Lydia pricked up her ears. ‘And just who have you sent running?’ she asked, a grin forming.
Karina shook her head. ‘Never you mind,’ she said. ‘But I’ve had my offers since my husband died.’
The grin on Lydia’s face widened and she leaned forward expectantly. ‘You have?’ she said. ‘Tell me more.’ But Karina dismissed her with a wave of her hand.
‘Never mind me. You’re going to have to tell Rollond before too much longer.’
‘I know,’ Lydia said, the grin fading. ‘I’ll do it after the festival. He’s asked me to be his partner. I can hardly hurt his feelings before that. It’d make for a very awkward evening.’
‘Good point. But make sure you don’t drag it out any longer.’
Lydia nodded. ‘You’re right. It’s time to let him know. It’s a pity that Heron isn’t going on a long cruise. That’d be the best way to distance myself from him.’
‘Nothing coming up in that line?’ Karina asked, although she knew if there were, Hal would have told her.
‘Not that I know of. Just short patrols minding the trading fleet. Out for three days, back for a week. That’s not enough time for him to get over me.’
‘Maybe something will come up. Hal did mention that Erak wanted to speak to him about something. You never know.’
‘That’s true,’ Lydia agreed. Then, with a devilish smile, she returned to an earlier subject. ‘What about you?’
Karina looked up at her. ‘What about me?’ she said. There was a warning tone in her voice.
‘What have you got lined up for the festival? Any of those mysterious suitors planning on dancing the night away with you?’
Karina snorted derisively. ‘Me? I’m an old widow. Who’d be interested in me?’
Lydia laughed out loud at that. ‘You can’t be serious? You’re one of the most attractive women in Hallasholm! I’ve seen how men’s heads turn when you’re in the market.’
Karina threw the trimmed mutton leg to one side with more than usual vehemence.
‘Well, I’m not in the market for any of them,’ she said primly, setting to work on a third mutton leg. ‘And stop grinning at me like that,’ she said, without looking up. Somehow, she knew Lydia was grinning. And somehow, she knew that she hadn’t stopped. Finally, Karina set the knife down and looked the girl square in the eyes.
‘I have agreed to accompany an old and trusted friend. He will act as my partner. Nothing more than that.’
‘And who might that be?’ Lydia teased.
Karina straightened her back and said, with great dignity, ‘Thorn.’
Lydia’s eyes widened. ‘Thorn? Our Thorn? I mean . . . Thorn who lives . . .’ She gestured in the direction of Thorn’s lean-to. ‘That Thorn?’
‘Do you know another Thorn by any chance?’ Karina said stiffly.
Lydia shook her head in wonder. ‘No, I don’t. Who would ever have thought it? You and Thorn?’
‘Nobody would have thought it, because it isn’t. And we’re not.’
‘Not what?’ Lydia’s grin was as wide as it could be now. ‘What are you not?’
‘We’re not . . . anything,’ Karina said. She slashed vigorously at the leg of mutton, removing nearly as much meat as fat.
Lydia couldn’t resist it. She crooned softly.
‘Karina and Tho-orn, sitting in a tree-ee. Kay-eye-ess-ess-eye-en-gee.’
‘This is a very sharp knife I have here,’ Karina said evenly.
‘I was just leaving.’
‘What in the name of chaos is that?’ Erak asked, pointing at Kloof.
Hal smiled. He was getting used to this reaction.
‘She’s a mountain dog. They’re used to find lost travellers in the snow and lead them to safety.’
‘Where did you get her?’
Hal shrugged. ‘I found her on the mountain. I think she wandered off from her home and got lost.’
‘Hardly what you’d want in a dog whose task is to help people who are also lost,’ Erak remarked and Hal acknowledged the truth of the statement.
‘She’s only young,’ he pointed out.
Erak raised his eyebrows. ‘I hope she doesn’t have any more growing to do. Now come and sit, the two of you.’
They were in the Great Hall of Hallasholm, where Erak conducted official business as the Oberjarl. He gestured to two long benches that flanked his massive oak chair of office. Hal and Stig sat either side of him. Kloof flumped down onto the floor between the three of them, with a massive sigh.
‘I asked Stig to come because I assumed that you had something in mind for the Heron,’ Hal said.
Erak nodded several times. A good skirl usually included his first mate in discussions involving the ship.
‘I do indeed.’ Then, without further preamble, he said, ‘How would you like to go to Araluen?’
Stig and Hal looked at each other in surprise. Whatever they might have expected from Erak, this definitely hadn’t been on the list. Stig recovered first.
‘What for?’ he asked.
Erak shrugged. ‘Well, for eight or nine months. That’s the usual term.’
‘I think he meant why?’ Hal said.
‘Oh, I see. Well, you know we assign a ship each year as the duty ship in Araluen?’
The two boys nodded. It had been a longstanding practice, since the treaty brokered years before by two Rangers and the royal princess of the western kingdom.
‘I’ve heard about it. I’m not sure what it entails,’ Hal said, glancing at Stig, who shrugged.
‘Basically, I place a ship at the disposal of King Duncan,’ Erak told them. ‘If he needs to get people somewhere in a hurry, the duty ship takes them. Our wolfships are faster than anything they have in the Narrow Sea.’
‘And Heron is faster than any of the other wolfships,’ Stig put in.
Erak turned a heavy-browed frown on him.
‘With the possible exception of Wolfwind, of course,’ Stig added diplomatically.
‘Exactly,’ the Oberjarl agreed. Then the frown disappeared. ‘In addition, the duty ship patrols the Narrow Sea for King Duncan and takes care of any smugglers, pirates or slavers in the area.’
‘Are there many of those?’ Hal asked.
Erak nodded. ‘Oh yes. Since we gave up raiding, other countries have swarmed in to fill the gap. Sonderlanders, some Magyarans, of course, and corsairs from the Constant Sea. Iberian slavers are a problem, too. What is your dog doing?’ he said, abruptly changing the subject.
Hal looked down. Kloof had wriggled forward and was licking Erak’s prized walking staff, where it rested against his chair.
‘She appears to be licking your . . . walking stick.’
‘Well, tell her to stop,’ Erak said. He had considered shoving the dog away with his foot, but she was a very big dog, after all. ‘And it’s an official staff, not a stick,’ he added, with some dignity.
‘Cut it out, Kloof!’ Hal snapped. She looked at him, a guilty expression on her face, and he gestured for her to get away from Erak’s chair.
‘Go on! Out of it!’
Reluctantly, she moved back, her tail lowered. She lay on her side again and sighed heavily.
‘You were saying?’ Hal asked.
Erak nodded and resumed. ‘Oh yes. Well, there’ll be bags of things to do. Quite a bit of fighting, chasing slavers, catching smugglers, that sort of thing. Should suit your boys down to the ground.’
‘Certainly sounds better than playing nanny to the fishing fleet,’ Stig said.
‘We’re right in the middle of re-rigging her,’ Hal said. ‘That’ll take a few days.’
‘No rush,’ Erak said. ‘You can wait until after the festival if you like. That’ll still give you time to get round Cape Shelter before the Summer Gales set in.’
‘In that case, we’ll take the job,’ Hal said.
Erak cocked his head. ‘Don’t want to speak to the others about it?’
Hal paused, but it was Stig who answered.
‘Hal’s our skirl. We go where he says.’
Erak nodded, impressed. That was the way he had run his ship when he was skirl. He sighed. Sometimes those days seemed so long ago.
‘That’s settled then. I have some dispatches to send to Duncan. I’ll get those to you in the next day or so. Then you can head off after the festival.’
Hal and Stig grinned at each other. They both felt a stirring of anticipation. The prospect of a new mission, a long way from home, appealed to their adventurous spirits. They stood to go, shaking hands with the Oberjarl.
‘Speaking of ships,’ Erak said, ‘have you seen Tursgud’s?’
The eager grins faded from the two boys’ faces. Tursgud, their nemesis during brotherband training, had turned out badly since losing the brotherband title to the Herons. He had become surly and argumentative, liable to flare up in anger at the slightest reason – real or imagined. His own brotherband members had largely deserted him and he spent his time in the cheap taverns near the waterfront.
His father, hoping to spark some sense of purpose in him, had bought him a ship. But Tursgud had crewed it with a bunch of thugs and petty criminals. The ship itself had been painted midnight blue and he had rechristened her Nightwolf.
‘She looks fast,’ Hal said. She had a long, slender hull and a fine entry. She was rigged in the traditional square sail pattern. ‘I’d say she’ll be very fast going downwind.’
‘Hmmm,’ said Erak thoughtfully. ‘Just wonder why he painted her that dark colour. Dark ships tend to be that way for a purpose – and it’s usually not a good one.’
The main square in front of Hallasholm’s Great Hall was awash with light. Lanterns and torches hung from poles and stood in brackets in the walls of buildings and there were three large bonfires set around the edge of the square.
There were also half a dozen fire pits, each one with a spit set over it, where carcasses of bullocks and sheep turned above the red-hot coals, spitting and sizzling as they gradually browned. Cooks moved in from time to time to slice cooked meat from the outer layers of the carcasses, exposing the meat underneath to the heat, so it could grill in its turn. Platters of smoking hot beef and mutton were set out for the revellers to help themselves. Half a dozen large salmon, smoked to a succulent finish in the town’s smokehouse, provided a delicious alternative for those who preferred it. In addition, there were bowls of fresh, crusty bread, potatoes baked black in their jackets in the coals, fresh greens and tart pickled cabbage.
The people of Hallasholm were there in force: old, young and everywhere in between. This was, after all, the haymaking festival, the most important night in Hallasholm’s social calendar. In addition to just about every inhabitant of the capital, people had travelled from outlying farms and villages to join in the fun. The cleared space directly in front of the Great Hall was packed with couples dancing. A four-piece band consisting of a fiddler and two pipers, accompanied by a tonal drum, kept the music going – jaunty happy country airs for the most part. The musicians were sustained by a constant relay of foaming tankards of ale, deposited in front of them by the dancers. The band seemed to have mastered the art of drinking deep draughts of ale in sequence, so that the music continued, uninterrupted.
Young children ran between the legs of the people thronging the square, shrieking with laughter and excitement at being up after their normal bedtime. From time to time, an exasperated parent would yell at his or her offspring to ‘Keep it down! Keep it down, for Thaki’s sake!’ The children would fall silent for two or three seconds, then the running and shrieking would start all over again.
Erak’s great chair had been carried out and set at the top of the stairs in front of the Great Hall, overlooking the square. The Oberjarl sat there, beaming at his people, a tankard in one hand and his magnificent polished staff in the other. At intervals, he drank from the tankard and beat time to the music with his staff. Sometimes, he got the two actions mixed up, but nobody seemed to notice.
Erak looked around the square and, seeing the people enjoying themselves, he felt content. Life in Skandia could be harsh, with its long winters and freezing temperatures. And the Skandians worked hard most of the year – at sea, fishing or trading, or on land, tending their sheep and cattle and crops. It was a hard life, with not a lot of time for relaxation. On a balmy summer night like this, it was good for his people to let their hair down and enjoy themselves. He smiled, pleased to see that the evening was going well. There had only been a few fights so far, and they had been quickly subdued. And so far, only one girl had been reduced to wailing tears by her boyfriend’s dalliance with another girl. All in all, it was a good festival.
Then the smile faded as his gaze fell on a group at one of the side tables.
It was Tursgud, and half a dozen of his unsavoury crew members. They were seated at a table – sprawled would be a better word for it, Erak thought. An ale cask had been broached and was on the table between them. From time to time, they dipped tankards into it and drank deeply. Even across the square, and the background noise of hundreds of happy festival-goers, he could hear their raised voices as they shouted and laughed raucously. People around them drew away, casting disapproving glances in their direction.
‘There’s trouble about to happen,’ Erak said.
Svengal, who was sitting on a stool to one side of Erak’s chair, had followed the direction of his gaze. He curled his lip with distaste at the sight of Tursgud and his men.
‘Want me to get some of the crew?’ he asked.
Erak looked at him. ‘Do you seriously think we need help to handle that rabble?’ Then he changed the question. ‘Do you seriously think I need help to handle that rabble?’
Svengal grinned. ‘Not really. But I’ll tag along for the sheer fun of it, shall I?’
‘Suit yourself,’ Erak growled. He took up his staff and began to thread his way through the crowd, Svengal following close in his wake. There was no outward sign of Erak’s anger, other than the sharper-than-usual clack! clack! clack! of the metal-shod staff on the cobblestones.
Tursgud looked up as the Oberjarl approached. His eyes were bleary and he was very much the worse for drinking ale. It was not a law, but it was a generally upheld convention in Hallasholm that young men didn’t drink ale until they had turned twenty-one. They might occasionally have a tankard, and people would turn a blind eye. But Tursgud and his crew were all below that age and they had been drinking solidly for some time. Tursgud felt a quick thrill of nervousness as he focused on the Oberjarl’s face. Then bravado, courtesy of the ale, kicked in and his lip curled in a sneer.
‘I think you’ve had enough to drink,’ Erak said calmly.
Tursgud sniggered. Erak took a deep breath, restraining himself with some difficulty. Behind him, Svengal raised his eyes to heaven. He wondered whether Tursgud knew exactly how much danger he was in at that moment.
‘Silly old fool,’ said the youth sitting next to Tursgud. His name was Kjord. He was a swarthy-looking young man with long hair that hung in greasy plaits down the side of his head. He’d meant to make his comment in an undertone, but unfortunately it had been louder than he planned. Then he shrugged to himself. There was just the Oberjarl and his former first mate, standing a few paces away, and there were seven of the crew from Nightwolf at the table. What could Erak do, after all?
What Erak did was to look at the half-full ale cask on the table before Tursgud. It was about forty centimetres across and sixty centimetres high. The lid had been removed so Tursgud and his cronies could dip their tankards in to fill them. Erak set down his staff, leaning it against the wall behind him, then picked up the cask in both hands and raised it to his lips.
‘This your ale?’ he asked.
‘Well, we bought it,’ Kjord said. He maintained his defiant air, yet he felt a qualm of uneasiness. The cask was still quite heavy, yet Erak had raised it without the slightest effort. The Oberjarl tipped the cask and took a long mouthful.
Then, wi
th an expression of disgust, he spat a stream of ale, sending it splattering onto the table in front of them.
‘You should get your money back,’ he said.
Only Svengal saw what was coming. But then, he’d known Erak for years. The others all had their attention on the foaming ale that was running across the table. As they watched it, Erak raised the cask high, then slammed it down on Kjord’s head.
The bottom of the cask gave way and showered the remaining ale down over Kjord’s body and shoulders. The outer section of the cask crammed down over his head, encasing it completely. Kjord’s startled cry was muffled by the cask and the flood of ale over his face.
He sat upright for a second or two. Then Erak grabbed his collar and jerked him up and back off the bench with one convulsive heave. Luckily for Kjord, the cask protected his head from direct contact with the cobbles as he crashed over. But the impact was too much for the cask and it disintegrated into its component pieces – a handful of staves and two steel hoops that slid down around Kjord’s neck.
Tursgud and the other Nightwolves stared at their shipmate in shock and fright. One of them went to rise from his seat but felt a powerful hand pushing him back down.
‘Don’t,’ Svengal told him softly, and he didn’t.
Erak leaned down, resting his fists on the table and putting his face close to Tursgud’s. ‘Now, pick that piece of garbage up.’ He jerked his head at Kjord, who was moaning softly. ‘And get out of my sight.’
Tursgud met his gaze and felt a blade of fear stab through him. Erak was, for the most part, a cheerful man. It was easy to forget that he’d fought in scores of battles and mortal combats and faced hundreds of enemies in his time. When the affable mask was stripped away, what was left was nothing short of terrifying.
‘Yes, Oberjarl,’ Tursgud said meekly. He gestured to his crewmen. ‘Give me a hand with Kjord.’
Erak turned to Svengal, a satisfied look on his face.
‘Well,’ said his former first mate, ‘it appears that you didn’t need me after all.’