text: They had all known that they would go south because where else was there to go? They could have sailed north up to Kaupangen where Solmund said there was a small settlement from which some supplies might be got. But beyond that there was likely nothing but jagged, empty coast and unless you wanted to raid for the wind-dried cod and smoked herring that the folk up there lived on, there was no reason to go there.
  
  'Fish is not the sort of silver we need,' Svein had said when old Solmund had talked of his exploits in the north. Besides which, it was not the time of year to be going north. It was one thing to be at sea when most sensible men were snugged up by their hearths and jarls and kings had hauled their dragon ships from the water and tucked them up in their nausts; it was altogether another to venture into the freezing unknown, especially crew-light in a ship which had not been given the love and attention it would have had if pulled aground over winter. For that was the time to re-clink the ship, replace old strakes, sew sail rents and give the woollen cloth a new coating of pine resin and sheep's fat to help it hold the wind better. The hull could be scraped of slime and of the mussels that cluster where the keel meets the belly. New horsehair string could be pushed into any cracks and the whole ship, from thwarts to mast, to the rigging and oars, could be coated in sticky resin to shield it from rain and salt water. But there had been little opportunity to treat Reinen so kindly and now they would make do with things as they were. And at least they were not going north.
  
  They had all known that they would go south, and no one doubted the dangers in that, so none was surprised when, on the third day out of Osøyro, they saw another ship ploughing its furrow through the wide sea.
  
  'If the witch were here we could have asked her who they were,' Svein said, mainly to rankle Asgot who had not liked having a seiðr-wife around the place. But all he got from the godi was a sneer and he shrugged as if to suggest it was worth a try. The witch had left the previous dawn, trudging off into the brittle snow and being swallowed by the woods as though she had never been.
  
  'Wolves are one thing, Sigurd Haraldarson, but boats are another,' she had said, the corners of her eyes creasing like well-used leather. 'I have done what the gods asked of me. At least where you are concerned. Perhaps we will meet again.'
  
  But none of them, not even Sigurd whom she had come to warn, had been sorry to see the back of her and her cat skins.
  
  'My cock has been hiding since the day she arrived,' Bjarni had said, but only when he was sure she was out of earshot, which was a full day after she had left.
  
  'You worry for nothing, brother,' Bjorn had said, 'for even a seiðr-wife cannot put a spell on something she cannot see. It would be like trying to hit a louse with a spear-throw.'
  
  The others had laughed at that and it was a good sound if a small one in Jarl Hakon's vast old hall.
  
  'Bollocks but they really want us dead,' Olaf said now, for who else but King Gorm would have a ship out there in the rough water west of Karmøy in the heart of winter?
  
  'Wanting it is not the same as having it,' Sigurd reminded him as they stood at the prow. Some of the others were shrugging into their brynjur and grabbing spears though the ship was still a good distance off, having come round a headland like a hawk swooping from a branch.
  
  'Treat them like you would a dog turd in the street,' Sigurd called back to Solmund at the helm.
  
  'We'll give them a wide berth if we can,' Solmund called back, 'but that would be easier if you would all get back to work instead of puffing up your damn chests and laying your cocks over the side.'
  
  'You heard him! Back to the ropes!' Olaf yelled, and they swapped spear shafts for tarred lines again. It had been hard work all morning, tacking Reinen into the wind, Olaf shouting commands and setting the sail from the feel of the gusts on his cheeks. Solmund would drive the steerboard hard to one side until Reinen turned so far into the wind that the wind on the front of the sail halted her and then blew her backwards. With one corner of the sail released and lines freed at bow, midships and stern, Bram and Svein would haul on the ropes stretching to each end of the yard in order to draw the sail to the other side of the boat, catching the wind to move forward once again. When they got it right Reinen would lurch forward and fly like an arrow from a bow. But it was hard work and mostly silent work too, each crew member playing their part with Olaf's the only voice in their ears.
  
  Despite Solmund's cautious optimism, Sigurd was not so sure they would get past the other ship before it came across their bows. Not against the wind. Not when all the other ship had to do was turn her bows towards the north and run with the wind.
  
  He was still watching the other ship when Runa came to stand with him, clutching the sheer strake as Reinen's sail snapped full of wind and she set off at the gallop on the new tack.
  
  'Are you two friends now?' Sigurd asked, patting the rail beside his sister's hand. Runa had not spent much time at sea and was still getting used to the way Reinen flexed through the water like a fish. Like all good ships her hull had been built to ride the waves and the current, not to muscle through the sea like a drunk man through a crowded hall.
  
  'We are on speaking terms,' Runa said, her gaze, like his, fixed on the other ship that looked to be making its turn now in order to come at them like a spear with the wind behind it. Out here in the open water that wind whipped white spume off the waves and Reinen was flexing through her length; Sigurd hoped that the rivets would not begin to work themselves free of the strakes. She was a fine ship, but she was not made to endure the open sea for long and he could feel her trying to agree terms with winds and currents which were arguing amongst themselves.
  
  'How can you be sure they are our enemies?' Runa asked. Her golden hair had worked free of her fur hat and was streaming and fluttering in the gusts, and she had one hand at her throat clutching the Freyja amulet which brought her luck.
  
  'Because we have no friends, sister,' Sigurd said, for there was not a jarl or wealthy karl anywhere who would side with him these days. The only allies he had in the world were in that belly of oak, heaving and hauling on ropes, driving Reinen on, beating against the wind. 'That is one of Biflindi's ships and its skipper has been waiting for us.'
  
  Sailing down through the sheltered waters of the Karmsund Strait had not been an option. No ships could pass through the channel below Avaldsnes without paying the king for the privilege, and seeing as the king wanted Sigurd dead more than he wanted all the taxes in the world, it would have been impossible to slip through the net that way. So they had taken the sea-road west of Karmøy. There had been a chance that they would not meet any of King Gorm's crews out there. For even though the king was bound to set the trap, a sea fog or sheeting rain might conceal their passing. Or the king's skippers might prefer to keep their ships moored in some safe harbour than be patrolling amongst Rán's white-haired daughters with the wind freezing their cheeks and numbing their hands.
  
  In the event, though, there had been no fog and no veil of rain to hide Reinen. The king's ships must have flown from Avaldsnes the moment he laid eyes on Freystein's torc-wearing corpse and knew there could be no peace with Sigurd.
  
  'That's Wave-Thunder,' Moldof said, confirming it. 'I thought it earlier but wanted to be sure. Her skipper is called Bjalki. I know him.'
  
  'Is he any good?' Sigurd asked.
  
  'You're asking his opinion now?' Aslak said. 'It was not long ago that he showed up meaning to hew off your head, toss it in his little boat and row it back to the oath-breaker.'
  
  'Winds change,' Sigurd said, glancing at Moldof, who with Valgerd was putting spare shields in the rack on Reinen's larboard side to form a higher rampart against spears and arrows and to make it more difficult for the enemy to clamber aboard.
  
  'Bjalki rarely eats at the king's table,' Moldof said. 'But he's ambitious. He'll be hungry for this chance.'
  
  Sigurd nodded. How ambitious your enemy was was always a thing worth knowing.
  
  'It's going to be close,' Olaf called.
  
  'Close enough to smell the whoresons,' Bram said.
  
  Asgot had a short axe in either hand, ready to cut the ropes of any grappling hooks that were thrown into the thwarts. The rest worked the ship.
  
  'Be ready with your compliments!' Solmund bellowed from the tiller. 'We'll be cosy enough to share fleas and if you haven't pissed yet you'll have to wait.'
  
  Wave-Thunder had got her bows round now and was coming fast with the wind in her sail. Reinen was on her westward tack, heading out into the open sea, and would have time for one, maybe two more turns before the enemy was upon them. Sigurd was torn. He could take his crew from their work and have them arm themselves properly, but this would stop Reinen dead in the water and make the fight unavoidable. A fight they could not win, judging by the spears, long axes and shield-bearing men crammed in the belly of the king's ship. Or he could have them work the sail and maybe they would edge past, but maybe they would be caught like a hare in the eagle's talons and then they would die quickly because they were too few and not ready for the fight.
  
  'Go aft, Runa,' Sigurd said. 'Take a shield and stay near Solmund, but get down amongst the ribs.' The first arrows streaked from the enemy ship now, one of them clattering into Reinen's thwarts but most falling short into the wave furrows.
  
  Runa shook her head. 'I can fight. You know I can. Valgerd has taught me the ways to kill a man. It is not so hard as one might think.'
  
  Sigurd did not doubt that his sister could fight. He had watched her and Valgerd training together and had been as surprised as he was impressed by Runa's resilience and determination. The inevitable cuts and bruises had, if anything, spurred her to greater efforts and she was a quick learner too.
  
  'What did you expect? She's Harald and Grimhild's daughter,' Olaf had said one day, when he and Sigurd had sat by the hearth watching Runa, her teeth gritted, grunting with effort as she hammered Valgerd's shield with wild sword blows. 'Besides, she had to put up with you and your brothers growing up,' Olaf said, and Sigurd had smiled, though his mood had inevitably soured as he thought of his brothers Thorvard, Sigmund and Sorli: all dead now, like their mother and father and so many others.
  
  'I won't hide like a mouse in the floor rushes,' Runa said now.
  
  Sigurd sighed. 'Fetch a shield and a spear. But keep your head down.'
  
  He could see the enemy crew's leader now, a barrel-chested man who stood at the prow of his ship tying the helmet strap under his chin as he barked commands at his men. Beside him was a broad-shouldered warrior with a long axe who had the look of a prow man. He loomed beside the carved dragon head making sure that his enemies could see more of him than they could of anyone else aboard his ship. He was yelling something, insults probably, but whatever it was got lost in the wind.
  
  'Sigurd?' Olaf called after a while, wanting the younger man to make the final decision about whether to stay at their stations or prepare for a fight.
  
  They had completed another tack and were heading out to sea again, so that it seemed they must collide with the enemy, that Wave-Thunder's bows would strike Reinen midships or aft. Then the king's men would hurl their hooks and haul the ships together hull to hull and when they were as close as lovers the killing would begin.
  
  'Hold your positions!' Sigurd yelled, raising his shield to knock an arrow out of the air into the sea.
  
  Olaf nodded, the order good enough for him.
  
  Then the sea air was thick with the noise of their enemies' war cries and Sigurd's nose was full of their stench and a spear thunked into Reinen's mast, where it quivered like a branch in the wind.
  
  'Tell your king that I proclaim him an oath-breaker and a coward!' Sigurd yelled over the side. He was close enough to his enemies to see the blood-hunger in their eyes and the snarl of their teeth. He could see the Thór's hammers at their throats, the rings of the prow man's brynja beneath his furs and the patches of grey in the skipper Bjalki's beard. 'Gorm is a pile of vomit!' he bellowed. 'A spineless tax collector who has forgotten how to please the gods. He is a nithing!' And then Sigurd laughed, even as an arrow whipped past his head and another thunked into the free board where he stood, because the enemy prow had all but kissed Reinen's stern post yet Reinen had slipped by just beyond reach. Bjalki was red-faced and yelling but Sigurd was laughing too hard to hear the words coming out of his mouth.
  
  Then a grappling hook clumped into the thwarts, but before it could bite into a rib or snag on the sheer strake Asgot hacked through the rope and the frayed end slithered harmlessly away.
  
  Those on the ropes cheered and yelled insults at the other crew, who bristled helplessly, their chance missed. The grin in old Solmund's beard was so wide its corners might have met at the nape of his neck, and Sigurd shared a look with Olaf that said more than words could. Gods but it had been close.
  
  Her sail full of wind, the king's ship flew past, her skipper already yelling at his men to lower the sail so that he could turn her back into the wind and give chase.
  
  'Now we will see what kind of a crew they are!' Solmund called, leaning to spit over the side in disgust. It wasn't long before they got their answer. Sigurd had made his way aft, slapping the grinning brothers Bjorn and Bjarni on their shoulders and declaring that even half a crew they were more than a match for any other. Now he stood at Reinen's stern, watching Gorm's men run out their oars and begin to row after them.
  
  'All muscle and no craft,' Solmund said, unimpressed because it seemed their enemy had no confidence in their own ability to tack into the wind.
  
  'This skipper Bjalki has crammed his thwarts with fighting men and left no room to work the sail,' Sigurd said.
  
  Solmund's lip curled. 'Either way they won't catch us now.'
  
  And yet, after the time it takes to sharpen a knife, Sigurd and Olaf were exchanging concerned looks again. 'What the pig-swivers lack in sea craft they make up in brawn,' Olaf said, for with so many oars in the water Wave-Thunder was coming on at a frightening speed, so that it was not impossible that with Reinen's long tacks their enemies might eventually catch them. It did not help that now and then Olaf would misjudge the wind, or one of the men would take too long to tie off a rope and Reinen would be blown backwards, losing much of the distance they had previously fought so hard for.
  
  And they were getting tired now.
  
  'They are like shit clinging to a sheep's arse,' Olaf growled as they came to the end of the landward tack and everyone prepared for the well-practised fury of movement that would bring the sail across and take Reinen back out to sea.
  
  'Bjalki is trying to make a name for himself,' Crow-Song said, dragging an arm across his sweat-slick face.
  
  'No storm-driver to swell his sail
  
  He yet carves the wave with his prow.
  
  His men lash the sea with their oars
  
  But poor Bjalki cannot catch us now.'
  
  There were smiles at that for it was rare to hear Hagal word-weaving these days, and they enjoyed it, even if no one admitted as much to Crow-Song.
  
  They were off the coast of Åkra now, could see the smoke hanging in the wan sky above the village like unspun sheep's wool. It was a cold, dull, slate-grey day, yet most of them had taken off their furs and cloaks and worked in tunics and breeks, though they would begin to shiver between each setting of the sail.
  
  'We should turn around and fight them, Sigurd,' Black Floki called, his crow-black braids hanging either side of his lean, glistening face as he and Svein heaved that great log, the bietas, across the beam of the ship.
  
  'It would not be a fair fight for they will be too tired to lift their shields,' Svein said, wedging one end of the log into Reinen's side ribs and threading a rope through a notch in the other end which now hung out over the windward edge of the boat. The giant's own braids danced like red ropes as he worked and Sigurd thought how much he looked like his father Styrbiorn these days. Styrbiorn who had slaughtered Jarl Harald's enemies with his long-hafted axe, until by some bad luck the axe head had caught on Sea-Eagle's prow beast and some nithing had plunged his spear into the champion's belly. That had been Styrbiorn's death wound and Sigurd and Svein had watched him fall back into the thwarts like a felled oak.
  
  'It would be worth turning round for a little fight just to have a taste of the wind on our side,' Bram said. 'Gods this is thirsty work.'
  
  'So what are you thinking?' Olaf asked Sigurd, his eyes little more than slits, perhaps remembering the last time they had turned Reinen around to face the enemy. That enemy had been Jarl Randver of Hinderå, and having fled across the froth-crested sound Sigurd had felt Óðin's one-eyed glare on him like the heat from a forge. They had chosen to end that business one way or another and, turning Reinen and dropping the sail, they had waited for Randver and the slaughter that came with him.
  
  'I have an idea, Uncle,' Sigurd said, watching a gull dive down to snatch something from the waves.
  
  'So long as it does not involve losing half this half crew – unless you want Solmund hauling on ropes with his arms and steering us with his feet.'
  
  But while having an enemy ship half up their arse was nothing to be happy about, Olaf knew that it was better to deal with that threat than risk running into another of Gorm's crews and having to fight two ships together.
  
  'Well, lad?' he said, having given the command to move the sail across for the next turn. 'Let's hear it.'
  
  They made a mess of two out of the next five tacks. On these failed attempts the wind blew them back and Solmund and Olaf waved their arms and yelled insults at those working the sail. Then they let the wind spill from the great woollen sail so that Reinen rocked in complaint, her mast swinging from side to side, before they made headway again.
  
  Sigurd watched the ragged coast with its snow-sheathed pines slide slowly past then looked at Wave-Thunder and smiled because his plan was working. Her oars were beating even faster now, cutting neatly into the fjord and biting well, because Bjalki knew he might actually catch up with Reinen and make his fame.
  
  'The turds must think we have broken out the ale and are up to our eyebrows in it,' Olaf said.
  
  'Aye and it's painful as a knife in the ribs,' Solmund moaned, 'letting those king's men think we've got no sea craft.'
  
  'They won't think it for much longer,' Sigurd told him. They were some twenty boat lengths ahead of Wave-Thunder now and he locked eyes again with the enemy skipper, though this time he did not hurl any insults, wanting Bjalki to think his confidence had leaked like the wind from Reinen's sail.
  
  'Ugly bollock,' Olaf said, grimacing beside Sigurd, because Wave-Thunder's skipper was all grin now, imagining the silver arm ring he would earn and the feast which King Gorm would lay on in his honour. His men's oars beat like wings, the plunge and lift relentless and inevitable. With muscle and spruce those Avaldsnes men were weaving their own saga and it was only a matter of time before they lashed their hull to Reinen, spilled over her side in a wave of sharp steel, and slaughtered their king's most hated enemy.
  
  'Now!' Sigurd yelled, and snarling like wolves his crew went to work, Solmund driving the tiller across to turn them into the wind. It was a storm of muscle and rope and Reinen gave herself to her skipper.
  
  'Like a lover on a summer's night!' Solmund called.
  
  'You've a good memory, old man,' Bjarni said, getting an insult back for his trouble.
  
  Then Svein and Bram and the others trimmed and tightened the sail which cracked loudly as, at last, the wind bellied it, the wool stretching with the sudden force, and Reinen bolted like the creature for which she was named.
  
  Now it was down to Solmund, who was old and not as keen-eyed as he once was, but who loved being at Reinen's helm more than he loved anything in the world.
  
  'Remember this for your saga tale, skald,' Sigurd called to Hagal as they grabbed spears and Svein took up his long axe and Valgerd nocked an arrow to her bow string.
  
  Bjalki was so shocked by Reinen's about turn that he was too slow in giving any commands that might have changed things, and Solmund aimed Reinen's prow beast at that of the enemy.
  
  'If he gets this wrong we'll all be swimming,' Olaf muttered.
  
  Then Solmund pushed the tiller and Reinen's bow turned. The king's men had no time to unship their oars and Reinen's sweeping chest smashed into them in a thunder of splintering, snapping wood cut with screams as men were crushed in the thwarts by their own oar shafts.
  
  'Kill them!' Sigurd bellowed, casting his spear which took a man in his chest, hurling him back into his companions. Valgerd's first arrow plunged into a grizzled-looking warrior's open mouth and the second planted itself in a young man's eye and he screamed like a vixen. Bram's spear had taken their prow man in the shoulder and now he stood impaled, his mouth gaping like a fish as he stared in disbelief. Svein could not reach anyone with his long axe and so stood with his arms wide, roaring at the enemy that they were cowards and the sons of shit-stinking sows.
  
  Then, the insults still hanging in the air like a fart, it was all over, Reinen having left Wave-Thunder reeling in her wake.
  
  'Óðin!' Asgot screamed, arms raised, fingers grasping at the leaden sky. 'Óðin spear-lord! We kill in your name, Raven god!'
  
  Sigurd strode up the deck, pulling a silver ring from his arm. 'Solmund Sigðir!' he said, but the old man batted away the name Victory-giver as though it was a cloud of gnats and Sigurd laughed. 'Here, take this.' He held out the arm ring but the helmsman shook his head with a smile that was all worn teeth and gaps.
  
  'What would I do with that, young Sigurd?' he asked. 'I'm too old for all that strutting and boasting. Besides which, I have all that I need.' He patted the tiller where the wood was worn smooth and shiny. 'Beats all the silver you could give me.'
  
  Sigurd nodded and clamped a hand on the helmsman's shoulder. 'You did well, old man.'
  
  'She's a fine ship,' Solmund said, 'and has a half-decent crew.'
  
  'Don't tell them that,' Sigurd said. He turned and tossed the ring to Bjorn who caught it in one hand. 'Cut it. Everyone gets a share,' Sigurd said, 'but for Olaf and Asgot. We'll let the godi sacrifice something.'
  
  'And Olaf?' Bjorn asked.
  
  'He'll be happy with a horn of mead. When we can find some.' Sigurd caught Olaf's eye and the older man nodded, which was approval enough. An arm ring cut into nine pieces would not make any of them rich, but it was silver and they had earned it. Yet even so its lustre was nothing compared to the sight of Bjalki's crew floundering against the wind with neither enough oars or sea craft to make headway out there amongst the froth-whipped waves.
  
  'Now that is an unhappy ship, I think,' Svein said, his red beard slashed by teeth.
  
  A ship of splintered oars, broken bones and blood, Sigurd thought. But even a few corpses in the thwarts would be as nothing against the damage done to their pride, and Sigurd continued to gaze at his enemy as Olaf and the others went to work turning Reinen back into the wind and beginning to tack once again.
  
  'The gods love you, brother,' Runa said, the breath of those words fogging around her face.
  
  'Aye, girl, they do,' Olaf said, 'but the gods change their minds more often than my wife. They are as fickle as the wind and we'd do well to keep that in mind before we try a trick like that again.' He gestured towards Solmund behind him. 'I'm not even sure the old goat did not mean to pass those swines on their larboard side.'
  
  'I heard that,' Solmund called, proving that his ears still worked.
  
  Sigurd took Runa's hand in his. 'Uncle is right, sister, the gods are fickle. But the Allfather loves chaos.' He smiled at her. 'And so we shall give him chaos.'