Sigrun's Secret (31 page)

My hands were chilled on the reins, and the dark clouds above us promised rain at any moment. Two days’ hard riding had brought us to Halfgrim’s farmstead, a shabby, cobbled-together place on poor land. It had taken half of another morning for Arnor to persuade him to meet me. Now I sat waiting on horseback on this cold, exposed hillside for Halfgrim to appear. The wind blew steadily, stealing all the warmth from me, and making me shiver. Perhaps I shivered, too, because I dreaded seeing my father’s killer again. I loathed the idea of having to speak to him.

We’d agreed to come unarmed, but I was almost certain, as Halfgrim and his men finally rode towards us, that they had weapons concealed beneath their bulky cloaks. My horse sidestepped restlessly and I knew she was picking up on my fear.

Arnor rode forward a few steps and greeted Halfgrim, who grunted something unintelligible in reply.

‘We are here to try to reach a settlement over the feud that has arisen between your families,’ Arnor began formally.

‘Yes, yes, we know all that,’ snapped Halfgrim. He leaned forward over his saddle, breathing heavily.

‘Very well,’ said Arnor, clearly thrown off his stride by Halfgrim’s rudeness. ‘Do you both accept that I’m a neutral negotiator? That’s important before we move on. I barely know Bjorn’s family, and I know you only by reputation. Will you state your satisfaction with that before we go any further?’

‘Pah!’ said Halfgrim scornfully and spat on the ground. His face was flushed and his eyes bloodshot. I wondered whether he’d been drinking, but it seemed early in the day for that. I noticed him tug awkwardly on the reins with his left hand. Some memory stirred in me, but I couldn’t quite think what.

‘I see no need for any settlement,’ Halfgrim said. ‘No need for any negotiation at all by you or anyone else. I avenged my father, there’s an end to it.’

‘It’s not an end,’ said Arnor. ‘Bjorn went into exile according to the agreement you made. His life was no longer forfeit. But you pursued him and killed him anyway. And Bjorn has a son who now intends to avenge
his
father. You can prepare to protect yourself and your family, or you can agree to a settlement that will be to your advantage. My task is to bring an end to the dispute so that both families keep their honour and there is no more killing.’

I heard a crunching sound and realized Halfgrim was grinding his teeth in rage.

‘The only settlement I’ll consider,’ he said angrily, ‘is the usurper’s farm, house, and all its contents, including the slaves. They all belonged to my father.’ A gust of wind bringing the first drops of rain blew over us all, and Halfgrim shivered. I looked at him closely, noticing how he held his right hand awkwardly cradled over the pommel of his saddle. I had a sudden, painful memory of Halfgrim fighting my father. He was right-handed. Something was wrong with his right arm.

‘Your father stole many of those possessions from others including
my
grandparents,’ I said, half my mind still on the argument, but the other half distracted as I diagnosed my enemy’s health. ‘And there are no slaves at Thorastead.’

‘There soon will be,’ said Halfgrim with an unpleasant smile. ‘And anyway, I won’t do business with a wench. That would shame me. Send your brother, or is he afraid?’

‘He’s so unafraid that he’s sworn you’ll be dead by midsummer,’ I told him.

Halfgrim laughed scornfully. ‘Let him try,’ he said. ‘As if I’d be afraid of an untried stripling like him!’ As he spoke he jerked suddenly on the reins, pulling his horse around to ride away. My stomach lurched, knowing this was my last chance to stop him, to persuade him to settle with me.

‘Wait, please!’ I cried.

But Halfgrim’s horse had thrown up his head as he turned and the movement had buffeted Halfgrim’s right arm, making him groan and bend forward in pain. His high colour faded to a sickly grey as he swayed in the saddle. Beneath his anger, I could suddenly sense overwhelming pain and sickness.

I watched as he slid helplessly off his horse and fell to the ground. His attendants jumped off their horses to help him. One grabbed his arm and Halfgrim screamed in pain, startling us all.

I knew I should help. I suspected the wound my father had given him had festered. If I left him, he would probably die and a part of me wanted to let him do just that. He’d murdered my father in cold blood. His death now would keep Ingvar and Asgrim safe.

Halfgrim muttered something, his words slurred and indistinct. Then he fainted.

‘What’s wrong?’ asked Arnor. ‘Is he sick?’

‘Wounded,’ said one of his men, looking helplessly at us. ‘I think he’s had it. I don’t know what to do.’

Arnor looked sideways at me, but I pretended not to see. I knew what he was going to ask of me, and I didn’t know how to respond.

‘He needs a healer,’ said Arnor. He was still looking at me.

‘There aren’t any round here,’ said the man. ‘Only the old woman at the farm a days’ ride away who delivers babies, but she won’t come here. She’s no good anyway.’ He looked back at his injured friend.

Arnor turned to me. ‘Sigrun,’ he said quietly, so the others wouldn’t hear, ‘I know he’s your bitter enemy. We both know what he did. You have a choice now: you can watch him die and see it as the gods’ justice, or you can try and help him.’

I bit my lip, my training and my conscience at war with my instinct. My hatred for Halfgrim still burned so fiercely within me. I could never, ever forgive him for what he’d done to my family.

‘What do
you
think I should do?’ I asked, torn and unhappy.

Arnor shrugged. ‘It’s not for me to say. It may be too late to save him anyway.’

I sat frozen with indecision. My horse dropped her head, sensing I was distracted, and snatched a mouthful of grass. I pulled her up absent-mindedly. Arnor would always know, I thought, that I could have helped Halfgrim and didn’t. Worst of all,
I
would always know it. Right now, I didn’t care. But would it weigh on me for the rest of my life afterwards?

I tried to imagine what my mother would want me to do; what she would do herself. And then I knew, as clearly as if she had spoken to me, that I must try and help this man. No matter how much I loathed him and no matter how much I thought he deserved an excruciating death in the grip of fever.

I slid down from my horse and gave her a pat before handing the reins to Arnor,

‘Very well,’ I said. ‘I’ll look at his arm.’

I knelt beside the unconscious man, the wetness from the grass soaking my tunic, and forced myself to take hold of his wrist. His skin burned with fever. The infection must be very bad. I pushed his sleeve carefully back and revealed what I had guessed I’d see; the sword slash given to him by my father in their last fight, now swollen and dark, angry red. Foe Biter had been true to its name.

‘I can’t treat this out here,’ I said to Arnor. ‘I’d need hot water, clean cloths, and I’d have to brew some medicines.’

‘Are you a healer?’ asked Halfgrim’s companion in surprise.

‘I am,’ I said. ‘But I don’t have many of my remedies with me.’

‘Please try,’ he said. ‘Otherwise he’ll die, won’t he?’

‘It’s likely,’ I agreed. I swung myself back onto my horse and we followed the group slowly down to the house. Halfgrim had been slung across his horse, head and legs lolling to either side as the horse walked. It was raining in earnest now, drenching all of us. The skies were dark and clouds were rolling down from the mountains, engulfing the landscape in thick fog.

Halfgrim’s longhouse was smaller than my home; the building materials a shabby mixture of rocks, imported timber, and driftwood. There were hardly any women, and the house, though new, was dirty, smelly, and neglected. Everyone stared at me suspiciously as we entered. At first the women were reluctant to help me, but once I’d laid out my medicines and explained my intentions, they began to co-operate.

I lanced the wound to drain the pus. That brought Halfgrim round, but after a few delirious cries of pain, he fainted again. Once the injury was clean, I bound it in a cooling, disinfecting poultice. I also brewed a tea that would help his body work against the infection. As I worked, I tried to close my mind to the thought that this man had killed my father. I tried to think of him as just another patient, but it was difficult. My skin crawled every time I had to touch him.

‘He’s been ill since he came home,’ one of the women said, as she watched me. ‘Getting steadily worse. But when you came here demanding to talk, he got so angry he got up and rode out anyway. Will you be able to cure him?’

‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘It’ll be down to how strong he is and how well he responds to the medicines.’

As I was speaking to her, I noticed a grubby boy clinging to her skirts and peeping out at me. His face was smeared with dirt and his hair was long and tangled, hanging down over his eyes. I smiled at him, and he ducked back behind the woman’s kirtle, putting his thumb in his mouth.

‘Is he yours?’ I asked the woman pointing at the boy.

‘No,’ she said quickly, twitching her kirtle away from his grasp. ‘He’s master’s son.’

‘Oh, I see. I didn’t know he had a son,’ I said, surprised. ‘I didn’t even know he was married.’ There’d been no sign of a wife, or any kind of mistress of the house. How little I actually knew of this man who’d almost destroyed my life.

‘Dead,’ said the woman with a sniff. ‘Two winters ago.’

I crouched down, my sympathy for the boy stirred, but also alert to the danger he represented. If Halfgrim died, it still might not be an end to the violence. In a few years, this son might want to avenge him.

‘What’s your name?’ I asked the boy. He stared at me, poised for flight, uncertain if I was a threat or not.

‘Bjorn,’ he said at last.

‘Named for his grandfather,’ said the woman. There was no softness in her voice nor any apparent affection for the little boy.

Named for his grandfather using the name my father had taken as his new identity. All this had been going on while I lived quietly on our farm unaware of my family’s dark past. It was a strange thought.

I left Halfgrim’s servants with instructions and quitted the house accompanied by Arnor. We rejoined his men in the rough camp they’d made nearby. The rain had stopped and everyone had gathered around the fire.

‘Will he live?’ Arnor asked me as we warmed our hands.

‘I think so,’ I said. ‘But cases like this are difficult to predict.’

Arnor nodded. ‘It’ll take him time to recover,’ he said.

‘I’m afraid it will,’ I said, feeling guilty at keeping him and all his men kicking their heels here. ‘And I’d expected my brother would have tracked me down by now. We’ve wasted so much time. If Asgrim gets here before we’ve agreed anything, all this will have been for nothing.’

‘Don’t worry,’ Arnor said. ‘If he tracks you to my house I’ve told my people to send him in the wrong direction. Meanwhile, I’ve had an idea that will take a day at least to put into action. Halfgrim won’t be up and about by tomorrow, will he?’

‘I doubt it,’ I said. ‘Even when the fever breaks, he’ll be as weak as a kitten.’

‘All the better,’ said Arnor. ‘Perhaps he’ll be more malleable.’

When I tried to visit Halfgrim the following day, he was awake enough to recognize me and order me out of the house. I went swiftly, glad not to be forced to tend him again. I spent an interminable day waiting, while Arnor planned and talked and sent his men off in different directions on horseback.

‘Halfgrim doesn’t trust me,’ he explained. ‘He thinks I’m on your side. So I’ve sent my men out to gather all the neighbours within a day’s ride of here. Especially the men who come to the Northern Quarter Assembly in the spring.’

‘Assembly?’ I asked. I had a vague memory of Helgi talking about this, but no clear idea what it was.

‘We decide on laws, deal with disputes and so on. Halfgrim won’t be in a hurry to alienate all his closest neighbours. He has to live among them. I think that will give him better manners and make him think twice about breaking an agreement a second time.’

I was impressed by Arnor’s wisdom and foresight. ‘I’m very grateful for all your trouble,’ I told him. ‘I can never repay you.’

‘You delivered my daughter,’ he reminded me. ‘There’s nothing to repay. In any case, we don’t have a settlement yet.’

* * *

The neighbours started to arrive at our camp the following day, appearing like shadows out of the early morning mist. The sun hadn’t yet risen above the mountains when I struggled out of my furs, sleep still fogging my brain. I tied my shoes, dragged a comb through my hair and began preparing a hot breakfast of barley porridge for everyone.

I could feel an atmosphere of expectation, almost of excitement around me. People had few opportunities to gather together, spread out as they were on distant farms and were eagerly exchanging news and stories. Arnor moved among the new arrivals, the mist hanging in beads in his beard, greeting them and informing them about the conflict they’d come to help settle.

Once the sun was up and the mist had dispersed, there was a fair crowd of people standing around the fire. The noise of cheerful voices grew as more people arrived. It was almost like a party, I thought. For me, of course, there was nothing festive about it. I had the deadly-earnest task of preventing my brother and Ingvar from risking their lives. I was also uncomfortably aware I would have to speak before all these people. Not only was that the thing I hated most, but it was unusual for a woman to take on such a task. Disputes were normally settled by men.