CHAPTER
16
Aed Finnlaith saw his son by marriage across the stream. The Norwegian Wolf was unmistakable. Tall upon his midnight charger, he appeared to be more than mortal man; his golden hair seemed to catch the sun and radiate its power about him. Even from such a distance, indomitable force and endless energy charged the air about him.
A shiver touched Aed’s bones. I am glad that I ride with this man, he thought, for I am too old to ride against him again.
Horns signaled, banners were waved. The Ard-Righ of Tara rode, crossing the shallowest section of the stream, trying not to show the shock created in his aging flesh by the coldness of the water. He greeted Olaf with a brief embrace while still upon his mount, then both men edged their horses back. In turn he greeted his son Niall, for it was his province they rode to defend.
The troops merged and the tedious march began. They followed the inland road for fifty miles, day following day seemingly endlessly. Then made their turn for the coast.
The Danish attacked out of the night in stealthy marauding parties, but their small hit-and-run attacks were firmly and surely pushed back, step by step. Days turned to weeks, weeks became months. Spring rain and slush became summer rain and slush. Still the main body of Friggid the Bowlegs’s army eluded them.
In the brief skirmishes they encountered, Aed found himself fighting nearer and nearer his Viking son-in-law, and more and more he came to believe the man was invincible. Just a mighty, rattling growl from his chest could leave the Danes wavering in indecision that cost them their lives, for never once did the Wolf pause upon the field of battle. He did not fight as the berserkrs. He fought coldly, with unerring precision, and yet he fought like a man possessed.
One night as the dead were buried or burned, Aed approached the strange man he still had yet to truly know, offering him a leather gourd of ale as he leaned against a tree trunk, surveying the fields before him while Viking and Irish went about their tasks of burying or burning the dead.
For a moment the two men stood silently, each feeling the coolness of the night, listening to the occasional forlorn call of a night bird. The cooking fires were being lit. Soon, Aed thought, I’ll fill my empty belly and take refuge in my tent, easing my weary body for the night. This was one battle where he rode at the front, yet left most of the strategy to Niall and the Wolf. He had watched with admiring curiosity as Olaf had quietly taken second stance to Niall, advising the king of Ulster craftily and therefore teaching the young king much with honor. It was Ulster they defended; therefore, it was Niall’s battle. Niall fought for his land; Aed fought to defend his son and the laws of the greater Eire that had given Niall that land. And Olaf fought because he was committed to Aed and, therefore, to Niall. But Aed sensed that far more drove the young powerful Viking.
Aed watched as Olaf wet a parched throat with the ale, then asked forthrightly, “Do you seek out Friggid the Bowlegs because of Ulster, or do you seek to avenge Carlingford Lough?”
The crystal-blue eyes fell on him, then drew away, staring ahead once more. “Both, High King.” He was silent for a minute, then gazed idly at Aed once again. “And more,” he added softly. He returned the leather gourd to Aed and turned into the trees.
In the moss cool of the forest, Olaf sat on the ground and leaned his head back against a fallen log. He rode most of the time with no thought of anything but the warfare he engaged in, but there were times, nights like this, when he longed to return to Dubhlain. He wanted a scalding bath, a pleasant meal, the evocative, gentle touch of his wife.
He scowled with the thought. There had been whores along the way; women who entertained the men and let them laugh and boast of their prowess as they rode out the weary days. But he had been unable to allow himself to enjoy the physical soothing of a woman. He had noted with some amusement that Aed Finnlaith politely and aloofly steered away from such entertainment, and he had heard that Aed was eternally loyal to his queen. But the Ard-Righ was an unusual man.
Thinking of Aed brought Erin to mind. Olaf couldn’t bear the thought of his Irish spitfire in the arms of another man. Just that image in his mind could make him roar and snarl for a day. But it was the fact that she was his, a king’s property, that made him feel so protective. He was, he realized, a very possessive man, one who would defend all that was his to the death.
But he didn’t really worry about the wife he had come to know so briefly. He had left Sigurd in charge of Dubhlain, with strict instructions that his wife was to be carefully guarded and watched. He didn’t believe that she would attempt to escape, but he didn’t know what went on behind her brilliant green eyes. He had awakened her passions, yes. In his arms she became a wild and wanton witch, giving him a pleasure that cleansed his spirit and heart, taking away the dark hauntings that tortured his spirit. But he wondered if she still hated him, if she wouldn’t willingly seek out a lover for the purpose of cuckolding the “Viking barbarian” she had been forced to accept in marriage.
His fists clenched together as he thought of her, then he slowly released them. She would find little chance to place horns upon him with Sigurd around, and she was a princess of Tara, something she never forgot. It was unlikely she would stoop to an affair that might be discovered by others.
He closed his eyes, and he could see her before him, her cloak of silky black hair falling over the full curves of her breasts, her long legs moving toward him in a lithe, seductive walk.… That picture, he thought with a sigh, is why I cannot seek companionship with a whore.
But it was another picture that drove him on in battle. Grenilde. His golden beauty, his love. He thought of her, then frowned as the picture of her wavered in his mind. He sought to see blue, sparkling eyes and all he could summon were a set of emerald green.
He swore softly. The Irish minx who wanted his head on a blade was a witch. A witch who could be soft, who had laughed with him, loved him, come to him.…
“The king of Dubhlain is pensive tonight.”
Olaf’s eyes flew open and he cocked a brow high and grimly at the insolence of the interruption. He stared with a dark scowl on his face at the robed and bearded old man they called Mergwin who had come upon him without a sound.
“The king of Dubhlain wishes to be alone,” Olaf said curtly.
The Druid was undaunted. “There is a haze of light about you, Viking,” Mergwin said as he speculatively gazed at Olaf. “If you are to die in battle, it will not be soon.”
“That should please my wife,” Olaf said dryly.
Mergwin shrugged, stroking his long beard pensively. “You seek to kill Friggid the Bowlegs, my young lord Wolf. I would warn you. It is destiny that you will one day meet. And one of you must die. Perhaps you will slay him. Yes, it is quite possible. But when his death comes, it alone will not give you what you seek.”
“Oh? And what is that, Druid?”
“The return of your soul. You must find that in your own life, Wolf of Norway, not in another man’s death.”
Olaf stood and shook the leaves from his mantle. “So, Druid, you say I will not slay him soon. Do you suggest then that I allow Friggid to continue to haunt these shores, to live to slay me and others upon another occasion?”
Mergwin ignored the sarcasm. “Oh, no, Friggid must die. He is not of the land, Wolf, and the breeze whispers that you are. You must keep seeking him, fighting him.”
“Oh?” Amused now, Olaf cocked a brow again.
The Druid smiled. “Look at yourself, my lord. Your mantle is Irish, as is your robe. You speak to me in my tongue. I would hazard a guess that you oftentimes must think to speak in your own. Yes, Viking, you are of the land. You wish to take it, yet it will assimilate you, making you and it one and the same.”
Olaf laughed. “Perhaps you are right, Druid. But tell me, my friend, how is it you feel you know these things?”
“I often cast and read the runes for you, Lord of the Wolves.”
“The Viking runes?” Olaf inquired with s
elf mockery.
Mergwin merely smiled at the mockery. “I daresay, Olaf the White, that you never set your dragon ship across the sea without the advice of your rune master. Your men would not sail. The Norwegian defeat at Carlingford Lough was foretold by the runes. Even your first meeting with the princess you now call wife.”
Olaf looked at Mergwin curiously.
“Aye, my friend, I know of your meeting with Erin.”
“And you did not stop the marriage?”
“No,” Mergwin said, smiling slightly. “Your marriage was the destiny of the land.”
“Oh,” Olaf murmured dryly.
Grinning and feeling curiously lightened by the encounter, Olaf turned to quit the forest. “Lord of the Wolves,” the Druid called him back.
Olaf turned with a frown at the tone of his voice.
“The battle will end tomorrow, and the victory will be yours. The rune of the sun, Sowelu, is with you. But watch yourself, my lord, for there is treachery and evil afoot. Tomorrow speaks of danger, yet it goes beyond that. I know not when it will strike again, nor from where, only that it exists and that you must rise above it. Then, and only then, will you find that solace you seek for your soul.”
Olaf lifted his brows high again, surprised by the quiet confidence and yet the pleading sound of Mergwin’s warning.
“I always take care, Druid,” he said softly, not sure if the man was a true prophet or raving lunatic. “I always take care.”
One part of Mergwin’s prophecy was to come true with astounding accuracy. They had barely broken camp when the troops of Friggid the Bowlegs came upon them in a shocking raid of full force.
Caught between the high ground and the forest, the battle raged in small pockets. Men had to watch carefully to see that they battled foe rather than friend, since the forces quickly became enmeshed.
Olaf saw quickly that Friggid the Bowlegs had reinforced his troops from both Britain and his home shores. The swift attacks along the road had been but a tease compared to the force of men who had been brought to strike from the north.
Morning passed in a rain of clashing steel and spitting blood. Holding a southern ridge with the advantage of a small stream, Olaf noted that Leith and Brice mac Aed fought near him. They were valiant, greeting the Danes with fierce battle cries, and hacking their way ever forward with deliberate determination.
Olaf smiled to himself as he dodged a spearpoint. The throb of victory began to rise in his blood. The Danes were falling back. This was it, the day he would find Friggid the Bowlegs.
With triumph giving renewed vigor to his limbs, he howled ferociously and dove forward into the melee. The Danes, who had been as thick as flies, were thinning to a mere trickle. He heaved his sword and brought down a fire-eyed opponent, then searched quickly for his next victim.
To his horror he saw a Danish battle-axe plummeting toward Leith mac Aed. He roared out a warning; his muscles geared into action. His sword blade pierced through the neck of the accosting berserkr, but all too late. Leith mac Aed, a red stain swamping between his shoulder blades, pitched forward.
Olaf knelt beside him, the battle growing dim in his ears. His troops had pushed forward, and he was alone on the field with the dying youth.
He was accustomed to death, to the screams of the dying, but pain suddenly seemed to lacerate his heart as he thought of the agony this would bring to his Irish ally of Tara—and to his Irish wife.
He hesitated, wondering if he couldn’t stop the flow of blood and somehow save the boy.
“You can do nothing, my Lord. Leith of Tara was destined to fall here. You must go on.”
Olaf jerked his head up, astounded to see the Druid standing before him again. Mergwin knelt beside Leith. A little chill whispered through Olaf’s body. Mergwin had known that Leith would die.…
The Druid turned the boy over. Leith opened his eyes, smiled briefly, grimaced in pain, and rattled his last breath. Mergwin gently closed his glazed eyes. “Go, Wolf of Norway. Your work—your destiny?—for the day is not yet fulfilled.”
Olaf rose and took one last look at Leith and then Mergwin. He wondered briefly if the crazed Druid didn’t wish him to hurry out and die. He didn’t know if he trusted those flaming eyes or not.
But the battle awaited him. He strode over the ridge and down to the sector of trees where the howls and screams of war now vibrated. He moved warily, watching his back, knees bent, sword poised. The battle waged in the trees was dangerous; a neck could be slit from behind and a man could bleed to death before he knew he had been struck.
A fierce roar warned him of attack. He spun lithely and struck, sending his massive sword in an arc, and his opponent crumpled to the ground, a look of shock replacing his snarl.
The battle raged through the afternoon. With the coming of dusk, the Danes had been pushed eastward, almost to the ocean. Olaf again found himself on a ridge, and again the fly-thick Danes began to fall. He shouted the order to his men to push forward. He sent a squad to flank the left, and another in a right curve to see that the enemy would be crushed between them.
It was then that he turned to see he was alone again except for the Dane who charged him in an effort to take him off guard, the Dane who had led the forces that annihilated the Norwegians at Carlingford Lough, the Dane who had caused Grenilde’s death, the death of all that had been life to him—Friggid the Bowlegs.
Olaf jumped aside with barely a second to spare as the honed and bloodied edge of the battle-axe whistled by his shoulder to lodge into the ground. He could have slain Friggid then. He could have slipped his sword into his back, but he wanted to kill the Dane face to face. He smiled and stepped back, facing the filthy red-haired, pockfaced Dane.
“Get your weapon, Dane. I want to stare into your eyes when you die.”
Friggid returned the glacial smile. “So be it, Wolf. Down to the two of us. The only end.” He raised his axe. “You will drink to my life in Valhalla tonight as you sup with the dead!”
He made a mighty rush forward. Olaf warded off the blow with his sword. Steel clashed; two mighty arms shuddered and the men snarled as they broke apart again. Olaf made a swipe at the Dane. He cut his flesh, but the Dane dropped and rolled, playing for time. Olaf followed him again. Friggid threw a handful of mud into Olaf’s eyes, temporarily blinding him. He jumped up to deliver his mortal blow, but Olaf sensed the wind of his blade and warded it off with the steel of his sword. The sword shuddered and flew from his hands.
With his vision clearing, Olaf saw the Dane coming for him again. He jumped high to elude a blow to his legs. The heavy axe brought Friggid’s weight careening downward, but he was up quickly. Olaf realized he was playing cat and mouse without a weapon. He backed away from the Dane, avoiding the quick succession of blows by agility alone. Then suddenly his sword was thrown before his feet. He knew not from whence it came, nor did he care. He dove to retrieve it.
Friggid shrieked in a berserkr rage and rushed forward, arcing his axe for Olaf’s skull. Olaf dodged at the very last second, feeling his hairs split. But the maneuver was successful. Friggid the Bowlegs was carried away with the force and was sent rolling toward the shelf of foliage. Olaf tore after him, but too late. Two Danes rushed into the fray, allowing their leader to escape. Olaf battled both men, raging that Friggid was a coward not to keep the battle man to man, one on one. He slew both the Danes.
Victorious, he had taken the day, but he hadn’t taken Bowlegs. He felt empty and drained.
Something rustled in the trees, and he hunched low and raised his sword again, his eyes alertly darting through the trees. He saw only a patch of white disappearing into the depth of the forest—a patch of a long white robe.
He smiled slowly with wonder and glanced at the sword that had been so opportunely returned to him. He lifted it high in the air and allowed the dying sun to reflect on it. “Thank you, Mergwin,” he whispered softly. “Thank you for life.”
Some of the emptiness left him and he felt streng
th return to his drained limbs. He laughed aloud. “Yes,” he said softly. “Thank you, my strange friend, for I am very glad to be alive.”
Brice mac Aed would allow no one near Leith. He sat against an oak, cradling the body of his brother to his chest, tears streaming down his cheeks. He smoothed the hair from Leith’s brow, talking to him, sometimes laughing.
Not even Niall of Ulster, grief drawing his own countenance tight, could separate his living sibling from the dead Leith for proper burial. The Viking forces had long since decided the fierce young Irishman should be left alone to handle his grief; they had gone to tend to their own. But the Irish priests were concerned. They demanded that the body be turned over to them so that Leith’s soul might join that of Christ in heaven.
Such was the scene when the Irish High King discovered the death of his son. He did not attempt to confront Brice, he merely stood in the clearing, feeling as if his heart were as brittle as his bones and shattering. Leith. The easygoing one. The one with the crystal laugh. The son who could step in between serious Niall and wild Brice and say a few simple, logical words to cool both rising tempers. Leith. Aed closed his eyes as the pain shuddered through him. He tried to tell himself that he was a lucky man. He was the Ard-Righ of Ireland; he had spent most of his years in battle. He had fathered ten children, and a miracle had allowed each of his offspring to reach adulthood. His sons had been fighting for years, except for Mikel, who trained with the guard at Tara and Shean and Galbraith, who had long ago taken Holy Orders.
He had ten children but that fact did not diminish the pain of losing this son, this special, unique individual.
But he was the Ard-Righ, the leader of men who had fought long and hard for him; men who had given sons of their flesh to the land. He could not show his grief, but neither could he condemn the son who cradled his brother. He approached Brice slowly and placed his hand on his shoulder.