Viking Revolt Read online

  Had the man been a scavenger, startled at his thieving? An outlaw? Or had he indeed been a troll, straight out of the stories Gest’s grand-dam had told him when he was a weanling, up north in Naumdale? At the king’s court in Tunsberg, offerings were made to the gods who had favoured Harald’s rise to power, given him victory and fair seasons. But little was said of trolls. The king disliked dark matters, trolls and trollcraft, although strange things were whispered about certain of his sons…

  Earl Sigvaldi’s stronghold lay at the head of Gandsfjord, in a broad stretch of farmland between the woods and the strand. The earl led Gest and the others up a grassy slope towards a cluster of buildings surrounded by a stockade bristling with sharp stakes. Cattle lowed in the meadows and fishermen brought in their catch. The stink of rotting fish and cow dung and wood smoke hung rank in the air.

  To one side stood a large forge, its fire glowing, the regular chink-chink-chink of a blacksmith’s hammer ringing out across the garth as a bald man with the thews of an ox beat frenziedly at glowing iron. Beside him lay lengths of iron, in a pile. Sweat stood out on his brow, and he seemed to have been working for quite some while.

  They all dismounted, and the men had led the horses away to the stables. Gest followed Earl Sigvaldi across a muddy yard to the gates of his hall, which was as magnificent a structure as his longship, almost fit for a king. Thralls and hirelings were busy at work all around the yard, but Earl Sigvaldi hobbled through them and led Gest in through the already open hall doors.

  Inside things were cool and gloomy, although embers glowed in a fire pit in the packed earth floor. Earl Sigvaldi spoke to a handsome woman of his own years, and she strode from the hall, clapping her hands and yelling orders. Gest was taken away to a bathhouse near to the hall where servants washed the stains of mud and salt from his limbs and he was given new clothes befitting his station.

  He was led back into the hall. Earl Sigvaldi’s men had gone to sit at the benches that lined the walls, while Earl Sigvaldi set Gest beside himself on the great black oak high seat on the far end. Gest found himself sharing the high seat with two big hunting hounds who the earl fussed over, feeding them scraps until they both took it into their heads to go frisking about the hall.

  Beer was brought for the men, while Earl Sigvaldi and Gest drank mead. Banners hung from the rafters high overhead, and Gest studied them as he drank. Earl Sigvaldi followed his gaze.

  ‘Those are the standards of my forefathers,’ he said, ‘who ruled these lands in the days of the petty kings. Things have changed,’ he added with a jerky shrug, ‘and a strong king rules all Norway now. After King Harald’s victory at Hafrsfjord, where my two uncles died, my father renounced the throne that was offered him and departed, none know where. When the throne became mine, I saw the sense of bowing the knee—I am no fighter!—though my brother would have none of it, and he took ships and men and sailed off into the outer seas.’

  Gest nodded. It was a familiar story. Many men had been too proud to accept King Harald Finehair’s rule, and had fled Norway for other shores. ‘Folk have settled in the Orkneys and Shetland,’ he commented, ‘and there is this new land in the north, Snowland some call it, Iceland others. There men live without kings. Perhaps that is where your brother is to be found.’

  Earl Sigvaldi began telling Gest a long story about his distant forefather King Josur and how he slew King Alrek of Hordaland, and Vikar Alreksson slew him and all the men in the area, until the land in question was called the Women’s Hundred.

  “Then Hjor Josursson fought Vikar until they made peace,’ the earl went on, “and Hjor’s son Hjorleif had a son called King Half who was a noted sea king and…”

  Gest nodded absently and supressed a yawn. The earl’s words were interrupted by a commotion from the hall doors. The handsome woman who Gest took to be Earl Sigvaldi’s wife swept in at the head of a small train of humble folk, men with the shaven heads of thralls, women in dowdy servants’ garb. Amongst them was another girl who caught Gest’s eye as soon as she came into the light of the fire pit. And those of Earl Sigvaldi’s men, if the whistling and catcalling were anything to go by.

  Blushing furiously, she stood with the others before the high seat. She was tall, with high cheekbones and long, flaxen hair that she wore uncovered though she was surely of marriageable age. Pursed lips and ice blue eyes gave a haughty look to her bold face as she glanced left and right at the yelling men.

  ‘Here are the thralls and hirelings of Thorstein’s household,’ said Earl Sigvaldi’s wife, raising her voice above the hubbub. ‘It took me some little while to round them up.’ She scowled at the earl’s men, and called for silence.

  Earl Sigvaldi echoed her words. ‘Quiet, men,’ he said. ‘Let not our guest consider us to be backwoods boors. He is a king’s steward, like Thorstein.’ He looked down at the gathered folk. ‘Let your new master inspect you.’

  Gest climbed down from the high seat and looked over the small gathering. ‘I am Gest, housecarl of the king,’ he told them. ‘I am to be your new master, steward of Thorstein’s steading. We shall be working together to get things back on their feet after the attack that cost the life of your old master. Tell me, what do you remember of the attack? Folk have told me it was the work of trolls?’

  He was studying the girl as he spoke. Boldly she returned his gaze, and her voice cut through the mumblings of the others.

  ‘We were woken in the middle of the night, master, by the reek of smoke,’ she said in a voice that was like a gritty caress of honey. ‘Rushing into the main hall, we found the master already there, sword in hand, though he was still in his nightshirt. From outside came yelling voices. It was all very confused. Before any of us knew what was happening, the master was ushering us down into a secret tunnel that led from beneath the hall floor and we came out again after what seemed like miles in the trees to the east of the hall.

  ‘When we came out, it was the blackest midnight, but we saw the hall ablaze, and dark figures dancing about it. Even as we watched, the roof caved in with a shower of sparks, and we knew that our master was lost. I led the others to the shore where we took a boat from the boatshed and rowed to the strand by Earl Sigvaldi’s stronghold.’

  Gest listened to her account, taking the chance to admire her looks. The other thralls and hirelings were an ill favoured lot, dirty and drab, but he thought that Thorstein had not kept this girl for farm work.

  ‘What is your name?’ he asked her.

  ‘I am Hild,’ she said with a proud jut of her chin. Her voice had the trace of an English accent.

  He glanced at the others. There was a short, squat man with a squint, two dull eyed clods, gaunt and scrawny and reeking of fish, and three plump milkmaids with about two teeth between them. ‘Is what Hild says how you remember it?’ he asked. The others nodded dumbly.

  ‘Our master was a good man,’ said the fellow with the squint, who Gest later learnt was named Njal. ‘He stayed behind and fought the trolls while we escaped.’

  ‘So you say it was trolls that attacked the steading?’ Gest asked with a slight smile. ‘Hild, girl, what would you say?’

  She shrugged. ‘It was too dark to be sure,’ she told him. ‘But who else would it have been?’

  Gest returned her gaze. ‘That remains to be seen,’ he said. ‘Very well, tomorrow we shall return to the farm and make a start on rebuilding. We shall see a hard first year, no doubt, but with the aid of Earl Sigvaldi and his folk we shall soon have the steading back on its feet. You will find me a good master, if you serve me loyally and well. But I must warn you not to cross me, or you will regret it.’

  Hild bobbed her head, followed by the others. ‘We will serve you,’ she murmured. ‘We will serve you as loyally as we served our old master.’

  But as he led them from the hall the next day, Gest noted glowering eyes above mustachios watching Hild as she went. It seemed that Ivar was not happy to see her leave-taking.

  The next few days were packed
full of hard work, and Gest was too busy to question his new charges any further. Purchased at a fair price from Earl Sigvaldi, new timber was provided to replace the charred wood of the burnt buildings. Livestock was shipped in from Kaupang, barn and byre rebuilt, and the hall was soon towering over the rest of the steading as it had done formerly, a rival to that of Earl Sigvaldi.

  Gest came to know his hirelings well, the two fishermen brothers, Kormak and Dufthak, the cowherd, Njal, and the milkmaids, Kraka, Signy, and Gerd. They were of great help in the rebuilding of the hall, all except Hild, who refused to do any work other than to spin flax. She didn’t even seem to know how to cook, although she certainly was ready to order the other girls around when they cooked supper.

  ‘What were your duties with your former master?’ he asked her in some exasperation when the work was done and they sat by the hearth in the hall, dozing after a supper of oatmeal and stock fish. ‘It seems to me that we can’t have useless mouths here.’

  She looked away. ‘My other duties,’ she said tartly. ‘I knew you would bring them up sooner or later. Very well, it is evening. The hall is restored. As you know, Thorstein was not a married man. You too have brought no wife with you.’

  ‘Ah…’ said Gest as understanding dawned. ‘I understand. Very well, you shall warm my bed tonight.’

  He rose, and led her from the hall to the shut bed that Earl Sigvaldi’s craftsmen had built for him. That night he found that Thorstein had chosen his leman well, and that she was skilful in duties of the bedchamber, however lacking she was around the farm. Women were aplenty at court, and the housecarls had their pick of them, but he had been away from court some little while.

  Afterwards, sated, he lay beside her. The hall was silent now, and he knew that the hirelings slept in the main room, beside the fire. They would be up at the crack of dawn if not earlier, if he had his way. Much work was still to be done.

  He remembered the drudgery of farm work from his youth. It had been that which he had been escaping when he came south to Vestfold and the king’s court, years ago now. That, and the small matter of outlawry; he had killed a man in Naumdale and fled. When he became a housecarl of the king, he had never thought he would return to such a grubby life. And yet here he was. But farming was not his main concern.

  ‘You have done your work well,’ murmured Hild. ‘The steading is restocked and restored. Our former master could not have done so well. But are you not afraid to dwell in so unlucky a place?’

  He turned his head to study her, ran a possessive hand along her bare flank. ‘I am a king’s man,’ he said. ‘I fear nothing.’

  ‘Your predecessor claimed fearlessness too,’ she said. ‘But he confessed his fears to me, when were alone together. The attack was not the first time interlopers came here.’

  Even as she spoke, Gest heard a sudden clatter from the yard outside. It came again, and there was a muttered curse. The sounds were clearly audible through the timbers of the wall.

  —3—

  ‘What was that?’ Hild tensed like a startled fawn. Gest pressed her back down, and rose, pulling on his breeks and tunic as he pushed open the doors of the shut bed.

  The main hall was cold, the embers of the dying fire flung a flickering red glow over pillars and rafters. ‘Sounds like we have a visitor,’ Gest whispered, taking a spear down from its stand. He propped it against the wall while he lit a lantern with an ember from the fire. As soon as it was shining, he picked up the spear in his right hand, and with the lantern in his left, he advanced on the main doors.

  Hild, struggling into her kirtle, darted to his side, the fire strike highlights from her bare legs. ‘Nay,’ she hissed. ‘They could be waiting for you. Oh, this is all far too like when they came for Thorstein.’

  He scowled at her. ‘It’s a single man,’ he said. ‘I have only heard one, besides.’ He remembered the dark figure that had ambushed him when he first came to the steading. ‘It’s not a whole gang of trolls.’

  ‘All the same,’ Hild hissed, leading him back up the hall, past the sleeping thralls, now wakening and blinking in the glow of Gest’s lantern. ‘It would be better if you took another way. They could be waiting for you to emerge.’

  She pushed back the high seat, revealing the trapdoor that led to the escape tunnel. ‘Go this way,’ she hissed.

  ‘It will take me out into the stand of trees beyond the steading,’ he murmured. ‘By the time I get there, this interloper could have stolen anything, or set fire to the hall.’

  He went back to the main doors. As he did so, they began to shake and shudder. Something long, thin and pointed thrust itself into the narrow gap between doors, sliding up towards the bar that kept them shut. It was the tip of a spear!

  Teeth gritted, Gest set the lantern down on a shelf beside the door, then gripping his spear in one hand he lifted the bar with the other, and kicked the doors open with a crash. A dark figure stood silhouetted against the cold night sky, holding a spear in both hands. He lunged.

  His own spear sank into the man’s thigh. There was a muffled grunt, and then the figure thrust at him and he leapt back, and the attacker’s spear sank into the doorpost. Gest lunged again but the dark figure leapt back. For a second, in the light of the flickering lantern, Gest caught a glimpse of white teeth in a bearded face, then it was away, sprinting into the darkness of the garth, leaving its spear thrumming in the doorpost.

  Ducking under the spear haft, ignoring the cries of consternation from his household, Gest ran out into the windy night. After taking only a couple of steps, he collided with something that lowed in complaint. The garth milled with beasts, cattle, sheep, horses. He seized a ram by the horns and dragged it bleating back to its pen, then shouted to the hall: ‘Come and help me, all of you!’

  Flooding from the hall the thralls began forcing beasts back into byres and sheds. Gest left them to it, hurrying from the garth, spear in hand. The attacker must still be somewhere nearby. Opening up the beast sheds had created a diversion—maybe that had been his intentions. It seemed to be one man—or troll?—but a one man cattle raid made little sense.

  He sped across the meadow. It had been in this direction that the dark shape had run. In the blackness, Gest had no hope of tracking the visitor, so he had to trust to luck. At last, he caught sight of a running shape shooting towards the edge of the trees. The black wall swallowed it up.

  Gest halted panting at the entrance to the wood, peering out into the gloom. He hefted his spear as if to throw it, then lowered it to his side. No use. Even if it had been weighted for throwing, he could make out nothing of the runner’s position. And now the crashing sound of movement deeper in the woods had been swallowed up by the night wind among the branches.

  ‘You win this round, friend,’ he said softly. He turned and trailed back to the garth.

  By the time he got back, the breakout had been stalled and the beasts were back in their pens and sheds. The thralls and hirelings stood in the garth talking together, while Hild waited in the doorway, backlit by the glow of more lanterns. Gest strode into the light, spear over his shoulder, and surveyed them.

  ‘Get back to bed,’ he said curtly. ‘There’ll be work enough for everyone in the morning. Njal.’ He ripped out the spear that still projected from the doorpost and flung it to the hireling. ‘Stand watch until dawn, then come and wake me.’

  Gest led the others into the hall, where Hild greeted him with a look of worry in her eyes. ‘Was it the troll?’ she said.

  ‘Troll?’ Gest grinned, cleaning the blade of his spear before putting it away. ‘Do trolls bleed? Maybe it was a troll, but I wounded him. He’ll not try sneaking around my steading again, I’ll warrant.’

  He shut the hall doors, leaving Njal out in the garth clutching the other spear, and led Hild back to the shut bed.

  Gest lay back, and Hild snuggled up to him. Her tone was admiring. ‘You wounded a troll? The old master never did the like.’

  ‘So what did the old master
do?’ Gest asked curiously. ‘You told me that he died fighting the trolls. What else did he do?’

  She was cagy. ‘He oversaw the running of the steading, of course,’ she said. ‘Although he spent much time away from the hall, roaming the surrounding woods, leaving me in charge. There’s little else to say, except, aye, he died when the hall was burnt. But I do not know if he died fighting or was crushed to death when the roof fell in. He was a strong man,’ she added, running her hand over Gest’s iron muscles, ‘as strong as you. But I never saw him use his strength. Not like you.’

  ‘I did very little,’ Gest said dismissively. ‘If that’s what fighting trolls is like, the feats of the old heroes have been much exaggerated. But I have my doubts. More likely it was some man, a vagrant, perhaps, looking for something to steal. It was a clever trick, that, letting the beasts free. It would have kept us all busy while he could have done who knows what.’ He paused. ‘Why did Thorstein wander the woods? Did he ever say?’

  Her hair tickled against his arm as she shook her head. ‘I know only that he was looking for something,’ she said. Then she added, ‘Wealth is a source of strife among kinsmen.’

  She lay there in silence, expectant, waiting for a response. Unspeaking Gest smiled a little to himself, then rolled over and went to sleep.

  Njal woke him at dawn, and he went out to survey the garth. The mud was churned up by the hoofs of the beasts that had been set free, and it was impossible to follow any kind of trail, but he found a splash of blood on the ground near the door.

  Next he took the spear that Njal had been clutching and examined it. It seemed normal enough, of Frankish work if he was any judge.

  ‘Do trolls trade with the Southlands?’ he asked mockingly. Njal squinted at him but said nothing.

  Hild came out, stepping primly to avoid the worst of the mud. ‘Should the thralls go to their duties?’ she asked him.