Runestone (37 page)

“Why is this?” he asked Odin.

The Skraeling looked at him with surprise.

“How else would the children learn of their people?” he asked.

Yes, Nils could see a pattern here, and felt that it was good.

“In the beginning,” Singing Moose droned one evening, “the People lived under the ground. All was darkness and cold. There was water, because there was a great lake under the ground there. But few plants grew, because there was no sunlight. A few mushrooms, some fish from the lake. Then one day, one of the young men saw something like a rope hanging from the roof of the great cavern in which they lived. He pulled on it, and found that it was solidly attached, and that there were other branches to it. He tied some of these together, and started to climb up, up toward where the ropes disappeared into the darkness. No one knew, you see, how high the roof might be.”

Nils smiled to himself as he saw small children tip their heads back to study the shadowy rafters above.

“Finally,” Moose continued, “the young man saw light above. He was afraid. …What kept the fire from falling down on him as he climbed?” The children were wide-eyed. “But he kept on, pulling himself toward the light, and at last he saw that it was a hole, leading out into the world above. He
peeked out, and saw that he had been climbing the roots of a giant grapevine. In fact, grapes grew everywhere, and there was sunlight, and much game to eat.”

Vinland!
thought Nils.
This sounds much like the description brought home by the first Norsemen. A land of grapevines!

“Well,” Moose went on, “the young man took some grapes back down, and everyone tasted some, and it was good. They began to climb the grapevine. One after another, they crawled out into the world, and they began to dance and sing and to hunt and pick grapes and to build lodges. That, too, was good. Then, a tragedy … A fat women was climbing the vine, and was nearly at the top, when her great weight broke the vine! She fell back into the darkness, and no one else could come through. But those who had already come through became the People.”

“What happened to those below?” a little girl asked anxiously.

Singing Moose shook his head sadly. “No one knows. No one even remembers now the exact location of the hole. Maybe it crumbled away when the vine fell. But coming outside brought problems, too. Winter, enemies, wild animals like bears and wolves …”

“But my heart is heavy for those below,” the little girl protested.

Moose patted her head. “And so you should be, child. But that is another world. This one is ours.”

Nils was pondering this story, heard for the first time in its entirety and with understanding.
It is a sort of reverse Garden of Eden
, he thought.
How strange!

But Moose continued.

“About half of those first People were left behind. They built a village like this on the shore of the lake below. After death, we rejoin them there. Except, of course, for those who have been very wicked in this life. They find that they cannot cross the lake to get to the village.”

Someone requested that Odin recount the story of the time White Wolf changed himself to an animal to confound the enemy. This was the first time Nils had heard his story retold when he was able to understand the storyteller. It was
somewhat startling to him, the mystical, supernatural aura that Odin was able to create. By the time the story reached the point where he had jumped off the ledge and attempted to attack the enemy, he almost believed it himself.
Had
he changed into a wolf? His memory for the event was faulty, from weakness, fasting, and whatever else it was that had occurred in the berserk episode. After all, no one really knows what happens to give the berserker his superhuman strength. At least, Nils had never heard an explanation. It was a creepy feeling, to hear this description from the viewpoint of Odin, with the strong influence of the mysticism and spiritism of the People. Maybe it
had
happened that way.

Now Singing Moose was speaking again, and Nils was brought quickly out of his wandering thoughts.
He is speaking to me
, he realized.

“… so, White Wolf, will you honor us by telling of your people? Their Creation story?”

With something like panic, Nils pulled himself back from his daydreams. He started to protest that he could not, but then realized that only a short while ago he had actually been comparing Moose’s story of Creation with his own. Yes, he could tell them of Adam and Eve, and the Garden.

It was just then that he happened to think of his grandfather. He was never certain why, but he remembered that the old man had loved to tell the tales of the Norse gods. Grandfather had honored and respected the God of Christianity, because his family did, but he had loved the old legends, too. Nils had always suspected that his grandfather was never completely convinced that one story was right and one wrong.

“Men call God by different names,” he had once told the boy, “and He speaks to them in different ways.”

It was like the many paths up the sides of the mountain, maybe. All lead to the top. No sooner had this idea struck him than he knew what he must do. He would tell the story that he felt would be most reasonable to the minds of the People. And, of course, the most interesting.

“In the beginning…” he began, and paused for a moment. “My brothers and sisters, I may need our friend Odin to help me with this story. My lips have not learned your language.
But I will try. Now, in the beginning, there was only darkness. No earth or water or air. In the darkness was a being, the Allfather.”

He paused, unsure of himself and his translation. Odin spoke a few words to clarify. It occurred to Nils that up to this point there were many similarities in the various stories.

“Whatever the Allfather willed, it happened,” he went on. “So, there came to be, in the middle of the darkness, a deep gully … a canyon. … To the north of it, a spring of water and fog. The water froze to ice, and great pieces fell off into the canyon all the time. It made a roaring sound, but the canyon was too deep to see the bottom. To the south of it was a bright world of light and fire. It was a warm place, guarded by a giant whose weapon was made of fire. Sparks fell from him onto the ice with hissing sounds and the ice melted, but only part of it. The steam froze again and began to snow, to fill the deep canyon. In the middle of all this there came to life a great creature called Ymir, from the frozen clay. He was an ice-giant.”

The listeners were spellbound by the enormity of the Norse story. Nils was glad he had chosen this one over that of the Garden of Eden, whose warm and idyllic setting would be hard for the People to understand. Sometimes, in the chill of winter, the Garden was hard for the Norse to understand.

“This ice-giant,” he went on, “looked around for something to eat, but there was nothing. Then he noticed a great animal, just created like himself. From her came four streams of milk, and he saw that this was good. He called her Audhumla, the nourisher.”

There was a short pause at this point while Odin and Nils conversed in the Norse tongue. The concept of a cow did not translate well. Finally Odin spoke to the assembled People.

“My friends, it is this among the people of White Wolf and Fire Man: When I was living there, I saw these animals. The people there keep them as we keep dogs, and they squeeze milk from their udders.”

There were gasps of amazement.

“No, no, it is true,” Odin assured them. “I have seen it. This animal is much like the hump-backed buffalo that we see
sometimes from farther west. Now, let us listen to more of White Wolf’s story.”

The crowd quieted expectantly, and Nils continued.

“This cow, the nourisher, was also looking around for something to eat,” he went on. “She began to lick at a block of ice, melting it a little, and soon there was seen a head like that of a man, but it was a god-being. He stepped free of the ice. Meanwhile the ice-giant had fallen sleep, and there began to form other frost-giants from his body. From the sweat under his arms, a boy and a girl. From between his toes, a six-headed giant, who was the start of a race of evil giants.”

There were more gasps.

“Now,” Nils went on, “there was the god from the ice block, who soon had a son, Borr, and he was good. The ice-giants were evil. This started a war between the gods and the giants. Three sons of Borr finally killed the great Ymir and rolled his body into the canyon. This ended the war, and they began to make the earth out of the giant’s parts. His blood and sweat formed the ocean, his flesh the land. His bones are the mountains and hills, his hair and beard the trees and grass. They painted the inside of the giant’s skull blue, and it is the dome of the sky. The clouds are Ymir’s brains. Four very strong little men were put at the four corners to hold the dome in place. Their names were North, South, East, and West.”

He paused, and a murmur ran through the crowd.

“What about people?” someone asked.

“Yes, White Wolf,” said Odin, to whom much of this was new. “What about people?”

“That was not yet,” Nils explained. “First, there was—”

“Enough!” stated Singing Moose. “My head is tired from such a story.”

He rose and left the lodge. Others began to drift out, too. Now Nils was concerned. The listeners had certainly responded well, but had he somehow offended the honored storyteller of the People? Should he have
not
tried to tell the Norse story of Creation?

S
inging Moose needed some time to think. He had not been offended, actually. It was more as if he had been overwhelmed by the enormously powerful stories of the outsider, White Wolf.

It was a good thing, to have an honored guest such as this light-haired holy man. An honor for the People. It was also good that White Wolf and yes, the other, too, the one called Fire Man, were fine providers. They had proved themselves in the hunt, in both skill and bravery. These two had vast powers. White Wolf was regarded with awe because of Odin’s eyewitness tales, and the People had
seen
him change the color of a stone. Fire Man’s powers were different, but equally impressive.

The People had been afraid at first, of men with such gifts. Even with the reassurance of Odin that they could be trusted, it was an uneasy time. It was soon apparent, though, that Odin was right. These holy men were, after all, men. They were kind to children, and both had now taken wives among the People. From what Moose had heard, they treated the women with respect. That, too, was good. It was known that some tribes did not.

So, it had become an interesting, stimulating thing to have these outsiders among the People. They had learned the language quickly, though they were still not skilled in its use.

One thing, however, that had never even crossed the mind of Singing Moose, was that he would be challenged as a storyteller. Moose had inherited this vocation from his father, and he in turn from
his
father, for many generations back into the Old Times. It was the responsibility, the duty of the storyteller, to teach and pass on the story of the People. Their
Creation story was a good one. He had always enjoyed telling it to visitors, and listening to theirs. In addition to the underground lake account and that of the grapevine ladder, there were many other stories of the People. Some of these were for amusement, some for instruction, some for both. Children loved the stories of foolish Rabbit, back in the time when the animals talked and could converse with man. How Bobcat lost his tail…How Coyote stole fire…Good stories.

It was good to hear the stories of others, too. That was always a pleasure. He had inquired of the stories of White Wolf’s people out of curiosity. The outsiders now seemed to have enough use of language to share their stories. Now Moose was wondering if he should have done so. Even with the language difficulty, White Wolf had told them a story so powerful…
Ah!
Gods and giants and ice caves and dwarfs…For the first time, Singing Moose was afraid. Always in the past when other storytellers were present, it had been an easy, friendly give-and-take.
Ah, your story is a good one. Now here is ours
. … And others had good stories, too. Some were closely alike, others had interesting variations. In one Creation tale he had heard, people came from the sky, sliding down its dome to reach earth. None, however, had threatened him as a storyteller of the People. Until now. He had been unable to absorb any more, and had caused the story-fire session to end. He needed to think. There was always an interest in new stories from outside, but never an absorbing acceptance like this. And if the outsiders were to stay, what would happen? Would they
prefer
the stories of White Wolf? In a generation or two, would the origins of the People be forgotten? It was a heavy responsibility for the old storyteller to bear. He wished that the light-haired outsider would just go away. Let everything be as it was, as it had always been. Maybe it would be best for the People if some tragedy were to fall on the two outsiders. Maybe he could … He thrust that thought aside.