“Do you want me to?” It seemed now that this was what Heming wanted from him: if he could not have his father’s approval, Ragnvald’s might do.
“I don’t care,” said Heming. Ragnvald did not respond. “He defied his own father when he went to conquer Halogaland,” Heming added. “He forgets that.” He turned and looked Ragnvald up and down, the sneer returning. “You may keep the horse for the rest of the day,” he said. “Return it to me when we camp for the night.”
*
That evening the procession reached Hakon’s ships where he had left them beached on the shore of Lustra Fjord. Hakon’s stewards directed men in their loading until the sun dipped below the horizon at midnight.
In the morning, Oddi invited Ragnvald onto Hakon’s flagship, with all of his brothers. It was the sleekest ship, and would sail first, camp at the farms and halls of Hakon’s allies, while the others stayed on barren islands and wallowed in heavy seas.
The day was chilly and damp, without much wind. Ragnvald took his turn at the oars, until it troubled his wounded shoulder. The wind picked up as Lustra Fjord joined the great Sogn Fjord, whose high walls were lost in fog. He watched the farms go by, high atop cliffs. Near noon they sailed past the market town of Kaupanger, where houses ringed a broad beach. Ragnvald had been there once before, with his father, and seen slaves of all races, men and goods from all corners of the world. The town was rich enough that its elders could hire warriors, and not pay taxes to any king for protection. This Harald might change that.
While they traveled, Heming put aside the clothes that caused him to be called Peacock, and instead wore homespun and leather like any common sailor. That these were of a fine make and hung in some indefinably perfect way from his frame did not escape Ragnvald. At least Heming was practical enough not to wear his silks shipboard.
Hakon’s younger sons were near to Ragnvald’s age. The middle son, Geirbjorn, seemed to be a slightly more winning version of Ragnvald’s own stepbrother. He was stout and brown where Sigurd was skinny and pink, but had that same ingratiating, hesitant quality. He joked with his father, and after each witty phrase he looked around to see what effect his words had made, who smiled, and who ignored him. The youngest, Herlaug, was quiet and sullen, with a colorless face: eyes, lips, and hair all blending into one sandy sameness.
Travel to Yrjar could take as little as two long days in fine weather, but the wind turned fitful when they left Sogn Fjord. As they traveled north, the light grew thinner and paler, like the whey that ran off the fat cheeses Vigdis made in the summer. Oddi told Ragnvald that at the farthest reaches of his father’s territory, during the depths of winter, a night came that lasted for a month, and the stars turned a different way than they did to the south. He said also that ghosts and spirits walked those flat, cold lands in the long night. Ragnvald could not work out whether Oddi was jesting with him or not.
Hakon pointed out fjords and islands where he had fought as a young man. He expected his sons and Ragnvald to listen to his stories, and learn from the lessons he would impart. Ragnvald could see from the expressions on their faces, even Oddi’s, that they had heard these tales before, but to Ragnvald they were new.
Also new was the way Oddi and his half brothers joked with their father, finishing his tales for him, pointing out that the last time they had passed a particular rocky strand, he had fought a hundred men there, and now it was five hundred.
“See, Ragnvald respects me, at least,” he said, laughing, and cuffing Oddi.
Ragnvald smiled, forcing a broad grin, wishing he could be part of their play.
*
At the mouth of Trond Fjord, two days after they had left the assembly grounds at Jostedal, Hakon’s ship stopped at a farm on the island of Smola.
“I spent summers here as a boy,” said Hakon, “learning the ways of the sea.”
Ragnvald stood near him in the prow as they approached. The island was low and green, with few trees. “It looks a fair place for riding, as well, my lord,” he said.
“Yes,” said Hakon. “I used to cause a horse fair to be held here in the summer, within easy reach of horse merchants from Frisia. Perhaps I will one day again.”
The hall at Smola was constructed in the old style, with a low ceiling and walls of turf to withstand the harsh winds. The steward’s wife fed them around the central long fire that night. They drank fermented mare’s milk rather than ale, for Hakon said that grain did not grow well under the constant sea winds in this exposed place.
“How does my mare, Erna?” Hakon asked his steward Rathi as they dined that night.
“Her last foaling was difficult on her,” Rathi said. “It may have been her last.” He was a stooped, bald man with a protruding chin that gave his face a petulant expression.
“Her get is ridden by kings all over Norway,” said Hakon. “Let us try for one more.”
They spoke of other farm business. When the women were clearing the trenchers away to feed to the pigs, Ragnvald heard Rathi say, “There is a more pressing matter I would trouble you with. You remember Helgunn, the wise woman?”
Hakon nodded.
“Her son was lately killed in a raid upon our coast.”
“A raid?” said Hakon. “I had not heard—”
“Some old rovers of Hunthiof’s,” Rathi continued, “without enough to do. I’m told that king keeps his men too close this summer, for fear of Harald’s attack, and they chafe at it.”
“Hunthiof and his son must fall,” said Heming. “Young Ragnvald knows this is true.”
“We sent them off smarting,” said Rathi. He gave Heming a baleful look. “Only Helgunn’s son was killed.”
“And?” Hakon asked.
“And now he will not stay dead,” said the steward. A thrill of fear traveled up Ragnvald’s spine, and made him shiver where he sat, warming his boots by the fire. He remembered the man at Adisa’s farm who had lived with his throat cut, long enough to say words that chilled Ragnvald’s blood.
“Helgunn would not consent to have him burned,” Rathi continued, “and instead put him in a barrow as though he were a king. Now this wight walks at night, and the peasants are frightened.”
“Kill the sorceress, and have done with it,” said Hakon. Ragnvald flinched. He had slept poorly since his trial. Now his imagination showed him a vision of a bloodied sword through the throat of a woman whose black hair was streaked with gray, who had only tried to save her son. When she died, she did not cry out in vain but spoke Ragnvald’s name. He shook his head, and it wobbled from ale and fatigue.
“We did, of course,” said Rathi, his voice sounding to Ragnvald as if it filtered to him through sea water. “But the wight still walks. The sorceress has a daughter, whom we have not found.”
Ran was drawing Ragnvald down into her darkness, the fjord waters closing over his head, to whisper things in his ear that he did not wish to know. He felt he could not allow the killing of this daughter, the wight’s sister.