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Oh, for the love of Fryja.I stepped closer, my arm-cargo bumping his broad chest. “Spit it forth, my brother. What happened?”
Even though I was half his size and younger to boot, Bjorn ever retreated before me. “I do not know.” His breath bore precious little cargo of fermentation; he had not been at the mead in his usual way. Who was this fellow, and what had he done to my brother? “Astrid and I saw the Northerners outside the Althing hall just as the last sacrifices were done. They made some sort of announcement inside, but only to the elders andtheywill not say aught, even Father himself, and he was silent for a while. Then, a little later we passed them at the palisade, upon the row where the fine weavers and smiths sellwares from south-over-sea, and one of them looked at Astrid and said summat. Father looked sour, for he knows a very little of their Old Tongue, and Astrid asked what he had said, and—”
My head ached, attempting to imagine the scene with only this halting explanation. “So you struck him for…?”
“Another fellow said summat else in that strange talk of theirs, to take him to task by the tone, and the first one laughed.Youknow the manner of laughter I mean. So I hit him, the laughing fool.”
Without even knowing what was said?Still, I did indeed know the manner of laughter Bjorn meant.
Every woman does.
“An ill deed.” I studied his face in ruddy hornlight; inside the women’s hall someone raised their voice in a midwinter song. Several others followed suit, Astrid’s tone a clear silver bell. Something was missing from my brother’s story. “Then they required weregild of Father, and…?”
“Well, at first he said he’d give me to them in bond.” Bjorn’s expression suggested a certain discomfort with the notion, which showed he was not entirely brainless. “Astrid cried, and the Northerners were discussing when the boy-one passed by with the wolf-leader.”
“The one with the decorated hilt?” I did not like the one they named Eol, but he perhaps did not like the weight of my glance either. Sometimesseidhrpresses certain others who possess it away with invisible force, like a lodestone turned against its fellow—yet he wore a blade, so he could not have the weirding. “You slewhisson?” He did not seem of an age to have a child old enough to leer at a girl, but it was said those in the North wore their years lightly, and perhaps they married young as well.
“No, their great lord is still in the North. Eol has the leading of the wolves and the others have their own captains, though ’tis the boy Aeredh who seems to have the guiding toss.” Bjorn glanced over my shoulder as a trio of thralls bustled past, each giving him a dark look. Or perhaps they were merely anxious. “I can only guess they told him what occurred in their own tongue, and the boy said to Father,We shall take the daughter who lights the fire tonight, my lord.” He did not quite have the lightness of lilt to mimic the youth’svoice, but it was a good attempt. “And nothing Father said or offered would shake them.”
“They do not seem easily shaken,” I agreed. I did not know the noble houses of the North beyond that certain of them acknowledged one named Aenarian’s overlordship, probably as some outlying halls and steadings nominally acknowledged Father. “But perhaps they will forget me by tomorrow; I hear Northerners are great travelers.” Ever looking for the next horizon, they are said to be, though we had not seen many come through Dun Rithell.
We were too small to bother with, though fine enough in our own way.
“Whatever they told the elders is being kept from other ears.” Bjorn’s gold torc—my father’s bear-heads upon its ends instead of my paternal grandmother’s bees—glistered as he shifted, and the runes embroidered upon his shift-cuffs throbbed for a moment as my exhaustion mounted another notch. He did not wear a small-axe as usual, probably wisest for all concerned at the moment. “If ’tis war…”
My weariness acquired fresh depth. “And against just whom would we be warring, then? Even the Robed Ones and their strange god pestering the Barrowhills are more occupied with each other than with us, and that Dagnar fellow in the east died without heir.” I shook my head, glad of a fresh set of braids after the sauna’s delicious heat. Healthful cleanliness works wonders against exhaustion. Still, I was weary, and longed to set my burden of cloth down. “There’s nobody to fight except other petty riverlords or greathalls wanting tribute.” Which was the problem; if Bjorn could have plunged into a real battle or two, he might have learned a little restraint for peaceable life. I took a deep, smoke-tinged breath; the afternoon’s bread was still baking. There would be more wassail tonight, though I might not drink quite so much of it. I ached all over, but this late in the afternoon I could only grit my teeth and wait for dusk.
The sooner I could climb into my own bed, the better.
“Well, there’s some talk old Dagnarhadan heir, but summat strange happened.” Bjorn’s golden-wire eyebrows lifted significantly. If not for his nose and my own, an onlooker might have held us to be from two different families entirely, but in that moment he lookedvery much like Mother—and hence, me—indeed. His black eye was puffing closed, and I knew without having to ask it was Father’s work.
It would be difficult for Bjorn with me gone. Astrid was too gentle to keep an old bullock and a young one from touching horns. It takes a stubbornness greater than either to build that fence; in Dun Rithell, only Mother and I possessed that deep a measure.
Ulfrica passed again, hissing at Bjorn once more. He made a face, and had I been younger I might have taken her to task for such behavior even if she was a freedwoman performing honorable service in a lord’s hall. Now, however… well, brother or not, he deserved some discomfort. Arn’s scornful laugh was soft, but still clearly audible.
I freed a hand from the folded cloth; we would be sewing until Midsummer. Or Astrid would; she would have to forgo some embroidery in order to repair and make afresh what I was no longer available to. Naked indeed is the house without a woman at the needle, as the saying goes.
It did not seem possible I would be sent forth as weregild—not bondswoman and not thrall, certainly, but not quite free either. Frankly, I hoped I would wake the next day and find the entire matter simply a vivid dream, like glimpses of the past or future seen through pungent smoke and spinning disorientation. One who hasseidhr, empty of stomach and skull, may stare through drug, hunger, and time itself to find an answer to the deeper riddles, stave off god-anger, or to turn aside disaster.
“Lean down.” A deep sigh rose unbidden from the very pit of my belly. “And be still, or it won’t work.”
“You shouldn’t,” he muttered, but bent close anyway. His beard-oil was scented with pungent purple laventeli, a reminder of summer. “I deserved it.”
Yes, you did.“Who will comfort Astrid and Mother while I’m gone? It will have to be you, Bjorn; Father has other work.” My fingertips rested upon his warm brow; my palm cramping from proximity to bruise-pain. “Holdstill.”
“It feels odd.” But he froze, ox-patient now that I had given him a task. “I’ll look after them, Solveig. Never fear.”
You’d better.I drew out the swelling, my face a mask as my ownleft eye smarted. Spreading the pain up my arm, exhaling hard to drive it away, imagining a starlit glow to eat whatever discomfort remained—there are several ways to treat any wound, and I ever thought it best to combine a few for safety. Idra held that one way fully followed was better than two or three mixed, but everyseidhrhas their own preference. “I wish I could put a halter upon your temper, like Lokji was put to plow.” Mentioning that son of the Allmother was not the best luck, but it fit the situation.
“I try,” Bjorn said mournfully, nothing but his mouth moving. He was very big, my brother, but he did not strike women or children. If the Northern lord’s son had been a daughter, my brother would have borne any laughter or gibe from that quarter with good grace. “You know I do.”
Oh, ’tis Bjorn, what can be done?I drew my hand away before the wound was fully healed; I would help, but not fully erase. “You must save your gift for the battlefield, brother mine. Even if there are no wars to be had.”
“I am sorry, Solveig.” He must have truly been so, for he regarded me with the most penitent of his looks, lower lip pushed slightly out and his big dark thick-lashed eyes mournfully wide. “I will keep my temper until you return.”
They will probably leave me here, content to have made their point.Even the bare thought of travel, interesting though it was, wearied me further that day. “I might not depart at all, to save you the trouble. Go find summat to do. Help Father.”
“I doubt he wishes to see me at the moment.” My brother straightened, subtracting cloth from my trembling arms. “Where is this bound?”
