Worse than that. Against the black sea and the sky Karli made out a shape, a fierce head lifted high, like a monster questing for swimmers. The dragon prow of one of King Halvdan's giant warships, out rowing his endless summer blockade. Karli could see the white splash of the oar-thresh, hear the rhythmic creak of the rowlocks, the grunting of the rowers as they put their weight on the oars. They were rowing very slowly, not going anywhere special, conserving their strength. Lookouts stood at prow and stern, alert for skippers trying to evade King Halvdan's taxes, for pirates sneaking by to raid Eastfold or Westfold. Karli lay down immediately on the plank, careless of the water soaking him. He dropped his face, pulled his hands back into their sleeves, trapped the oar beneath his body. On a dark night, he knew from much avoidance of husbands and fathers, nothing showed up more than white skin. He tried to look like a piece of floating wreckage, skin crawling as he imagined the bowmen taking aim.
The oars thundered in his ear, the door pitched and heaved as the bow-wave of the great warship went by. No challenge, no shot. As the stern-tail crawled past the corner of his eye he heard the lookout call something, an indistinct reply. Still no challenge. Nothing to do with him.
Carefully and shakily he climbed back on to his feet, retrieved the oar, began to scull slowly after the warship's receding stern. As he began to count off his strokes once more he felt the door begin to rise again beneath his feet. Another bow-wave? No, something greater, something closer, the whole clumsy contraption tipping over almost on to its side. Karli dropped on to his knees, clutched the edge, as he did so heard a great snort in the water not six feet away.
A fin his own size cruised gently past, standing straight up almost at right angles to the water. Beneath it a huge body rolled black and gleaming. Ahead of him the fin turned, cruised back to intercept. A head came out of the water, broad enough to engulf the door in one snap. Karli caught the flash of brilliant white barring beneath the black upper body, saw an intelligent eye observing him.
The killer whale, a bull orca out foraging for seals ahead of the rest of its school, considered tipping the man-thing off its floe and snapping it to pieces in the water, but decided against. Men-things were hardly fair prey, a gentle, irresistible voice told it. There was no excitement in chasing them. Sometimes porpoises followed their ships, and porpoises were a good catch. Not tonight. It ceased to follow the warship, ignored the thing on the floe, swam inexorably off to find its companions. Karli straightened again, realized the warmth inside his breeches was his own piss. Shakily he took up the scull, began to count off his strokes. This country was not safe. Both the men and the animals were just too big.
In their hut, the English catapulteers were preparing their breakfast and at the same time checking their weapons. Light was just showing in the sky, but ex-slaves rose early, out of habit. Besides, in spite of the pendants they all wore, in spite of being at the heart of their adopted religion, they felt uneasy, isolated, unsafe. Their leader had vanished, no-one knew where. They were surrounded by men of alien speech and unpredictable temper. In their hearts they knew that most of the Norsemen they met thought all foreigners were just slave-material waiting to be seized. They had come to Kaupang as men of a conquering army. Slowly their status seemed to be slipping away. If they were disarmed they would be back to tilling fields and herding goats, working under the lash once more. Without saying it, every one of them had determined that that was not to happen. If need be, they would have to break out. But how?
In the army of the Way in England there had been three main divisions: crossbowmen, halberdiers, catapulteers. No-one had made any effort to train them as swordsmen, though each carried a broad, single-edged seax-knife in his belt, as useful for firewood as for enemies. But Udd had made sure that each man there, whatever his original trade, carried and knew how to use one of the latest model crossbows, no longer wound by belt-pulleys, the spring-steel bow cocked instead by a long, pronged lever. It fitted under the bowstring and latched onto inset bolts. With a single, heaving effort the bow was cocked as the pull was exerted against a foot stirrup on the front of the bow's wooden frame. Osmod and three of the others also carried their unwieldy halberds, the combination axe and spear that Shef had invented for himself to make up for his lack of weight and training.
But the group's main weapon stood outside the hut: the mule, the stone-hurling catapult they had unshipped from the
There was one further innovation that no-one as yet had tried. Udd's invention of case-hardened steel as yet seemed all but useless. The material, once hardened, was too hard to work with any tools they had. Udd had suggested hardened crossbow-bolts, but as the others pointed out, the ones they had would go through any known armor anyway, so why bother? In the end Udd had made one thin round plate of the new steel, two feet in diameter, and pegged it on to a standard round shield of linden wood. Few warriors if any carried iron shields. The weight was so great that the shield could not be wielded for more than a few moments. Soft linden wood was used instead, to catch and trap the enemy's point or edge, usually with an iron boss as hand-guard. The plate Udd had made was so thin that if it had been normal iron it would have added no protection. But the case-hardened steel would turn any ordinary sword, spear or arrow, and weighed no more than a second layer of wood. Udd and the others had not yet worked out what the utility of the new shield was—none at all to men who fought as they did. It was a case where a new technique had not yet found a use.
At first, in the early-morning hubbub, no-one heard the scratching at the door. Then, as it was repeated, Cwicca paused. The rest fell silent. Fritha and Hama snatched up crossbows, cocked them. Osmod stepped to one side of the door, poised his halberd. Cwicca jerked out a peg, lifted the latch, swung the door open.
Karli fell in on hands and knees, barely able to support himself. The seven men inside gaped at him, then slammed the door shut and sprang to help.
“Get him on the stool,” snapped Osmod. “He's soaked. Hah, not all water either! Get his clothes off, one of you bring him a blanket. Rub his hands, Cwicca, he's half-frozen.”
Karli, supported on the stool, was pointing towards a mug. Osmod passed him the strong warmed beer, watched it go down in a dozen gulps. Karli finished, breathed out, sat up straighter.
“All right. I'll be all right in no time. Just cold and wet and dead-tired. But I've got news.
“First, Shef is alive, on Drottningsholm. The message he got was a trap but we got there just the same. So he's on the island, he's alive but he won't be much longer if he stays there. Trouble is, that queen of theirs is screwing him senseless and he won't leave. We're going to have to go and get him. But he won't come of his own free will and they've reinforced the guards over the bridges. And he's not the only one there who needs rescuing…”
Karli poured out his story to a ring of faces that grew grimmer as he went on. At the end Osmod silently passed him a refilled mug, looked at Cwicca, who as catapult-captain shared the leadership with him in Shef's absence.
“We've got to get him off. We could do it ourselves, but we'd never get away afterwards. That's what we've got to think about. Now, who in this place can we trust?”
“How about Hund the leech?” asked Cwicca.
Osmod considered a moment. “Yes, I'd like to have him with us. He's English, and he's the lord's oldest friend, and he's a Way-priest besides.”
“Thorvin the priest, then?” suggested one of the hammer-wearers. Faces round him twisted dubiously. Cwicca shook his head.
“He's more loyal to the Way than he is to King Shef. This is Way business, somehow. You can't tell which road he'd turn.”
“Can we trust any of these Norskers?” asked one of the others.
“Maybe Brand.”
A pause while they thought it over. Finally, Osmod nodded. “Maybe Brand.”
“Well, if we got him on our side, it's easy. He's nigh seven foot tall and built like a stone wall. He's the Champion of wherever-it-is, isn't he? He's just going to walk through them guards like piss through snow.”
“I'm not so sure about that,” muttered Osmod. “He got a sword right through his belly last year. They've
