“We call ourselves strong,” she said. “But what do we rule over? A few thralls and hirelings, some head of livestock. We call ourselves free. But we are bound as fast as any of them.”
“A great man sees beyond the rim of eyesight,” she said. “He makes of his life and his world what he will. In the minds of his men he stands higher, more beloved than their own fathers. Wealth flows into his hand, and he bestows it freely, so that all know his heart is as mighty as his arm. They flock to him from afar, with their gifts and tales and ventures. Skalds chant his praise. His name will live undying after him and his sons be thankful to him for what he wrought. You have the makings of a great man in you, Gudorm. I felt it when first I saw you. Let it not wither away!”
Such things did she say to him, not once but again and again, in many different ways and words. In the beginning he told her she was wrong, overweening, a woman who could not understand the doings of men. She gave him answers soft or hard, mild or icy, as she deemed best, and never pressed him too long. She merely came back to it, and back, year by year.
“I fear for us if Frodi becomes king,” she said when she was ready to. “He’s wild and wasteful. His heed is for nothing but himself. Ill will it go with Denmark. You and I may not yet be in the earth when the red cock crows here.”
“He’s your brother!” cried Gudorm.
Ulfhild smiled grimly. “Yes. Though we were raised apart, I know him well. The same blood runs in us both. But I am only a woman. I cannot do the harm he can.”
“The king has chosen him. Hadding’s other sons have goodly holdings, high standings, naught to chafe at. And I hear he’s made them swear oaths not to rise against Frodi.”
“Those men are not the only boughs on the tree of the Skjoldungs,” Ulfhild murmured.
He gaped at her. She sighed, turned her head, and said no more about that for a span.
But step by step she won him over to believing that he, even he, would be a far better king than Frodi. He was a young man, mettlesome, who often longed back to his days as a housecarle. Then he fared, feasted, and fought. They had been too few, those days. He felt as if his life were narrowing, dull little tasks among dull little folk. Ulfhild stoked the restlessness in him. Now and then they were guests at the king’s hall. Early on Gudorm brought home cheerful memories of those visits. Later he bore dreams that would not leave him in peace.
“But it would be madness to try overthrowing Frodi,” he groaned one day.
Ulfhild nodded. “Yes. However, what of forestalling him? Say he was abroad when Hadding dies. He is half the time anyway. A well-liked man with blood of Skj old in him, who won some fame as a warrior against the Jutes and Saxons, with Hadding’s own daughter to wife—if he trod boldly forward, he could make them hail him at enough Things that the rest would go along. Frodi would strike at him, but now Frodi would be the foe of the Danes, the outsider reaving our shores. Reckless as he is, he should soon fall in battle.”
“The, the new king—he who’d be the new king—he’d have to have strong backing.”
“Yes. It’s none too soon to start laying groundwork. Hadding is old. Who knows when something will take him off? A fall from his horse, a boar or bear he’s been hunting, a sudden storm as he crosses the Sound or sails among the islands, a sickness, an elfshot—who knows? For the sake of Denmark as well as ourselves and our sons, we should be taking forethought and quietly talking with men of weight.”
“They’d look on such thoughts as faithlessness.”
“I can tell you which of them will not, if you pick your words carefully. I’ve always kept my eyes and ears open.”
Another year passed before she said to him, “It’s not as if Hadding himself were a good king.”
They were walking alone at the end of a winter’s day. Thin snow crunched beneath their feet. A streak of cloud smoldered sullen where the sun had newly gone down, otherwise dusk deepened fast. Trees stood bare and black; the garth was a huddle of murk in the offing; closer loomed the grave-mound. Breath smoked white. A belated flight of crows cawed afar.
“What do you mean?” burst from Gudorm. “He leads us, he wards us!”
“Yes, as you lead and ward your kine. But I am thinking beyond that. Remember his life. He grew up among jotuns. He was the lover of his own foster mother. He dealt with witches, wizards, monsters, and who can say what other beings? Who can say he does not yet, to this very night? He slew a godling and fell under a curse for it. Has that ever really been lifted, or does it bide its time? He went down among the dead. He sails closer to the wind than any rightful skipper can. How much of him is human, how much is something else? Woe falls on a land whose king is wicked. Worse must befall a land whose king is a warlock or a troll.”
“He’s your father,” Gudorm whispered.
“I hate him.” Ulfhild’s voice shook. She stared straight before her into the gathering dark. “When he limps oft on hell-road, I will laugh aloud.”
“What wrong has he done you?”
“That I will never tell.” Nor did she ever. She left the words in his head like
