“He was tempted,” said Skaldfinn. “Whatever you may say, Thorvin, there is something of Othin in him.”
“It would have been the greatest slaughter since men came to these islands,” added Geirulf. “The Franks on the beach were worn out and helpless. And the English churls would have had no mercy.”
The priests of the Way sat again in their holy circle, around the spear and the fire, within the rowan cords. Thorvin had picked great bunches of the freshest berries of autumn. Their bright scarlet answered the sunset.
“Such a thing would have brought us the worst of luck,” said Farman. “For with such a sacrifice it is essential that no loot or profit be taken. But the English would not have regarded that. They would have robbed the dead. Then we would have had against us both the Christian God and the wrath of Allfather.”
“Nevertheless he did not shoot the dart,” said Thorvin. “He held his hand. That is why I say he is not a creature of Othin. I thought so once. Now I know better.”
“You had better tell us what you learned from his mother,” said Skaldfinn.
“It was like this,” Thorvin began. “I found her easily enough, in the village of her husband the heimnar. She might not have talked to me, but she loves the girl—concubine's daughter though she is. In the end she told me the story.
“It was much as Sigvarth told it—though he said she enjoyed his attentions and she… Well, after what she suffered it is not surprising that she spoke of him only with hatred. But she bore him out up to the time when he lay with her on the sand, put her in the boat, and then left her and went back to his men and their women on the beach.
“Then, she said, this happened. There was a scratching on the boat's gunwale. When she looked over, in the night, there was a small boat alongside, just a skiff, with a man in it. I pressed her to know what sort of man, but she could remember nothing. Middle-aged, middle-sized, she said, neither well-dressed nor shabby. He beckoned to her. She thought he was a fisherman who had come out to rescue her, so she got in. He pulled out well clear of the beach, and rowed her down the coast, saying never a word. She got out, she went home to her husband.”
“Maybe he was a fisherman,” put in Farman. “Just as the walrus was a walrus and the skoffin was a foolish boy afraid of keeping watch on his own.”
“I asked her—did he not want a reward? He could have taken her home. Her kin would have paid him, if not her husband. She said he just left her. I pressed her on this, I asked her to remember every detail. She said one more thing.
“When the stranger got her to shore, she said, he pulled the boat up on the beach and looked at her. Then she felt suddenly weary and lay down among the seaweed. When she woke, he had gone.”
Thorvin looked round. “Now, what happened when she lay in this sleep we do not know. I would guess that a woman would know by some sign if she had been taken in her sleep, but who is to say? Sigvarth had been with her not long before. If she had any suspicion, she would have nothing to gain by mentioning it. Or remembering it. But that sleep makes me wonder.
“Tell me now.” Thorvin turned to Farman. “You who are the wisest of us, tell me how many gods there are in Asgarth.”
Farman stirred uneasily. “You know, Thorvin, that is not a wise question. Othin, Thor, Frey, Balder, Heimdall, Njorth, Ithun, Tyr, Loki—those are the ones we speak of most. But there are so many others in the stories: Vithar, Sigyn, Ull…”
“Rig?” asked Thorvin carefully. “What do we know of Rig?”
“That is a name of Heimdall,” said Skaldfinn.
“A name,” mused Thorvin. “Two names, one person. So we hear. Now, I would not say this outside the circle, but it comes to me sometimes that the Christians are right. There is only one god.” He looked round at the shocked faces. “But he—no, it—has different moods. Or parts. Maybe the parts compete against each other, as a man may play chess, right hand against left, for sport. Othin against Loki, Njorth against Skathi, Aesir against Vaenir. Yet the real contest is between all the parts, all the gods, and the giants and monsters who would bring us to Ragnarok.
“Now, Othin has his way of making men strong to help the gods when they shall stand against the giants on that day. That is why he betrays the warriors, chooses the mightiest of them to die. So they will be in his hall the day the giants come.
“But it is in my mind that maybe Rig too has his way. You know the holy story? How Rig went through the mountains, met Ai and Edda and begot on Edda, Thrall. Met Afi and Amma and begot on Amma, Carl. Met Fathir and Mothir and begot on Mothir, Jarl. This jarl of ours has also been thrall and carl. And who is the son of Jarl?”
“Kon the Young,” said Farman.
“Which is to say
“Which is King,” said Farman.
“Who can deny our jarl that title now? He is acting out the story of Rig in his own life. Of Rig and his dealings with humanity.”
“Why is the god Rig doing this?” asked Vestmund, priest of Njorth. “And what is Rig's power? For I confess, I know nothing of him but the story you tell.”
“He is the god of climbers,” replied Thorvin. “And his power is to make men better. Not through war, like Othin, but through skills. There is another old story you know, about Skjef the father of Skjold—which is to say, Sheaf the father of Shield. Now the kings of the Danes call themselves the sons of Skjold, the war-kings. Yet even they remember that before Skjold the war-king there was a peace-king, who taught men how to sow and reap, instead of living like animals by the chase. What I think has happened now is that a new Sheaf has come, however we pronounce the name, to free us from sowing and reaping and living only from one harvest to the next.”
“And this is ‘the one who comes from the North,’ ” said Farman doubtfully. “Not of the blood or tongue. One who has allied himself with Christians. It is not what we expected.”
“What the gods do is never what we expected,” replied Thorvin.
Shef watched the gloomy procession of disarmed Frankish warriors filing after their king aboard the ships that would take them home. With them Alfred had insisted on sending not only the papal legate and the Franks' own Churchmen, but also the archbishop of York, and his own Bishop Daniel of Winchester, Erkenbert the deacon and all the English clerics who had failed to oppose the invaders. Daniel had screamed threats of eternal damnation for the excommunicate at him, but Alfred had remained unmoved. “If you cast me out of your flock,” he had remarked, “I shall begin my own. One with better shepherds. And dogs with sharper teeth.”
“They will hate you forever for that,” Shef had said to him.
“That is another thing we must share,” Alfred had replied.
And so they had done their deal.
Both men single, without heirs. They would be co-kings, Alfred south of the Thames, Shef north of it, at least as far as the Humber, beyond which there still lurked the Snakeeye and his ambitions. Each named the other as his heir. Each agreed that within his dominion, belief in the gods should be free, for Christians, for Way-folk, and for any other that should appear. But no priest of any religion should be allowed to take payment, in goods or in land, except for a service agreed upon beforehand. And Church-land should revert to the crown. It would make them the richest kings in Europe, before long.
“We must use the money well,” Shef had added.
“In charity?”
“In other ways too. It is often said that no new thing can come before its time, and I believe it. But I believe also that there can be a time for a new thing, and then men can stifle it. Or churches can stifle it. Look at our machines and our crossbows. Who could say they could not have been made a hundred years ago, or five hundred, in the time of the Rome-folk? Yet no one made them. I want us to get back all the old knowledge, even the numbercrafts of the
Now, still watching the files of captives embarking, Alfred turned to his co-king and said, “I am surprised you still refuse to wear the hammer of our banner. After all, I still wear the cross.”
“The Hammer is for the Way, united. And Thorvin says he has a new sign for me. I will have to see if I approve of it, for the choice is a difficult one. He is here.”
