Styrbjorn suddenly thrust forward, eager as a bounding pup — if he had had a tail it would have shaken itself off.
‘You are Czcibor,’ he declared and the man, frowning at this breach of manners, nodded curtly.
‘Ah, well,’ Styrbjorn went on, ‘then we are related, after a fashion, for my uncle is married to your niece. I am Styrbjorn…’
Czcibor held up a hand, which was as good as a slap in the face to Styrbjorn. When he spoke, it was a slow, languid, serpent-hiss of sound, made worse by the mush-mess he made of the Norse.
‘Styrbjorn. Yes. I know of you. My niece sent word of it down the Odra.’
I saw Styrbjorn stiffen and pale at that, which he had not been expecting.
‘I shall have a stake cut especially for you,’ Czcibor went on. ‘And for the little monk who killed the woman Jasna. Perhaps I will make it the same one for you both.’
My stomach roiled and my knees started to twitch against the rough wood of the rampart stakes, where I had braced them. For a man with a name like a fire in a rainstorm he could summon up a mighty vision.
‘An interesting idea,’ I managed eventually. ‘I would enjoy watching it under other circumstances. But we are all comfortable here and our arses free from stakes and a lot more dry than yours will be, by and by.’
He cocked his head sideways a little, appraising me; I had made it clear that I knew his predicament — he could not surround the
All he could do was attack and be done with the business as fast as possible, which was a hard option — but this was a man come fresh from victory and unmoved by such problems. He nodded politely, put on his splendid helm, dragged out a spear and, with a swift throw and a gallop off, hurled it over the ramparts as the signal that the bloody matter had commenced. It skittered on the hard ground behind me and a few men scattered, cursing the surprise of it.
‘That went well,’ Finn declared, grinning, then scowled and thumped Styrbjorn’s shoulder, making the youth stagger. ‘You nithing arse.’
Styrbjorn had no answer to it and slunk away while others who heard about his fawning attempt to wriggle over to safety jeered him.
And Dark Eye came to me, snuggling under my arm — which gained us both a couple of scowls from those who saw a sweetness they were not allowed — so that she could whisper softly.
‘He asked for me.’
I had guessed that and had made quiet warding signs to prevent him voicing it in Norse for all to hear; let the Oathsworn think they were sieged here for the settlement we slaughtered, for if they suspected Dark Eye was the cause, they would hurl her to them in an eyeblink.
Yet it nagged me, that thought, for there was a whiff of betrayal and oath-breaking in it. Worse, there was the thought that this was what the Sea-Finn’s drum had spoken of, so that defying it was standing up and spitting in Odin’s one eye. I thought I heard Einar’s slow, knowing chuckle as I turned away, whirling with mad thoughts of how to get folk out of these closing wolf-jaws.
Them, of course. Not me. I was only offering prayers to Frey and Thor and any other god I could think of to help convince AllFather to spare me long enough to see the crew away.
All the rest of that day we worked to improve our lot, comforted by the distant sound of axe-work in hidden trees; the Pols were making scaling ladders and would not attack before that was done.
Just as the dusk smoked in and we lit fires and torches, Finn came back from where he had been checking the watchers on the river wall; there were skin-boats on the river, crude and hastily made, carrying one man to row and one man to shoot.
‘The ground between the river and the wall is sodden, knee-deep at least,’ he added. ‘It will take four, perhaps five days for the water to seep away back to the river and even then a man will be hard put to walk through it without sinking to the cods.’
We ate together, waving off clouds of insects under the awning of the sail, for no-one wanted to be inside one of the houses, as if the air was thicker with rot there than elsewhere. I made a Thing of it, once they were licking their horn spoons clean.
To get away we would have to cross the bog down to the river, go in quietly, so as not to annoy the watchers in boats, then drift downstream a way to safety. Those who could not swim should fill bladders with air to stay afloat — there were sheep and goats enough for it — and we could try this when the bog had dried out, in five days.
By then we would be ankle-deep in blood, which I did not mention, and there would have to be men on the ramparts to let the others escape, which I did.
‘I will be one,’ I said, hoping my voice would not crack like my courage at the thought. ‘It would be helpful to have a few more, but I do not demand this.’
‘I will stay,’ said Crowbone at once and Koll piped up bravely on his heels. I saw Alyosha stiffen at that, so I shook my head.
‘Not this time, little Olaf,’ I said to Crowbone. ‘I need you to make sure Koll Brandsson gets back to his father.’
‘I will stay,’ Koll shrilled.
‘You will obey your foster-father,’ growled Finn, ‘whose duty it is to keep you safe.’
The white head drooped. Crowbone paused a moment, then nodded at me; from the corner of my eye, I caught Alyosha’s relief.
‘I will be at your shieldless side,’ Finn declared and I acknowledged it; one by one, men stood up and were counted, each louder than the last and each into cheers louder than the one before. At the edge of them, Randr Sterki glowered in silence, offering nothing.
In the end, I had to turn men down, keeping ten only — Abjorn, Ospak, Finnlaith, Murrough, Finn, Rovald, Rorik Stari, Kaelbjorn Rog, Myrkjartan and Uddolf. We broke out a barrel of the fiery spirit that passed for drink in this part of the world and men fell to flyting each other with boasts of what they would do in the morning.
Later, as the fire collapsed to showers of sparks and glowing embers, Finn and I walked the guardposts, pausing in the tower over the gate to stare out at the field of red, flickering blooms which marked the camp of our enemy.
Beyond it, the night was silver and grey, soaked with the scent of a rain-wind, fresh-cut wood and torn earth; the moon, blurred and pale, darted from cloud to cloud, as if trying to hide from the all-devouring wolf which chased her.
‘Will you tell them about the girl?’ Finn growled and I felt neither alarm nor surprise; Finn was no fool.
‘They would hand her over,’ I answered flatly and he nodded.
‘Aye — was this not what the Sea-Finn’s drum meant? Can you stand against it? Defy that wyrd?’
I must and hoped he would not ask me the why of it, for I had no answer. Every time I thought of it, all I saw were her great, seal eyes.
He nodded again when I howked all this out.
‘Is she so worth it then, that everyone here has to die? Even if both you and she get away, I am thinking Thorgunna will not be happy to see a second wife come into her home. I am thinking also that the Mazur girl is not the sort to be settled with being a second wife. If anyone makes it out of here at all — you are under the eye of Odin, after all.’
I had churned this to rancid butter night after night, after every furtive, frantic coupling we had stolen and had no answer for him.
‘Tell Red Njal to get her away to safety when the time comes,’ was all I could manage. ‘Tell him to take her back to Hestreng. I charge him with that and taking Koll home.’
Finn nodded, a twist of a smile on his face. ‘Aye — I wondered why you did not include Njal in your hopeless
There was a noise and a figure that turned us; she came up the ladder to the tower, wrapped in her too-large cloak and it was clear she had heard us talk. Her eyes had vanished in the dark so that her face, pale and seemingly pitted with two large holes, looked like a savage mask.
