branch to shift sideways and, after chasing it for a few steps, the thrall put a foot on it and kept cutting, so that Kaetilmund sucked in his breath and at once by-named the idiot No-Toes, since he predicted that as the most likely outcome.
Then the thrall changed the branch round and this time, when he put his foot on it, he did it on the curved end, so that it flew up and smacked his shin. The old man shouted something; Kaetilmund stuffed his knuckles in his mouth to keep from laughing aloud and the effort squeezed a fart from him.
Crowbone did not laugh. Memory washed through him of another time he had lain hidden in the grass, a memory dark as Munin’s wings. Lying in the grass above Klerkon’s summer settlement on Svartey, the Black Island, having run away yet again. Of course, being an island, there was no escape from Klerkon, the raider who had taken Crowbone and his mother and killed his foster-father. For all that, escape was what Crowbone had done more than once and, each time, hunger had driven him back to see what he could steal – and each time he had been captured he had been punished more harshly than before.
They had seen him this time, too, so that he had crouched down and pretended to be dead, not moving, not breathing, hidden in the long grass and so small at eight that he could easily be missed as they swished a way towards him.
Then a fart hissed out of him. He thought that was good, for he knew that the dead farted, sheep and men both and so would add to his subterfuge. Then the hand had gripped him like a vice and one of Klerkon’s men, Amundi Brawl, hauled him up, laughing about how the smell had given him away.
Klerkon, his goat-face twisted with anger, had thrown Crowbone back to Inga, Randr Sterki’s wife, snarling at her to make sure the boy knew he was a thrall and not to let him loose again. Inga, furious at having been so embarrassed, fetched sheep-shears and a seax, then cropped Crowbone’s head to the bone and beyond, flicking off old scabs and scraping new wounds until the blood got in the way and she gave up.
‘There,’ she said, wiping her hands clean on dry grass brought by her own son, the grinning Eyvind, full of his ten years and malice at his ma’s tormentor.
‘Now,’ Inga said, ‘you will be fixed to the privy by a chain and stay there until you learn that you are a nithing thrall.’
‘I am a prince,’ he had spat back and she had smashed his mouth with a scream of rage. He had wanted his mother, then, but she was already dead, kicked to death by the man who had put his bairn in her. It was him, Kveldulf, who fastened Crowbone to the privy and left him there.
Revenge. The day Orm and the Oathsworn had come to raid Klerkon and freed him, the day Klerkon’s own precious bairn went against the side of a wall and had the life broken from it with a snap and a last wail, that day he got his revenge.
Inga, begging and pleading, snarling and fighting, as the Oathsworn held her down and someone – who had it been? Crowbone squeezed his head, but could not remember clearly. Red Njal, maybe? Finn? No matter – the man who had broken his way into Inga had stabbed her first and a frantic Eyvind had died trying to save her. Orm had taken off the back of his head with a sword-stroke.
Crowbone had bent to Inga as the men had left her, choking in her own blood on the flank of a dying ox.
‘I am a prince,’ he had said, his breath wafting the dying flutter of her eyelashes. ‘You should have listened.’
Princely revenge. He shook the memories from him and shoved them back in the black sea-chest he kept in his head. Stuffed full, it was, of all those matters a prince finds expedient and necessary. Lesser men are allowed to brood on them, Crowbone thought, but princes who would be kings cannot afford them. Vladimir had taught him that, having learnt it from his own father, the harsh Sviatoslav.
‘Thor’s hairy balls,’ Kaetilmund hissed with delight. ‘We have to
Then the thrall changed the branch round and this time, when he put his foot on it, he did it on the curved end, so that it flew up and smacked his shin. The old man shouted something; Kaetilmund stuffed his knuckles in his mouth to keep from laughing aloud and the effort squeezed a fart from him.
Crowbone did not laugh. Memory washed through him of another time he had lain hidden in the grass, a memory dark as Munin’s wings. Lying in the grass above Klerkon’s summer settlement on Svartey, the Black Island, having run away yet again. Of course, being an island, there was no escape from Klerkon, the raider who had taken Crowbone and his mother and killed his foster-father. For all that, escape was what Crowbone had done more than once and, each time, hunger had driven him back to see what he could steal – and each time he had been captured he had been punished more harshly than before.
They had seen him this time, too, so that he had crouched down and pretended to be dead, not moving, not breathing, hidden in the long grass and so small at eight that he could easily be missed as they swished a way towards him.
Then a fart hissed out of him. He thought that was good, for he knew that the dead farted, sheep and men both and so would add to his subterfuge. Then the hand had gripped him like a vice and one of Klerkon’s men, Amundi Brawl, hauled him up, laughing about how the smell had given him away.
Klerkon, his goat-face twisted with anger, had thrown Crowbone back to Inga, Randr Sterki’s wife, snarling at her to make sure the boy knew he was a thrall and not to let him loose again. Inga, furious at having been so embarrassed, fetched sheep-shears and a seax, then cropped Crowbone’s head to the bone and beyond, flicking off old scabs and scraping new wounds until the blood got in the way and she gave up.
‘There,’ she said, wiping her hands clean on dry grass brought by her own son, the grinning Eyvind, full of his ten years and malice at his ma’s tormentor.
‘Now,’ Inga said, ‘you will be fixed to the privy by a chain and stay there until you learn that you are a nithing thrall.’
‘I am a prince,’ he had spat back and she had smashed his mouth with a scream of rage. He had wanted his mother, then, but she was already dead, kicked to death by the man who had put his bairn in her. It was him, Kveldulf, who fastened Crowbone to the privy and left him there.
Revenge. The day Orm and the Oathsworn had come to raid Klerkon and freed him, the day Klerkon’s own precious bairn went against the side of a wall and had the life broken from it with a snap and a last wail, that day he got his revenge.
Inga, begging and pleading, snarling and fighting, as the Oathsworn held her down and someone – who had it been? Crowbone squeezed his head, but could not remember clearly. Red Njal, maybe? Finn? No matter – the man who had broken his way into Inga had stabbed her first and a frantic Eyvind had died trying to save her. Orm had taken off the back of his head with a sword-stroke.
Crowbone had bent to Inga as the men had left her, choking in her own blood on the flank of a dying ox.
‘I am a prince,’ he had said, his breath wafting the dying flutter of her eyelashes. ‘You should have listened.’
Princely revenge. He shook the memories from him and shoved them back in the black sea-chest he kept in his head. Stuffed full, it was, of all those matters a prince finds expedient and necessary. Lesser men are allowed to brood on them, Crowbone thought, but princes who would be kings cannot afford them. Vladimir had taught him that, having learnt it from his own father, the harsh Sviatoslav.
‘Thor’s hairy balls,’ Kaetilmund hissed with delight. ‘We have to
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