One King's Way

Karli grinned even more broadly than before, and dropped his hands. “I expect you know some things too—a seafarer like you, with a spear and a sword as well. I have never been outside the Ditmarsh—hardly ever outside this village. How about a trade? I will show you what I know, and you show me what you know. I could soon teach you how to strike and guard with your fists, like we do here in the Ditmarsh. You move very fast. Too fast for most of these ploughboys.”

“A trade,” Shef agreed. He spat on his palm and looked at Karli to see if he understood the gesture. The other grinned, and spat too. The pair slapped palms violently to seal the bargain.

As Shef wiped the blood from his nose with the back of his sleeve, they resumed their companionable squat.

“Now listen,” said Karli. “You've more important things to learn right now than fist-fighting. My old man has gone out to tell the village you're here. They'll assemble outside, make the ring, and decide what to do with you.”

“What are their choices?”

“First off”, someone will say you're a slave. That'll be Nikko. He's the richest man in the village. Wants to be a lord. But silver is short in the Ditmarsh, and we never make slaves of each other. Having someone to sell in the market at Hedeby is what he thinks about all the time.“

“Hedeby is a Danish town,” said Shef.

Karli shrugged. “Danish, German, Frisian, we don't care. No-one tries any tricks on the Ditmarsh. They couldn't find the path through the fens. And anyway, they know there's no silver here. Lot to lose for a tax-collector, nothing much to gain.”

“If I don't want to be a slave, what's the other choice?”

“You could be a guest-friend.” Karli looked at him sideways. “Like with me. That means exchanging gifts.”

Shef felt his biceps, regretting the last-minute decision yesterday to strip the gold bracelets from them. One of those would have bought him hospitality for a year. Or a knife in the back. “What do I have, then? A spear. A sword. And this.” He pulled the silver pole-ladder of Rig from under his tunic, and glanced across at Karli to see if he recognized the sign. No interest there. But Karli had glanced more than once at the weapons propped in the corner.

Shef stepped over to them, picked them up for a closer look. The spear with the ‘Gungnir’ runes: excellent steel, glinting new-forged, a beautiful balance in the hand. The sword: serviceable enough, but a little too heavy, the blade mere sharpened iron without a specially welded edge, beginning already to pock slightly with rust. Swords were more valuable than spears, the mark of the professional warrior besides. Still…

Shef held out the sword. “Take this, Karli.” He noted the way the young man took it, the way he held the blade slightly off the square, disastrous for a parry. “And I will give you two more things. One, I will show you how to use the sword. Two, if ever we stay by a forge, I will forge it again for you to make it a better weapon.”

The freckled face flushed with pleasure as the door opened. Karli's father came in, jerked a thumb over his shoulder.

“Come, stranger,” he said. “The doom-ring is outside.”

Some forty men stood outside in a rough circle, their wives and children forming a larger circle outside them. All the men were armed, but not well—spears and axes, but no mail or helmets. A few had shields on their shoulders, but not strapped on ready for use.

What the Ditmarshers saw emerging from the hut was a tall warrior, his calling unmistakable from his bearing: straight back, wide shoulders, no sign of the stoop or the cramped muscles of the peasant who had to follow a plow or bend every day over hoe or sickle. Yet he bore no gold or silver on him, carried only the long spear in his right hand. He was scarred as well, with one eyelid drooping over a sunken socket, and the whole side of his face seeming drawn in. Unnoticed blood smeared his face, and his plain tunic and breeches were dirtier than a peasant's. The circle stared at him, unsure how to read these signals. There was a low mutter of comment as Karli emerged behind him, gripping in inexpert hands the sword he had been given.

Shef looked round, trying to appraise the situation. The waking feeling of calm and confidence was still with him, unshaken by the brush with Karli. Thoughtfully he pulled the silver Rig-pendant up on its chain so that it hung outside his tunic. Another mutter of comment, men peering closer to try to identify the sign. Some of the men watching, maybe a quarter of those present, similarly hitched pendants into view: hammers, boats, phalluses. None like Shef's.

The man directly facing Shef stepped forward, a bulky man in middle-age with a red face.

“You came from the ships,” he said. “You are a Viking, one of the robbers of the North. Even such as you should know better than to set foot on the Ditmarsh, where the free men live. We will enslave you and sell you to your kin at Hedeby. Or to the bishop's men at Hamburg. Unless there is someone who will pay to have you back— not likely, from the look of you.”

Some instinct drove Shef forward across the ring, sauntering slowly till he came face to face with his accuser. He looked at him, tilting his head back to accentuate his greater height.

“If you know I came from the ships,” he said, “you know there were two ships fighting. One was a Viking. It was the Frani Ormr, the great ship of Sigurth Ragnarsson. Did you not see the Raven Banner? The other one was mine, and Sigurth was running from it. Get me back to it and I'll give you a man's price in silver.”

“What kind of ships chase Viking ships?” said the burly man.

“English ships.”

The listening crowd made noises of surprise, disbelief. “It's true the first ship was a Viking,” said a voice. “But he wasn't running. He was leading on. And he fooled the other skipper proper. If that second ship was English they must all be fools. Mast and sail all wrong, too.”

“Take me back to it,” repeated Shef.

Karli's voice came from behind him. “He couldn't do it if he wanted to, stranger. No boats. We Ditmarshers are bold enough in the marsh, but half a mile out to sea and that's pirate water.”

The burly man flushed and glanced angrily round. “That's as may be. But if you've nothing else to say, one- eye, then what I said stands. You're my slave till I find a buyer. Hand over that spear.”

Shef tossed the spear in the air, caught it at its point of balance, and feinted a lunge. He grinned broadly as the other man jumped clumsily away, then turned his back on him, ignoring the threatening axe. He began to stroll round the circle, looking into face after face, and addressing his words directly to the pendant-wearers in the circle. They were just like the Norfolk farmers whose disputes he had so often judged as a jarl, he decided. Get their interest and exploit their village divisions.

“A strange thing,” he remarked. “Man gets washed up on the shore, might be alive, might be dead, what do you do with him? Where I come from, the fishermen, if they have the cash, put a silver ring in their ears. You know what that's for. So if they drown and their bodies come to shore, the folk are paid for burying them. The folk would bury them anyway, in duty, but they don't like the idea of taking a last service for nothing.

“Now here I am, no ring in my ear, but not dead either. Why should I get worse treatment? Have I done any harm? I've made a gift to your Karli there, and in exchange he's knocked me down, bloodied my nose, loosened my teeth, and given me a sore jaw—so we're all good friends.”

A rumble of amusement. As Shef had guessed, Karli was something between an object of admiration and a standing joke.

“Now what surprises me is our friend behind me.” Shef jerked a thumb over his shoulder at the burly man. “He says I'm a slave. Well, maybe. Says I'm his slave. Did I go to his house? Did he capture me single-handed in peril of his life? Maybe you all decided that anything that fell off a ship belonged to him. Is that right?”

This time a definite rumble of rejection, and what sounded like a loud breaking of wind from Karli.

“So what I suggest is this.” Shef had almost completed his circuit now, and was coming back face to face with the burly man. “If you want to make a slave of me, Nikko, then take me along to Hedeby and put me in the sale-ring. If you can make a sale, well and good. But then you must share the money with the village. Till you get to Hedeby, though, I stay free: no bonds, no collar. And I keep my spear. Sure, you can guard me as much as you like. Finally, till we get there I'll work for my keep.” Shef tapped his pendant. “I have a skill. I'm a smith. Give me a forge