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I had become somewhat accustomed to the perpetual fierce silenceof the Northerners and even to Aeredh’s soft, almost-swallowed singing as the horses plodded atop solid-packed snow starred with fallen branches, depressions showing animal passage, and other detritus. What made me cease my braiding and retying, swaying atop Farsight with my fingers caught in my hair, was familiarseidhr.
The trees were singing, as they often do deep in hushed woods. Even in the silence of falling snow—every hoof-fall muffled as our route doubled and wound to avoid obstacles, taking advantage of branch-cover or wind-sculpt pushing previous drifts aside—I heard their murmurs.
Arneior rode with her hood back, her hair glowing in directionless grey light. A shieldmaid’s hearing is sharp, but she did not glance in my direction. No, what I heard was for avolva’s ears alone.
It was not the creak of laden branches combed by wind or the snap of ice-freighted twigs. The trees which bear new leaf every spring muttered softly; those who wear their robes all winter were a little louder. They whispered as humans or beasts do while their dreamsouls—a third of what makes a living creature, someseidhrsay—wander night’s country.
I was hard put to thinkIwas not dreaming, my overlapping selves disarranged by successive shocks and last night’s fitful, shivering doze passing for sleep. For here we were, Eril’s daughter and her shieldmaid hemmed close by dark-clad Northerners, in a cortege headed by an Elder after escaping twisted beasts hailing from near the fabled wreck of the Dead Dust—calledthe Gaspingin the Old Tongue.
My braids were arranged as well as I could manage by evening; the rest of me felt too rumpled for much confidence. The sun was a mere handspan above the westron horizon, a strengthless smear amid gathering darkness and heavy-falling snow as the woods drew away and ribbons of smoke lifted from a steading. The greathall and its outlying buildings turned their backs to the north wind, all crowding close. The central hall was quite fine, though not as large as Dun Rithell, and the steadings’ meadows were ringed with round, hip-high grey rocks.
Most of the stones bore runes for health, warding, and protectionI knew well enough even if in somewhat ancient forms, but every so often they were shaped as squatting thick-bellied people with long earlobes, a few with ornately carved wooden pipes clasped to lichen-starred lips as if they longed for a twist of hemp or other herb-smoke to inhale. I almost laughed upon seeing them, for their expressions were comically surprised. Yet I sensed weirding drowsing within them, a different force than the tuneless hum of deep-carved, well-fed runes. The snow had been cleared in pathways, and hummocks in what had to be gardens during summer were domed hives, their inhabitants slumbering between tiny sips of honey produced against the long cold.
Had it not been winter I might have spoken to the bees, for they are powerful allies and enjoy avolva’s company. I touched the hard lump of my grandmother’s torc near my collarbone, obscurely comforted.
Our coming had been noticed. Great shaggy dogs belled from the outbuildings and we were soon surrounded by a pack of brindle, tawny, and black with white socks and blazes. They looked no different than Dun Rithell’s hounds, and the pale horses did not mind them; well-wrapped men with gazes both pale and dark clumped through the snow, hailing us in the Old Tongue. Steep-pitched roofs accumulating a fresh coating of white were a welcome sight, and I half-fell from Farsight’s back into Arn’s grasp.
Plunging into a hall’s warmth at the end of a winter journey, even if travel has taken only a day or two, is what a red-hot blade might feel diving into oil. A welcome cup was pressed into my hand and I took a hurried gulp. It was mead with herbs; heat exploded in my middle, altogether rougher and somehow more comforting thansitheviel. Dogs nosed at my thighs, an excited babble rose around me, and Arneior all but drained the great gilded goblet figured with running deer, their antlers lifted proudly.
A tang of smoke, the close welcome fug of mortal bodies breathing and shedding heat, the smells of baking bread, rich roasting meat, and a sharp breath of mead—it was so like my home tears stung my eyes. My snow-caked mantle and overboots were whisked away, Arn’s own dun greatcloak as well, but when they moved to take herspear she stepped before me, her upper lip lifting slightly and her shoulders square.
There was some discussion in the Old Tongue mixed with southron, while great waves of shivers passed over me. The body will oft save its protest until safety is reached; I was simply grateful to be out of the cold. If they tried to separate Arn from her weapon we might spend the night in byre or pig-wallow, and I would not mind overmuch except for the prospect of stepping outside again to get there.
Her charge was a weregild, yes. But none may separate a shieldmaid from her spear.
Finally, thin strips of yellowed leather were brought, and one was tied around Arn’s spear-haft. Eol’s sword and the other Northerners’ weapons received the same treatment, barring them from using a blade in anger. Such was the custom in certain parts of the North, the ancestor of our own pax-binding.
Hospitality requires different ceremonies in different places, but I did not care, for now that we had reached some warmth I was hard-put to quell the yawns which oft accompany the shuddering of deep physical relief.
That was how we arrived at the Eastronmost Steading, ruled by the Lady Hajithe—of whom I learned the next morning, for that eve I followed Arneior three steps into the hall’s antechamber and swayed with weariness, whereupon we were whisked to a closet in the warm depths of the women’s hall. I sank gratefully into a bed and knew no more.
Precious and Rare
Our pride is in loyalty, and in faithfulness our might.
—Asdrax the Tall, first lord of the House of Caelim
The Lady of the Eastronmost—so they called tall dark-haired Hajithe of Caelim, her eyes blue as summersky and her mien as forbidding as my own mother’s while judging inheritance or capital cases. Her infrequent laughter was merry as Astrid’s, though, and she gave my shieldmaid high honor; the Wingéd Ones do not go North, it seemed. Even Arn’s woad-stripe was the cause of some comment.
My ownvolva-markings and red-beaded braids fascinated the steading’s children almost as much as Aeredh seemed to. Strangers did not often visit the Eastronmost during the winter.
The “Elder Roads” had brought us even farther than my shieldmaid or I could have dreamed. We were well within the North proper, at least a moonturn and a half’s worth of hard summer travel from Dun Rithell; I learned this from Arn the morn after we arrived, and my shieldmaid’s gaze remained locked with mine for a few breaths after she granted me the news.
I could not say much in reply, for hard upon my waking there was a knock at the door of the closet given to our sleep-use, heralding a tray with breakfast and a tonic from the lady of the hall herself, full of herbs and honey but noseidhr.
I spent half that day abed, breathing deeply and listening to my body’s many complaints while Arneior performed stretches in lieu of practice-sparring. The closet’s door was propped wide open to let in heat—and perhaps to keep us from close counsel, for we could not help but be overheard by the stream of passersby. We excited much curiosity, and at regular intervals another thrall or freedwoman arrived with a tray of victuals, a wish for good health from the lady of the hall, a polite inquiry as to our needs, or some other reminder that we were guests.
Arneior did not complain, for they fed us well. Her appetite was that of any warrior’s in winter, and excited no outright comment but many a pleased smile. They even had a proper sauna. Both shieldmaid and weregild availed ourselves of its cleansing, though I did not scrub myself with snow afterward as Arn loved to do and even there we were not alone, for a few other women had their turn in its warmth.
I bore no black-ice kisses, and was relieved to have escaped my first adventure in the North undamaged. I had much to think upon, but exceeding little time to do so.
The Eastronmost Steading was more properly a greathall and a swathe of associated smaller farms. Its name was ancient, and Lady Hajithe proud of her ancestors. She had once been married, though her husband had fallen to some ill chance not spoken of in the short time we rested there. Her children, son and daughter, were fostered farther northwest in some mighty kingdom, and Aeredh given tidings and small gifts to take thence.
It was the first intimation I had of our destination, though not nearly a definitive one. It did not matter much, as I was to go where Eol of Naras bid—and yet I wondered. Where had the bear-marked Northerners and Uldfang’s men gone—farther south, on whatever errand, spoken of to the elders after the Althing, that had brought them all to Dun Rithell?
A weregild must be “stolen” from their hall, but this seemed a bit too extreme even for men of this quiet, grim stamp.
The lady of the Eastronmost seated me at her right hand during the evening meal; she was at pains to speak the southron tongue though her usage often waxed somewhat archaic. In her great carvenchair, scenes of hunt and field deeply figured upon its back and its arms ending in thoughtful, frowning boar-heads, she sat straight-backed and used the antique horn implements common for eating in the North, unlike our more modern wooden ones. During dinner she asked of my mother, of the ways of the South, and, with an air of great but restrained curiosity, if thevolva-markings pained me.
