who had discovered he had no legs or stomach for the sea, acknowledged his lack with a rueful smile.

Finn eventually growled that there was nothing much about my visit with All-Father and I did not know whether to be relieved or angry at that.

'After all,' he went on, 'it has told nothing more than we know already — even that part about a sacrifice of something held dear. Odin always wants something expensive draining lifeblood on an altar. It might even be me, since I took the valknut sign after the vow I made in the pit prison in Novgorod.'

'In return for what?' asked Sigurd, his silver nose gleaming in the firelight. Finn shifted uncomfortably, looking at little Prince Vladimir; what he had wished for was the death of that little prince and thought he had got it, too, when we heard the bells ring out.

Of course, it was the boy's father who had died and Finn simply put that difference down to not being specific with a shapechanger such as Odin — . but we had still been got out of the prison. The memory let me save Finn's face.

'To be free of the prison,' I offered up, smooth as new silk. Finn nodded eagerly and thanked me with his eyes. Vladimir frowned, considering the answer; he had an unhealthy interest in comparing the advantages of different gods.

'I am thinking,' piped up a voice, 'that the reason men give offerings to Thor is because he is less likely to betray them than All-Father Odin.'

All heads swung to Crowbone, sitting hunched in his cloak and blooded by firelight.

'What do you know of the betrayal of gods?' asked Gyrth curiously and those who knew Crowbone's early life stirred and wished he had never voiced the question.

Little Olaf favoured Gyrth with his lopsided look and cleared his throat.

'I know the treachery of gods and men both,' he said and brought one hand out of his cloak to take a twig and poke the fire so that sparks flew and the flames licked up. Few men wanted to back away from it, all the same, even though their hair was scorching, for we all knew we would be a long time cold after this.

'There once was a shepherd,' he said and there was a whisper like sparks round the fire, the relish and apprehension of a tale from Olaf.

'It was at the end of a deep and dark winter, almost as bad as this one. He brought his sheep into the field to find some grazing and sat down under a tree to rest. Suddenly a wolf came out of the woods. A lord of wolves, it was, with a ruff as white as emperor salt and a winter-hunger that had his chops dripping.'

''I know that hunger well,' interrupted a voice and was shushed to silence.

'The shepherd picked up his spear and jumped up,' Crowbone went on. 'The wolf was just about to spring at the man when he saw the spear and thought better of it, for it had a fine, silver head and he did not like the idea of a shepherd with so clever a weapon. They stared at each other and neither dared to make the first move.

'At that moment, a fox came running by. He saw that the wolf and the shepherd were afraid of each other and decided to turn the situation to his own advantage. He ran up to the wolf and said: 'Cousin, there is no reason to be afraid of a man. Jump on him, get him down and have a good meal.'

'The wolf eyed him with an amber stare and said: 'You are cunning, right enough, but you have no brains. Look at him — he has a silver spear, which is surely magical. He will stab me and that will be the end of me. Be off with your stupid advice.'

'The fox thought for a moment, then said: 'Well, if that is the way of it, I will go and ask him not to stab you. What will you give me if I save you?'

'The wolf told him he could have anything he asked for, so the fox ran to the shepherd and said: 'Uncle shepherd, why are you standing here? The wolf wants to make a meal of you. I just persuaded him to wait a while. What will you give me if I save you?'