Fin Gall (15 page)

             
Thorgrim watched them as they passed the mead hall and moved further down the road.

             
They don’t know we’re here...

             
But why would they? They would assume the Norwegians had made for their longship as quickly as they could.

             
“Wait here,” Thorgrim whispered. “Tell Ornolf I am gone, and to stay put. I’ll be back.”

             
Before Skeggi could reply, Thorgrim slipped through the door on silent goatskin shoes, moving low into the shadows of the mead hall. The rain fell blinding in his face but he did not notice. His body felt taut and ready, his senses wolf-sharp. He could smell the Danes even through the rain, could hear the tiny clink of mail shirts, the shuffle of shoes on the plank road.

             
He moved along the edge of the building, half-crouched, sword held low and ahead of him. He felt the earth through his shoes, felt the night on his skin. He moved through the dark, a part of the darkness, silent as a spirit.

             
Thorgrim Night Wolf slipped over a low fence at the edge of the mead hall, moved down the edge of the plank road, working his way in and out of the shadows of the buildings that lined the walk. He could hear snatches of talk from the swine array. Grousing. Concern. It was a frightening night and it might have frightened Thorgrim as well if he was not a part of it.

             
They were getting close to the river now and suddenly Thorgrim thought of Harald, carried off to the longship, lying helpless and burning with fever on the deck. The Danes would not hesitate to kill him. He moved faster, slipped around behind an ironworker’s shop, leapt over a fence, skirted down along the road. Someone peered out of a window, looked right at Thorgrim but did not see him as he slipped past.

             
Thorgrim arrived at the river’s edge fifty feet ahead of the cautious swine array. There were men hiding there, he could sense them as much as see them, crouching in the brush by the water. Thorgrim circled wide, moved up behind the one furthest from the water. He slipped his sword in his belt and pulled the more nimble dagger.

             
He was ten feet behind the man, stalking him, the taste of blood in his mouth, when he realized it was Olaf Yellowbeard, sword drawn, watching the road.

             
“Olaf...” Thorgrim whispered and he shuffled close.

             
Olaf turned. Thorgrim could see his eyes open wide. Olaf did not expect to hear his name whispered from behind.

             
“Thorgrim! By Thor’s hammer I thought you were some night spirit.”

             
“I am. Where is Harald? And the other wounded men?”

             
“That Irish healer-woman has taken them off, where it’s safe, she said. I had men posted on the road, they warned us the Danes were coming. We spread out. Hid.”

             
Thorgrim nodded. “Good.”

             
They fell silent as the Danes closed the distance down the plank road to the longship. They were moving faster now, realizing that they were alone. They reached the dock and their formation fell apart as the clambered on board the
Red Dragon
, looking for the escaped prisoners, looking for some sign of where they might be.

             
“Damn!” Thorgrim heard a voice shout out and he was certain it was Orm’s. “Where in all hell have they gone?”

             
No one answered. No one knew.

             
“They must be in the longphort still.” That voice was Magnus.

             
“Find them, damn you! Leave twenty men here, the rest, search the town!”

             
Thorgrim leaned close to Olaf Yellowbeard. “Stay here. Remain hidden. Pass the word to the others. I’ll lead the rest back here.”

             
Olaf nodded and then Thorgrim was gone, whipping back into the dark night. He kept away from the plank road, moved past the clustered houses, racing through kitchen gardens, hopping over low wattle fences. He crouched low, panting with the effort, but he moved fast and silent as if padding down a forest trail.

             
He came at last to the mead hall, approached from the back and slipped in the back door which, he was not pleased to see, was unguarded.

             
“Ornolf!” The jarl had found a barrel of mead and was making up for a week of deprivation in the Danish prison. “Ornolf, the Danes are down by the ship. They’ve left a small guard but the rest are searching the town. Here’s our chance.”

             
“Ah, damn the Danes!” Ornolf roared, causing the half-dozen unconscious men around him to stir. “Let the Danes come, I’ll bugger them all! Good strong drink has gotten me randy again!”

             
Good strong drink had also taken the hard edge off Ornolf’s leadership, Thorgrim was sorry to see. “You men,” he pointed to three men who were rifling through one of the drunk men’s clothes, “take up this barrel of mead and carry it down to the ship.” He knew there was no chance of Ornolf following if the mead did not come as well. “The rest of you, gather around.”

             
Ornolf was not the only one who had gotten into the mead, but that was all right, since any Viking worthy of the name would fight better with a belly full of drink.

             
Thorgrim pulled one of the smoldering torches down from the wall, crossed to the fireplace and used it to stir up the coals. Soon the torch was blazing again.

             
“Egil Lamb,” Thorgrim called.

             
Egil, lithe and sinewy, unlike most of his brethren, with a long thin neck and a sparse and sorry bit of hair on his cheeks that he called a beard, hurried over.

             
“Take this torch,” Thorgrim instructed, “and climb up there, set the roof on fire.”

             
Egil Lamb looked up at the roof, high overhead, ran his eyes over the various handholds and footholds on the wall. He nodded, took the torch, began to climb.

             
Thorgrim led the rest out the back door, out into the night. The rain had eased off some, still steady but not coming in torrents. The men huddled in the dark by a clump of brush. They could hear tiny thunderclaps of shouting in the longphort as the Danes spread out in search of them. They kept their eyes on the mead hall.

             
The flame was like a candle at first, no bigger than that. It peeked out through the thatch of the mead hall roof, dancing and wavering in the rain. And just as it looked as if it would go out, another appeared, and another, and then the entire roof burst into flame as the fire ate away at the still-dry thatch underneath. The timbers supporting the roof were dry and tarred and the beams were still covered with bark. The hall would burn well.

             
The back door opened. Egil Lamb stood framed against the now bright light of the interior.

             
“Let us go,” Thorgrim said.

             
They worked their way down to the water, following the route Thorgrim had found earlier. They were slowed by the bundles of food and the barrel of mead, but it did not matter because the Danes had other things to worry about now.

             
They were still two hundred yard from the river when Orm’s men discovered the fire. The occasional shouts that they had heard before multiplied and multiplied again as the Danes became aware of the magnitude of the disaster. The mead hall was burning.

             
Men pounded up the plank road. Men tumbled out of houses and shops, pulling tunics over their heads as they ran. They shouted for water, for axes, for more men to join them.

             
The mead hall was burning.

             
Thorgrim Night Wolf led his men down the hill, past the shops, across the tangled ground to where Olaf Yellowbeard still crouched and watched. “Not a man who was guarding the longship has gone off,” Olaf said.

             
Thorgrim nodded. These were disciplined men who would not be distracted from their duty. They would be skilled warriors as well.

             
The more rational part of Thorgrim’s mind told him it was a time for tactics - circle around, attack from two places, work men in from behind. But he was in no mood for that nonsense.

             
“You men carrying loads, get aboard the
Red Dragon
as soon as you can, get all the lines cast off, save one. The rest of you, come with me. Kill as many as you can. Remember, we don’t have to win, we just have to escape.”

             
He turned and leapt through the brush. He did not wait to see if anyone was following.

             
The men on the dock were alert and they would not be taken by surprise. Thorgrim saw heads turn, weapons come up ready as he leapt over the small briars and through the tall rushes, down the slope of the hill toward the river.

             
“Who’s there?” someone demanded. Thorgrim felt a howl build in his throat and he let it go as he rushed in with sword over his head. He howled and shrieked and bared his teeth and came in with sword swinging.

             
The first of the Danes to step up never had a chance. There was no checking the momentum Thorgrim had built up in his rush into battle. Thorgrim swept the man’s sword aside and literally ran over him, leaping in the air, stepping onto the man’s shield, bowling him over. They came down together, the man on his back, Thorgrim still on his feet, standing on top of the man. He drove his sword straight down into the man’s chest even as he flung himself shoulder first into the next man behind.

             
The Red Dragons broke like a wave on the Danes, howling out of the night, but the Danes met them, howl for howl, blade for blade. The conquerors of Dubh-linn were too skilled and too experienced to be thrown off by a surprise attack. Shield hit shield, swords clashed in the rain, spears sought out their targets.

             
Thorgrim was snarling as he wielded his sword, slashing and probing, but the man he fought now was good, very good, and he countered Thorgrim’s blade and sought advantage for his own. And he had a shield, and mail as well.

             
Thorgrim lunged. The Dane knocked the sword away with his shield, lunged himself, and Thorgrim twisted out of the way of the blade. Ten feet away, fighting Olaf Yellowbeard and Svein the Short at the same time, was Magnus Magnusson.

             
“Swine!” Thorgrim shouted. He swung his sword in a great sideways arc, slamming into his adversary’s shield, making him stagger and then Thorgrim was done with him. As if he had forgotten the men completely he shoved his way through the mob, pushed Svein aside, leapt into the fight.

             
His eyes met Magnus’s even as Magnus was fending off a blow from Olaf Yellowbeard and the mutual hatred came though as clear as if they had shouted it. Thorgrim lunged, straight arm, right at Magnus’s throat and Magnus knocked the sword away, an inch before it killed him.

             
Thorgrim’s eyes followed the sword in Magnus’s hand.
Iron-tooth!
Magnus was carrying the sword he had stolen from Thorgrim. Iron-tooth in the hands of his enemy!

             
Thorgrim screamed. He lashed out at Magnus, missed, lashed again in the kind of wild attack that generally left two dead on the field. The night was turning red in his eyes and he felt himself slipping away, as if the human part of his soul was fleeing, to be replaced by something more primal.