Maidensong (34 page)

He bowed his head toward her, hand over his heart. “Trustworthy One.”

 
The
oliphant
blasted three times. The ivory horn’s sig
nal marked the end of the soldiers’ working day. Sweat
poured down Bjorn’s body. He swiped the stinging moisture from his eyes and trudged off the drilling yard. Even though the mock battle was played out
with wooden swords, a couple of his opponents man
aged to land some solid blows. A bruise that went
clear to the bone purpled his right shoulder.

In the Northlands, brute strength and the ability to
ignore pain usually won the day in hand-to-hand com
bat. His new comrades-in-arms were teaching him some different tricks. Bjorn learned to feint and counter-swing, using his opponent’s own momentum
against him. His lessons with Ornolf came back to him and he used one or two of those maneuvers to good ef
fect. Even Argus, the tough one-eyed veteran Bjorn
had brawled with, gruffly admitted that Bjorn might live through his first battle as a
tagmata
after all.

Blessed forgetfulness came upon him when his
sword whistled through the air. The concentration re
quired to keep his balance during the deadly dance kept thoughts of Rika locked away in a far corner of
his mind. But once Bjorn was done for the day, she
rushed back to him, piercing as the sharpest blade,
sweet as honeyed fruit, and inevitable as the tide.

He drank too much each night. But never quite
enough to dull the pain beyond a keening ache.

“Bjorn!”

Jorand strode toward him, leading a black stallion.
The horse sidestepped, prancing skittishly, its large
eyes bright with intelligence. Bjorn met them halfway
across the yard.

“He’s a beauty.” Bjorn ran a hand over the withers
and down the stallion’s deep chest. “A fine animal. But
what does Sogna’s best shipwright need with a horse?”

“He’s yours,” Jorand said. “Ornolf wants to see you in the cavalry.”

“I’ll think on it.” Bjorn’s mouth tightened. He knew
his uncle meant well, but he didn’t want his interfer
ence. “Are you all staying at the Xenon?” He couldn’t help himself. He wanted to ask if Jorand had seen her,
if the wedding had already taken place, but he couldn’t bring himself to form the words.

Jorand had sailed with Bjorn long enough to under
stand. “Ornolf and I are at the hostel, though we fre
quently visit the Arab. Your uncle says he can’t be a
guest in Farouk-Azziz’s home and a profitable trader at the same time. Rika and Helge are at the Arab’s house, along with Torvald. Farouk insisted on it once he learned the old man was Rika’s father.”

“So.” Bjorn sighed. “It’s done then.”

“No. The wedding is postponed for a time,” Jorand said. “A religious question, I guess.”

Irrational hope surged through him, but he forced it
down as Jorand explained how Rika had agreed to ex
tend her betrothal to the Arab so she could learn about Islam.

“How does Rika feel about Torvald being there?”
Bjorn asked. “She never did warm to him after she
learned the truth.”

“I haven’t seen her,” Jorand said, guessing that was
Bjorn's real question. “She keeps to her chambers in
the Arab’s house when Ornolf and I are there, after the
custom of their women.”

“She’s held against her will?”

“Torvald says not,” Jorand shook his head. “He sees
her every day. She studies the Arab’s faith with an eye
to converting, but hasn’t committed to it yet.”

“Hmph!” His gut twisted afresh with longing. Hav
ing it done with or dragging out the agony—Bjorn
didn’t know which was worse.

Argus sauntered over to inspect Bjorn’s new mount. “A worthy beast,” he pronounced. “This reminds me.
There’s someone you both might be interested in meeting. A countryman of yours, a Northman, anyway. He
just returned from maneuvers with his unit. Fenris the Walker, they call him.”

“Why?” Jorand asked.

“Because we haven’t found a horse big enough to
carry him yet.” Argus’s one eye glittered with amusement. “I’ll take care of this dark son of Satan.” He
took the stallion’s lead rope from Jorand and led him toward the stables. “Fenris will be in the chow line, no
doubt,” he called
over his shoulder.

Bjorn and Jorand had no trouble finding the big man.
Fenris the Walker towered over the Byzantines around
him and even topped Bjorn by half a head. A braided russet beard flowed over his barrel-chest and his beefy
arms were bigger around than most men’s thighs.

Bjorn and Jorand introduced themselves, enjoying
the chance to let Norse trip off their tongues instead of
the labored Greek they used most of the time in Mikla
gard. Fenris was ugly as a troll, coarse-humored and
loud. Bjorn was just beginning to like the man when the giant pulled out a sword for him to inspect.

“
Galata steel,” Fenris said. “The sweetest blade I’ve ever owned. Try it.”

Bjorn sliced the air in glittering arcs and then rested
the flat of the blade on one finger just below the hilt.
Perfectly balanced. “It’s a fine sword,” he said, hand
ing it back to Fenris. “Even with the nick in the blade, the balance is still true.”

“Ja,
the pesky thing. It was too deep to grind out completely.” Fenris slid the sword back into his shoul
der baldric. “I got that nick in your part of the world
too, in Sognefjord.”

“Really?” Alarm bells clanged in Bjorn’s brain. He noticed for the first time that Fenris wore a fine silver armband, not on his bulging bicep—Bjorn doubted that one big enough had ever been made—but on his forearm. It was cunningly designed to look like inter
twined serpents with amber inset for the eyes. With a
lurch in his stomach, Bjorn recognized it. He looked
back up at Fenris, studying him intently. “I don’t re
member seeing you in Sogna and I think I would.”

“Of course, you would.” Fenris guffawed. “Not ex
actly inconspicuous, am I? I’m a Birkaman. I came overland into your forests, but didn’t come down into
Sogna itself.” Fenris grimaced, making his features
even more hideous. “We are all men who have sold our
blades here, so
I’ll
make no pretense. I was hired to
kill a man in Sognefjord.”

“Was that armband your pay?”

“It was.” Fenris slanted a questioning gaze at Bjorn.

“The man you killed, who was he?”

“He was the
jarl
, Harald Gunnarsson.”

Bjorn had only his wooden practice sword, so he
reached for Jorand’s real one. He yanked it out of his
friend’s shoulder baldric with a metallic scrape. Legs
spread, knees flexed, Bjorn used a two-handed grip to
point the long broadsword at Fenris’s ample middle.

“Defend yourself, Fenris the Walker, for I am Bjorn
the Black, son of Harald of Sogna. You killed my fa
ther and tonight you will feed the worms.” He glanced sideways at Jorand. “Interfere this time and you’re next.”

Fenris sidestepped out of the line, his pale eyes
never leaving Bjorn’s. “Don’t be too hasty, youngster.
We’re a long way from the Northlands and there’s no
need for you to start a blood feud over this. The killing
was just business. Nothing personal.”

“It was personal to me.”

The Byzantine soldiers didn’t understand the Norse words, but they recognized the intent. A ring of onlookers formed around Bjorn and the Walker.

“So be it.” Fenris spat on his palm and rubbed both
hands together. Then he unsheathed the Galata again. “
Shame to kill a man and his son with the same blade,
but Odin be my witness, you force me to it.”

Fenris’s chest heaved and he released a cavernous roar that made all the Byzantines reel back. Quicker than Bjorn would have thought possible for a man of
his girth, Fenris swung the blade over his head with a
whoosh and brought it down.

Bjorn quickly raised his sword to meet the blow
and, with a clang of steel on steel, the shock reverber
ated up Bjorn’s arms to his shoulders. If he hadn’t locked his wrists and elbows, Fenris would have
cleaved him from nose to navel in one stroke.

The giant’s blade slid off and flashed in a wide arc across Bjorn’s chest. Bjorn jumped back, arms spread wide to avoid the slash, but a row of red beads
bloomed on his skin where the
tip
of Fenris’s sword
sliced him.

 
Fenris rained down a hailstorm of blows, which
Bjorn managed to parry, but only with grunting effort.
The Birkaman fought without finesse, heaving one punishing stroke after another. With his brute strength, Fenris didn't need finesse.

Bjorn danced backward, trying to formulate a plan.
He knew from the outset he was outmatched for size
and reach, but he’d expected the bigger man to be
slower. He wasn’t. All Bjorn could manage was a shaky
defense from the relentless hammering, and even at
that, Fenris had nicked him in several places. Blood
streamed from gashes on his shoulder and thigh. As
sweat burned into the corners of his eyes, Bjorn realized with a tightening in his gut that he was in trouble.

He circled, trying to slow his breathing and stay out
of the wide arc of death that surrounded Fenris the
Walker.

“Come to me, boy,” Fenris urged, his gruff voice al
most kind. “You’ve fought well enough for honor’s
sake.
I’ll
kill you clean and you’ll be in Valhalla in time
for
nattmal.
You can drain a horn for me there with
your father.”

His father. Had Fenris’s hideous face been the last
thing Harald had seen? Rage boiled inside Bjorn, but he shoved it down. If he didn’t keep a cool head, he was lost. He couldn’t win in a test of strength against
Fenris. Bjorn’s stamina was being leached away by the constant need to defend himself and he
still
hadn’t so
much as scratched Fenris.

Fenris tossed his sword from hand to hand, toying
with him. Bjorn had to move quickly while he
still
had
wind. It was time to meet his fate and all that was left to him was guile.

He dragged in a lungful of air and hefted his sword for another round. Bjorn bellowed his defiance in a
berserkr
cry and lunged, his blade sweeping the air in
glittering swaths. Fenris met the challenge and soon
had Bjorn giving ground once again.

 
The Walker delivered a ringing blow that knocked
Bjorn off his feet. Panting, he struggled to his knees,
his back to Fenris. The sinking sun projected the big
man’s shadow over Bjorn and he saw the dark phan
tom of death looming in Fenris’s upraised arms.

In a flash, Bjorn whipped around and plunged his blade into Fenris’s belly halfway to the hill. Then he rolled out of the away as the Galata clattered to the
ground and Fenris sank slowly, his fingers grasping at
the steel protruding obscenely from his gut.

Bjorn rose to his feet and staggered back to his adversary. He grasped the hilt, slick with blood, and yanked it out of Fenris’s flesh. The fetid odor from the wound told him that the big man’s bowels were perforated. He would suffer much, perhaps for days, before death came.

Bjorn turned to go.

“Finish me, Sognaman,” Fenris croaked.

“Like you finished my father? With a blade in his
back?” Bjorn’s eyes blazed, as much with shame at his father’s cowardice as fury at his killer.

“Your father didn’t run,” Fenris panted. “He was a
braw fighter, like you. In truth, he almost had me,
but—” He shuddered as blood strangled his innards.

“What happened?” Bjorn knelt beside his foe.

Fenris lifted the arm that bore the entwined ser
pents. “The man who gave me this came out from his
hiding place. He stabbed your father from behind as
we were fighting.”

“His name? Who paid you to murder Harald of
Sogna?” Bjorn demanded as he gulped air. The fight
had been close. If not for Ornolf’s tutelage, Bjorn
would be worm’s meat already. He didn’t want to be
lieve the Birkaman, but he trembled with fury at his
suspicions. “I need to hear you say his name.”

“I never knew it,” Fenris said with a grimace of
agony. “He said it was cleaner that way. Come now and
make an end. Don’t leave me to die in bed covered in
my own piss.”