Viking's Sunset Read online

  Viking’s Sunset

  Contents

  About this Book

  Map

  1. The Barn-Burners

  2. The Sailing

  3. Cold Scent

  4. Distant Waters

  5. Haakon Redeye

  6. Westering

  7. Innuit

  8. The Cooking-Place

  9. Strange Cargo

  10. Landfall

  11. First Meeting

  12. Beothuk

  13. Heome

  14. Grey Wolf

  15. Journey Inland

  16. Long Sailing

  17. Algonkin

  18. Dawn and Brother-Trench

  19. The Lakes of the Gods

  20. The Gathering-Place of the Tribes

  21. Strange Partners

  22. The Fight on the Mound

  23. Settlement

  24. The Judgement of Gichita

  25. Long Snake’s Last Voyage

  About this Book

  This is the third and last book about Harald Sigurdson. In Viking’s Dawn, he was a lad of fifteen, voyaging in the longship Nameless to the Hebrides; in The Road to Miklagard, he and the giant Grummoch made the long journey down to Constantinople (now known as Istanbul) to join the Palace Guard there. Now, in Viking’s Sunset, Harald is a mature man and the date is AD 815.

  In this book he is a prosperous farmer, with a family of his own, who sails out from Norway on a voyage of revenge and, almost by accident, reaches Iceland and later the southern tip of Greenland, before setting off again, in Long Snake, to even stranger places …

  Here I should halt a moment to say that recorded history tells us that Iceland was discovered by one Naddodd in AD 867, and Greenland in AD 985, by Eric Röde who was flying from Norway to escape a charge of manslaughter.

  But I have a theory that recorded history, especially of the early voyages, often lags behind actual history. For instance, we don’t really know when the early Mediterranean travellers first ‘discovered’ Britain – though recorded history tells us that the Greek astronomer Pytheas came here in the fourth century BC. I would guess that a cautious scholar like Pytheas would have a pretty good idea, from unrecorded travellers’ yarns, what he was going to find!

  And so I feel justified in letting Harald Sigurdson anticipate Naddodd by a mere fifty-two years. After all, the longships of Harald’s time were superb creations, quite capable of the voyages I describe; and the questing spirit of the Northmen was as lively in AD 815 as it was in AD 867.

  In my other books I have tried to describe what Vikings were like, but to explain Viking’s Sunset I must add a little more. The Northmen were immensely brave and hardy; they were also savage and superstitious. They were still pagans when the rest of Europe had long become Christianised. In some ways they were like children – very dangerous children! To the Franks, English and Irish, they seemed like devils, and prayers were offered up in the churches as a protection against them. On the other hand, when the odds were in favour of the English, they treated these Northmen ruthlessly, even flaying them and nailing their skins on church doors, or flinging the ambushed marauders into adder-pits. There were no doubt faults on both sides, for in history no one is ever completely in the right.

  What attracts me most about the Northmen is their storytelling. From the Sagas we learn of many fantastic people and their incredible adventures, all told with the great craft and gusto of the Skald. Sometimes, these tales are full of repetition – as children’s fairy tales often are – and sometimes they are told so laconically, so briefly, that we almost have to guess what really happened! But almost always they are told with a dry and even a grim sense of humour, for the men of the North were not given to self-pity. They joked even in the face of death; which, after all, was to them only the beginning of a new life in Valhalla, the ‘Slaughter Hall’.

  In this book I have made an attempt to use the Viking style of storytelling, whenever it seemed right. I have also tried to show what a berserk was like, for I think that we must consider these strange creatures if we are to understand many of the things our curious forefathers did.

  The bullfighter, dressing up to go into the arena; the boxer, chatting with his seconds before a fight; the racing driver, laughing at a funny story in the ‘pits’ before the flag goes down, are all brave men: but they are taking a calculated risk, which they assume will bring them money – the more the better!

  The berserk, stamping himself into a fury, biting his shield-rim, bellowing in the cold air without a stitch on him, had no fortune to gain by his actions. If he saw anything awaiting him at all, it was a grimly-held wall of spear-points, just fifty yards away …

  Undoubtedly, the berserk was crazy; but, as Alan Breck said to Davy Balfour in Kidnapped, ‘Och, man, but am I no a bonny fechter!’ And who can help liking a bonny fechter, however crazy he may be?

  One more point: in Minnesota there was discovered a stone inscribed with Viking symbols. This fact struck no chord in my mind until one day an American boy who comes to see me said, ‘Didn’t you know, some of our archaeologists have found the prow of a longship in one of the lakes?’

  Then I did know – not in the historian’s way, but in the storyteller’s way – just what happened to Harald Sigurdson and his shipload of vikings!

  What I ‘know’ I am telling you in this book; but what Harald Sigurdson found out, he told to no man, for reasons which you will discover.

  HENRY TREECE

  1

  The Barn-Burners

  It was spring. Harald Sigurdson and Giant Grummoch were tending a sick cow up above Jagsfjord, with the wind blowing them half off their feet, when a shock-headed thrall came running up the hill to them.

  Grummoch heard him and said, ‘That is Jango No-breeches. When he runs the world’s end is near, for he is the laziest thrall between here and Miklagard.’

  Jango called out to them, long before he reached them, ‘Come quickly, masters!’

  Harald said, ‘If the meat is burning, turn the spit and roast the other side. This cow is in calf and it would ill become me to leave her because the meat was burning.’

  The thrall began to wring his hands. The wind carried away his words the first time. Then they heard him say, ‘The meat is burning with a vengeance, master. But it would ill become me to meddle with it.’

  Harald Sigurdson had grown into a stern man, with grey wolf’s hair, in the twenty years he had been headman of his village, after the death of Thorn. Now few men dared stand against him in his anger, save Jomsvikings or Russians from Kiev, and they did not come up the hill every day.

  But the thrall would not be silent. He ran to Harald and even took him by the sleeve of his leather jacket, which was a thing few men would have done save Giant Grummoch, who was his blood brother and the second father to Harald’s two sons, Svend and Jaroslav.

  The thrall said, ‘A wise man would come, even if twenty cows lay on the turf in calf, Harald Sigurdson. You have three barns a-burning, and your wife, Asa Thornsdaughter, leaving her broken loom in bitter tears over the wounds of your two sons.’

  Harald turned to him now and said, ‘I shall whip you for stealing the barley beer we had laid by for the Spring feasting, Jango No-breeches. You have fallen asleep and dreamed a dream. You listen too much to the skalds about the night-fires. Go back and dip your head in a bucket of water.’

  The thrall flung himself on to the turf and began to roll about, wailing, for he was of the Irish folk and given to such demonstrations. Grummoch picked him up with one hand and held him out before him like a girl’s rag doll, with his two legs dangling.

  ‘Say your message, if there is one, then go home like, a good dog,’ he said gruffly, his beard wagging close to the frightened thrall
’s face.

  Jango No-breeches said, ‘By Saint Colmkill and the Whitechrist, Haakon Redeye has been here while you were away. What torch has not done, axe has achieved. Down there is no more village left than a man could stow in a longship and carry away – and all charred timber.’

  Giant Grummoch put the man down.

  The thrall said, ‘I bring black news, not white, master. Many have gone to Odin in the last hour. Many have made the long dark journey and hang by their necks from the trees. Haakon Redeye brought eighty berserks with him, and only the young folk and the old were left in the village. How could they stand against eighty berserks with war axes and spears? Your sons were hurt with the others.’

  Harald said, ‘I do not ask if they are badly hurt, or near to death. I only ask if they carry their wounds on their chests.’

  The thrall nodded. ‘Aye, master,’ he said. ‘On their chests and their arms and their heads – but not on their backs.’

  Grummoch, who loved the two boys, took up a piece of black bog oak as thick as a man’s lower leg, and broke it across his thigh to show his rage.

  ‘In all the Northland,’ he said, ‘there is only one man who would do such things to old folk and young folk, and that man shall feel his neck snap like this twig before the day is over.’

  The thrall said, ‘Haakon Redeye has already sailed, master Giant. You must needs mount a swan and fly after him if you would catch him. But let us go down, and save what we can of the village. I am but a simple man and no warrior, but I counsel thus.’

  Harald said, ‘I am forty years old and looked to sit back in peace in my age. I thought my voyaging was over when I came from Miklagard, but now it seems I must put an edge on my sword again, if I can still lift it.’

  The thrall looked at Harald’s big muscles and his broad back, but did not speak, for he had learned not to interrupt warriors and shieldmen when they began their boasting.

  Harald said, ‘By this cow and her calf, I swear that I will harry Haakon Redeye to the edge of the world and will at last set his polished head on my shelf to smile at before this tale is over, for what he has done to me.’

  Grummoch, who had picked up the manners of the Northmen in his years beside the fjord, said, ‘When I have visited his berserks, they will ask each other why the thunder was so loud, and why the lightning came so suddenly. That is, if they still have heads to ask with.’

  Jango No-breeches said, ‘Come, come, masters. There will be time to bite the shield-rim and to bellow later, when you have seen what work is to be avenged.’

  Then he ran on along the slippery path towards the village and the others followed him, feeling it no shame to be led by a thrall, this time.

  2

  The Sailing

  It was as bad as the thrall had said. Out of thirty-seven houses, only six remained, and no barns.

  Harald looked at the old ones and the young ones who lay, no longer fearsome of the axe, and said, ‘To call this a bad business is to blow out hot air from the mouth. The only word is in the sword from this day forward. Where is my family?’

  The thrall led him to where Asa Thornsdaughter sat, weeping and rocking back and forth. Her two sons lay on a pallet of straw, their wounds covered with moss. Harald lifted the moss before he spoke to her and then said, ‘My boys have fought like warriors. Their wounds will heal, Odin be praised, for they are cleanly dressed.’

  Asa said through her tears, ‘Boys of ten and twelve should not be asked to carry wounds so early on, husband.’

  Harald said, ‘Asa, loved one, do you expect me to weep like a woman or a thrall when my sons are hurt? The old bear does not love to see his cubs mauled by the wolf – but he knows there is no profit in sitting howling. He knows that for a finger he must take an arm; for a hand, a head. The old bear will go after the wolf and seek his bargain, for Haakon Redeye is outlaw and wolf’s-head and will not stand before the Thing to receive sentence. He will not pay the blood money, so he must pay with his head.’

  Asa began to cry again, and put her apron over her face so that no one should see the wife of a Viking weeping.

  And when the other young men came back to the village, Harald met them and said, ‘There has been a slight mishap while you were away in the woods catching hares. The village has been burned down through an oversight of Haakon Redeye, and your families have been entertained by eighty of his berserks. It seems that he was so upset by the nuisance his visit has caused that he has gone away to hang his head in shame.’

  A young axe-warrior, given to fits when he was excited, stepped forward and ripped off his own shirt. His chest was covered with scars and so were his arms, from wrist to elbow.

  He shook a great axe in his right hand as though it were a little elder stick. ‘Before Thor and Odin,’ he said, ‘I will not rest until I have shamed Haakon’s head still further.’

  Harald said, ‘There you make a mistake, my friend. Haakon’s head is not yours for the shaming. I have laid claim to that prize already.’

  The young berserk bowed his head, but whispered to his nearest friend that Harald must take his chance when they ran up alongside Haakon Redeye, for in a case like this all men had equal rights, headman or henchmen.

  Then they drew out the longship from the creek where it was hidden under bracken and gorse, and they examined its timbers to see if it needed tarring again.

  Gudbrod Gudbrodsson said, ‘This steerboard side needs caulking, Harald Sigurdson, but there is no time to waste, and we have helmets to bale out the water. They will do as well as any buckets!’

  Harald said, ‘I will stick my finger in the hole if it comes to it, Gudbrod Gudbrodsson. Throw aboard dried meat, barley bread and two casks of ale, and then we will be off. A man must eat if he is to pay his debts with sword and axe.’

  Before he left, he kissed Asa most tenderly and told her that he was leaving twenty men behind to guard them and to set up shelters for them once more.

  He told her also that he expected to be back in three days, for his sixty shipmen were capable of repaying all the debts they owed to Haakon Redeye and his eighty.

  ‘A man with vengeance in his sword-edge is the equal of four who have burned a barn,’ he said, buckling on his iron friend, Peacegiver.

  Asa said, ‘Have you got your woollen shirt on, husband? The Spring winds are bitter along the fjords and it would go ill with a war leader to be stricken with a cold.’

  Harald said, ‘I shall keep warm with exercise soon, my love.’

  When he bent over the bed of his two sons, Svend and Jaroslav, the boys smiled up at him and said, ‘May Odin speed the prow, father.’

  Harald said, ‘I am blessed in having a pair of young hawks when many other fathers have only chickens.’

  Svend said, ‘If we could stand up, we would come with you, whether you agreed or not.’

  Jaroslav said, ‘I shall weep all the time you are gone, for I put a knife into Haakon’s arm before he struck me down with his club. It is not fair that I cannot finish what I have started.’

  Harald patted their heads and said, ‘Rest awhile, my pretties, then one day you shall have long swords and go after such pirates as Redeye yourselves, while I lie in the straw and think of my cows and the ships I have sailed in.’

  Svend said, ‘Bring me back Haakon’s dagger with the coral handle. And bring back his bronze shield for Jaroslav. It will help us to get better more quickly.’

  As Harald went down to the longship, Asa whispered, ‘Bring me back something we can put on the shelf and smile at in the feasting times, loved one. Something closer to Haakon Redeye even than his knife and his shield.’

  Harald said, ‘If I do not do that, I shall do nothing. An ornament is always pleasant in a house, Asa Thornsdaughter. But if the dice fall otherwise than what I think, then get yourself a cross of the Whitechrist and set that up as your ornament to smile at, for then you will know that Thor and Odin are no longer our friends.’

  Asa did not watch as they pushed
out into the fjord. She hated to see the longships sail away, for sometimes they never came back, and then there was always the misery of remembering how fine they had looked when they set off, with the gay oars rising and falling in unison, and the shipmaster laughing at the prow.

  3

  Cold Scent

  The days passed as Harald’s ship, Long Snake, drew in and out of the fjords seeking Haakon Redeye, and each day brought wild-haired villagers running down to the shore, shaking their heads, saying that Haakon had not stayed there, but had passed on north, and north again.

  One grey-headed jarl waded into the green waters of Langfjord and shouted, ‘They passed this way a day since, the wind in their red and blue sails, ship laden to waterline with plunder. You must needs row harder, Harald Sigurdson, to catch that wolf by the tail. I doubt you’ll not find him in Norway. He’ll be gone to the far north, to Isafjord Deep, or to Vatnsfjord. He’ll be gone to where the white fox runs and the walrus snorts, mark my word.’

  So Long Snake turned about once more, and headed northwards.

  Harald stood by Grummoch, near the steerboardman.

  ‘I swear by the fingers of two hands that I will not give up this chase until Haakon or I lie stark,’ he said.

  Grummoch said, ‘There is not a man aboard who will not sail with you to Iceland, or to Midgard itself, Harald. Ask them and see.’

  Then Harald spoke to the Vikings.

  ‘Who will turn back?’ he said. ‘Who will go back to eat fresh meat and lie snug under the blankets? Let any such man speak now and I will set him ashore with an axe in his hand and money in his pouch to make his way back to the village. Speak now or forever hold your peace.’

  Then the seamen turned towards Harald and shook their axes above their heads.

  ‘Who goes back now is a nithing,’ one called out. ‘Do you wish to insult us, Sigurdson?’

  Harald answered, ‘Thorfinn Thorfinnson, I would as soon insult your namesake, Thor, himself. From now on, I shall ask that question no more. Let us sail onwards, and whosoever comes alive out of this quest, let the skalds name him a hero of the folk.’