Chapter 1
Ravens and Wolves
Atholl, Perthshire 994 AD
The bards will not tell tales of girls that can be dangerous. They tell tales of those who are innocent and reject all sin. This is my tale; my name was Olith Meic Cinaeda, but now I go by a different name.
I am Gunhild, Mother of Kings. Jarl Gunhild. It is a name that is feared and respected among my people. Written in the Sagas. Cast in the bones. I am a sorceress. Witch. Seeress. I command these wild northern Isles and their seas, but it was not always so.
It begins when I was eighteen summers old, the first day I met the Northmen. I was out beyond the tree line, always where I should not have been, but no one ever cared to look. The sky resembled a deep bruise by the time I made my way up the embankment. I wore an old jerkin, that had belonged to one of the dead. I’d pulled it from him before they’d lit the pyre. I accompanied it with dark breeches and supple leather boots, with my hunting knife nestled snuggly at the ankle. I slipped through the trees like water, keeping my hood pulled up, hiding my thick raven braid.
I tiptoed across stones that formed a causeway across the narrow burn before weaving my way through sprouting ferns growing like slippers at the foot of huge trunks. Patches of sunlight dripped between the thatches of forest canopy, I kept to the shadows on the outskirts of the clearing opening out onto the loch. If I got myself caught, everything we had worked for would have been for nothing.
My father was King then, Malcolm II, High King of Alba and our borders stretched from Strathmore to the east and Bannock Moor to the west. Our woods teamed with hunting quarry, boar, deer, and rabbit if you only knew where to look. The wolves and bears kept themselves further north, on the periphery and away from our bows which was a pity. Their pelts brought ample coin, or at the very least something to trade with. It allowed me a certain degree of freedom from my father’s purse strings.
I was my father’s second daughter, the middle child. I say my father’s because my mother had been no more than a ghost since my brother died. I could remember little more than her screaming. That night, Donada and I crept along the hallway to her bedchamber. Scared to look inside, but I had to. I peered into the darkness. There was blood. So much blood. All I could hear was the screaming, like the slaughtering of the spring lambs. I did not know then what I looked upon. I took Donada’s hand, and I ran. As fast as I could, away from the sight and out into the darkness. I tried to carry her, but she was too heavy. Much too heavy. We did not make it to the tree line before one of my father’s men found us and took us back, cried out husks slick with rain. It was that night that we lost our mother and became one, I was scarcely more than six summers.
I still wake up screaming.
High above, two ravens swooped and turned against the daylight's gate. Black beads stared down at me with interest. They circled each other, almost colliding, before veering into the crest of an updraft.
I waited.
There had been another warning of wolves, that the Northmen used to hunt. They had been spotted patrolling out near the border. A shudder rattled down my spine.
I sat myself on a boulder, legs dangling against the long grass. I could barely peel my eyes away as the ravens came into landjust before me, in a ruffle of inky quills. The bigger of the two hopped forward, head tilted. Close enough that I might touch the softness of it. I held my breath as it sidled further, pecking at the seam of my boot while its mate watched on in vague curiosity.
Huginn and Munin, the ravens of the All-Father, Odin. Released each morning to be his eyes and ears of the world, returning each night to their master’s shoulder to relay their knowledge. I should have known then; it was a bad omen.
Out here, I was as free as the ravens I watched. Out here the gods called and I listened.
‘Olith.’
The noise sent the ravens scattering into the wind.
Elpin. My heart sang at the sight of the falconer. I think of Elpin now, moving through the woods like a wraith. A soundless creeping death, dressed in his favourite yellow tunic. His face was framed in rich brown curls and freckles that danced beneath his eyes. God, those hazel eyes and sharp jawline were enough to make my insides molten.
He seemed to appear out of a mist. One moment I was alone and the next I wasn’t. Slung over his shoulder were the glassy-eyed carcasses of three rabbits, young kits with barely enough meat on them to feed a scrawny cat, and on his arm, my falcon Drest, his hooded head cocked, listening.
I had been a scrawny, wiry nine-year-old when we’d met. All eyes and teeth. Suddenly, there had been nothing more exciting than falconry. On those days, I would be up at dawn. Washed and dressed in my finest gown. Hair combed and plaited, checking my reflection as a magpie checks a silver coin. I would wait patiently for my sisters to leave for their lute lessons, before sloping off in the direction of the fields surrounding my father’s fortress to try and catch sight of Elpin flying the falcons.
I was forbidden from hunting or venturing amongst the trees surrounding our fortress. It was the men’s domain, but it didnot deter me. On the fifth day of being ignored, I stole one of my father’s old jerkins. It was much too big, even when I belted it around the middle with string. I plaited my hair and hid it beneath a hood. If it was a boy he wanted, a boy he would train. I cannot imagine the sight I must have looked, waiting eagerly at the tree line in men’s clothes three sizes too big. When he saw me, his face cleaved into a smile, and he laughed. A laugh that rattled around the trees. From that day on he schooled me in hunting and before long I held a falcon on my wrist.
‘Our snares were fruitful,’ he said holding them up for my inspection.
‘You’ve been off collecting that tyrant’s tithes for three weeks and all you bring me is meat for the crows? You would have been better giving them to his starving people.’
‘That tyrant is your father.’ He cocked an eyebrow. ‘I haven’t checked the snares higher upstream.’ He pulled a bannock from his pocket. ‘Have ye had break-fast?’ He tore a piece off and tossed it in my direction.
I placed it to my nose and inhaled deeply. Fresh Beltane bannocks. ‘It’s still warm,’ I said. ‘Ye must have been up before the crows.’ I took a bite, spilling crumbs onto my jerkin.
‘Aye, up afore you, that’s fer sure.’
‘Not today.’ I smiled at the thought. ‘Today is Donada’s fifteenth year and we have Bethóc’s wedding.’
‘And on the day of the Beltane celebrations, no less.’ He placed Drest’s leash in my hand and his talons obediently gripped my wrist through the leather of my sleeve. ‘These weeks, all I’ve heard are whispers from them. He has plans for you and Donada after Bethoc’s wedding.’
‘What sort of plans?’
