He hesitated, no doubt weighing up in his mind how much he could trust me.
‘I cannot promise anything,’ he said after a short while, ‘but I’ll send word to my followers in the morning, and see whether they are willing to come with me. If enough of them are eager, then we sail.’
It wasn’t the definite answer I’d been hoping for, nor did I sense much conviction in his tone, but it was something. Of course I would rather have an ally on this expedition, but if the only choice was for myself and my small band to go alone, then that was what we would do. How I thought we could possibly confront Haakon and storm this iron fortress of his, I wasn’t sure. One thing of which I was sure, however, was that we would find a way, as we had always done. We had to.
I bade farewell to Snorri and his crew the next morning. I was surprised they were leaving so soon, but understood there was no sense in delaying while the winds were still favourable, especially given how far he had yet to travel to reach his home, which he told me was in distant Ysland. Hrithdyr’s hold was full, except that the quernstones and casks of wine had now been exchanged for bundles of the shaggy woollen cloaks that seemed to be considered fashionable in these parts.
‘The tufts lend them the appearance of fur, see?’ he said, proudly showing off one that he’d kept for himself. ‘For those who are too poor to afford deerskin or sealskin or ermine pelisses, it’s the next best thing. They’re almost as warm, too. In Ysland, these fetch many a penny. Enough for Snorri to feed himself and his kin through the winter, at least.’
I had to admit it didn’t look much like fur to me, but if that was what folk wanted to wear, who was I to argue?
‘Take care,’ I said. ‘Especially with men like Haakon Thorolfsson roaming the seas.’
‘I’ll take care, don’t you worry about that. Besides, once we’re beyond the Suthreyjar, the only thing we have to fear is the ocean.’
One of his crewmen shouted to him then. He bade me safe travels in turn, then stepped down from the quayside as the wide-bellied vessel cast off from her mooring. I called my thanks, and saw him wave in reply, then I watched from the wharves as Hrithdyr slipped out downriver, towards the sun-glistening sea, until she was out of sight.
It took several days for word to reach Magnus’s followers, scattered as they were across the lands that lay upriver of Dyflin, and another few for word from them to return. In the meantime Magnus showed us to his ship, which was grounded a half-mile downriver from the city, close to where the shipwrights had their slipways and their boathouses, drawn up on to the shore above a beach of mud and shingle and covered with an oilskin sheet. He called her Nihtegesa, which was English for ‘night terror’, the name that his people gave to the fear-dreams that cause a man to wake suddenly, drenched in sweat and with heart pounding. Not that she looked capable of striking dread in anyone’s heart.
‘This is your ship?’ I asked when the tarpaulin was drawn back by Magnus and two of his retainers. I did not know much of ships, but I knew enough to be able to tell when one was seaworthy, and Nihtegesa was clearly not. The topmost strakes on both sides were dry and crumbling, while a few others were cracked and darkened with rot; they would need replacing, as would the rigging. ‘How long since she was last out on the water?’
‘A full year, nearly,’ Magnus said.
‘We’d almost do better to buy ourselves a new ship,’ Serlo muttered, a little unkindly perhaps, though I would be lying if I said that the same thought hadn’t briefly crossed my mind.
‘And you have enough coin for that, do you?’ Magnus ran a hand over her timbers, stroking her gently as if she were a horse, at least where barnacles hadn’t encrusted her timbers. This was the first time I had seen him without a wine-jug either in his hand or close by, and he seemed a little brighter of spirit for it. ‘All she needs is a little care, and she’ll float again. Besides, she used to belong to my father. She’s all I have left of his, and I’ll not sail to war in any other vessel.’
At eighteen benches in length, she was fairly small for a warship, but she was sleek and, to judge by the waterline on her hull, would sit high on the waves. I had not measured her, but she looked to be around seven times from prow to stern what she was in beam, which were generally agreed to be the ideal proportions when building a boat with speed in mind. Assuming that Magnus was right and she could be repaired in good time, she ought to be quick enough to outpace any danger we might happen to run into. I had never fought from the deck of a ship, and had no desire to, if I could help it.