Crowbone

Eric, of course, is a historical character, as is his wife, Gunnhild, the arch-nemesis of Crowbone since before he was born. Gunnhild’s reputation for seidr magic was already legendary when she married Eric and included her living with two Sami wizards to learn all their magic — then she set Eric to kill them and married him.

There are also accounts of her helping in the killing of some of her husband’s brothers and other enemies by poisoning or raising storms to drown their ships. She was reputed to go into prolonged trances — the essence of seidr — transform herself into a bird and in that guise cross great distances over land and sea, spy out the movements of hostile armies from the air, or listen to the conversations of unsuspecting enemies. She had Crowbone’s father killed, but missed the wife, Astrid — and the unborn son, young Olaf Tryggvasson, otherwise known as Crowbone.

Eric’s youngest half-brother, Haakon, ousted Eric from Norway in 934 and, after unsuccessful attempts to get it back, Eric and Gunnhild and their sons moved to Orkney and then to the Viking Kingdom of Jorvik (York). His rule here was turbulent and he was ousted at least once, by the Viking king of Dyfflin, Olaf Cuarans, but regained the throne. He lost it, finally, when he was expelled by the populace and betrayed by Osulf, high-reeve of Bamburgh, and killed at Stainmore in 954.

The hunt for the axe takes Crowbone to a part of the world I had avoided with the first Oathsworn novels, simply because it was a route well travelled in other books — but the North Sea coast, from the Isle of Man to Orkney is an interesting place in the late tenth century. The Dyfflin Norse are humbled by the emergent Irish, first under the High King Mael Sechnaill at the Battle of Tara and then at Clontarf some thirty years later, under Brian Boru. At the same time, the Scots are slowly emerging as Alba while the last of the Picts cling to parts of the far north, a shadow of their former greatness; their fortress at Torridun (or Torfness) can still be seen today, as formidable earthworks at Burghead.

The Sami (Lapps) of the far north have already gained a place in Viking folklore as a strange, highly magical people and so were perfect for keepers of Eric’s Bloodaxe.

Gunnhild, according to the Jomsviking Saga, returned to Denmark in 977 and was drowned in a bog on the order of King Harald — a suicidal visit and not, in my opinion, in keeping with the cunning old spaekona. I prefer the alternative version of her fate that has her imposing herself on Orkney and dying there circa 980. She had eight sons — including the most famous of them, Harald Fairhair — and a daughter and, as far as I can ascertain, Gudrod was the last of them.

This, however, is the story of the emergence of Crowbone, Olaf Tryggvasson, already forging the reputation for hardness that will carry him all the way to the throne of Norway and, even as a stripling, determined to be first on his own boat rather than second on one belonging to the Oathsworn of Orm Bear-Slayer.

As ever, this is best told round a warming fire in the crouching dark; any errors or omissions I claim as my own — but do not let them spoil the tale.