An older man approached her, stooped, and hardly taller than Svanhild herself. “What are you looking for, maid?” he asked. “I can help you.”
He looked kindly enough, with bright blue eyes creased at the corners. He walked with the aid of a stick, but quick enough he could keep up with her. “I’m looking for someone to sell some silver to,” she said. “Can you help me?”
“Oh, there are a few shops, all along the back of the town,” he said, pointing toward where the houses started to rise and grow sparser as the ground rose toward the cliffs above the fjord. At Svanhild’s quizzical look, he added, “Farther from the smell of the shore. You’ll see. I’ll show you.”
He spun around her and stepped in front of her, as fast as if he did not have a cane to maneuver. He used it instead as a flourish to end his footwork, and pointed the way up the sloping streets, out of the mud. She followed him up, between weathered buildings. He told her as they walked that he had been born on the spot of land that would become this strange place, Kaupanger, the only town on the western coast, and he knew it better than anyone. When she glanced behind her to try to mark her way, he drew her attention back with a joke, or another flourish with his cane.
The houses here looked like little halls, shortened so they were no longer than they were wide. Small decorations were the only way of differentiating one from the other. At least the man kept leading her uphill. She could find her way by going back down again.
Then he turned a corner and disappeared. As she called out for him, something hit her in the back, and she stumbled forward. She tried to yell and another shove buried her face in the dirt. She pushed herself up and felt a hand scrabbling at the pack slung over her shoulder. She heard a dagger leaving its sheath and passing close to her ear, before the wight on her back began sawing with it at the pack strings.
“What do you want from me?” Svanhild cried.
“Your silver, of course,” said the man who had led her. Now that she was pinned down, he moved less swiftly. “Come on, give us the pack, or that dagger can be used for sawing more than just fabric.”
“I need it,” she said. “Please, I have to get away. It’s all I have.”
“You can work for it back, can’t you?” said the person on her back with the knife. “She’ll be a strong worker, I think.” He had a boy’s voice, and dug a boy’s bony knees into her ribs.
“Na,” said the man. “There’s a ship in port. Tie her up and get done with it. They’ve enough men, but they’re paying double for women.”
A jolt of anger went through her like a thunderclap. A free Norse man would never allow himself to be taken alive and enslaved. He would rather die, and so would she. Her fear gave her strength beyond this boy’s. She rolled over, heedless of his dagger, and threw him off her, onto the ground. She had begun to stand when he grabbed at her leg and pulled her down on top of him. She aimed her knee into his stomach. He slashed at her with his dagger, and she flinched away, covering her face. His slashes cut her forearms, driving her back so she no longer pinned him down.
“Stop this,” came a woman’s authoritative voice, “or I’ll have the guards on you.”
The boy stopped attacking her, and Svanhild used her advantage to kick him hard in the stomach. He choked and curled into a ball, like a grub exposed to sunlight. She wanted to kick him again. His master had disappeared.
“You, what were you doing following these scoundrels?” she asked Svanhild. It was the woman from the market whose vague directions had led her into this mess.
“You wouldn’t help me,” said Svanhild. “Who was I supposed to ask? No wonder all the kings want to put you under their control.”
“I’m sorry,” said the woman gruffly. “I should have helped you. Then I wouldn’t have had to leave my cow behind and climb up here. She’s probably made some mischief by now. Come with me, and I’ll bandage your cuts.”
“What about him?” Svanhild asked, turning to look at where the boy had lain. He was gone. She should have kicked him harder.
“You’re not a Kaupanger,” said the woman.
“What does that mean?”
“It means you don’t pay the guard to protect you. Who is your protector?” It was a question with too long an answer, and the woman saw it in her eyes. “Come with me.”
Svanhild followed her down the hill gratefully, to where a basket of vegetables was perched on a windowsill. “You can carry those.” A cow nosed through some rotting produce on the ground. The woman tugged on the cow’s head. It ignored her. The woman sighed and waited until it was done before continuing to walk.
They walked through the town, around back of one of the storefronts. It was not open yet, the entrance covered with wooden shutters, bound by leather thongs in intricate knots. She tied up the cow in the small, poor lot behind the house. No wonder she did not mind the cow eating rotten vegetables. Svanhild could not imagine what the cow’s milk would taste like.
“Don’t go shouting about your wealth in the street, girl. Are you simple?” the woman, whose name was Gerta, asked when they were out of the main thoroughfare. She led Svanhild inside, sat her down in the kitchen, and gave her a cup of ale and a cloth to wipe her face.
“I’m sorry,” said Svanhild, tears immediately threatening to spill over her cheeks. “I’ve never been here before. I have a pair of brooches I want to sell so I can buy passage on a boat to take me to my brother. I have to get to him. I don’t have anywhere else to go.”
“Where are your parents?” asked Gerta, sounding interested against her will. Svanhild related the whole story as far as she could, but there was too much to tell, and she started crying in the middle of it.
“I don’t know what was the right thing—maybe I should have married Thorkell, even if his big stupid sons killed all his other wives coming out. Hrolf wasn’t supposed to be allowed to marry me to anyone, and I know he didn’t want me there. I don’t want to be where I’m not wanted, but now I’m not wanted anywhere.”
“I don’t pretend I understand that story of yours—but you know your mind,” said Gerta. “You’ll do well to go to your brother. He was supposed to have the keeping of you.”
Svanhild remembered how relieved he had been to get rid of her, and did not reply.
“I can give you some advice about how to go from here,” Gerta continued. “We saw Hakon’s ships go by here six weeks or so ago, after the midsummer—the ting, I guess—and we haven’t seen them come back this way, not that that means anything. I suppose he’s at Yrjar still.”
“Why do the people at Kaupanger not go to the ting?” Svanhild asked.