The Sea of Trolls

Chapter Twenty THE WISE WOMAN

Olaf took them to his farm above the village. Several of his thralls—with slave rings around their necks—carried chests of booty. Jack wondered if he would be fitted with such a ring. It would be a terrible and unending humiliation. No one could look at him without knowing his status.

Any illusion Jack might have had about friendship between an owner and his slave was dispelled by the thralls’ names: Pig Face, Dirty Pants, Thick Legs, and a man-and-wife couple called Lump and She-Lump. She-Lump led Cloud Mane to a stable. Even the horse had a better name.

The walls of Olaf’s main house were curved inward. The ridge along the top formed an arc like the keel of an overturned ship. At each end of the ridge was a carved dragon’s head. Scattered about were other buildings—stables, storehouses, kitchens, and spare bedrooms.

Inside, as with Father’s house, the floor was below the surface of the ground. Along the sides were benches and tables and, leaning against a far wall, a beautifully made loom. Everywhere were examples of Olaf’s carving skills. Horses, birds, fish, and dragons decorated the roof beams and supporting timbers.

A fire burned in a long stone-lined trough down the middle of the hall. It made the air pleasantly warm, but smoky. Jack and Lucy started coughing the minute they got inside. “Good for the lungs!” cried Olaf, striking himself on the chest. “A hearty cough always tells me I’ve arrived home. Come on, ladies! Come and see what I’ve brought you!”

Olaf’s three wives crowded around, along with his tow-headed children. There were at least a dozen. They mobbed their father, demanding to see what he’d brought them. “A smack on the backside!” roared the giant. The children weren’t a bit scared. They continued to climb on their father’s legs and hang off his arms.

Finally, the wives unhooked them and the gift-giving began. There were shawls, tunics, bolts of cloth, and tools for the general running of the house. A heap of salt cakes brought cries of approval from the wives, who, Jack learned, were called Dotti, Lotti, and Heide. Olaf handed out embroidered headbands to the boys and scarves to the girls. Everyone got a new knife. He tossed necklaces, bracelets, and brooches to the wives, laughing to see them fight for the loot. “Who are the thralls for?” Dotti said. The women eagerly turned to look at Jack and his sister.

“He’s my skald,” said Olaf.

“Ooh! Your own personal skald!” cried Dotti.

“You deserve it, really you do,” enthused Lotti. They were as alike as two apples from the same tree: blond and blue-eyed with fat, rosy cheeks and well-rounded arms.

The third wife was different. She had a broad, flat face and eyes that tilted up at the corners. Her skin was bronze, which made her light blue eyes all the more remarkable. But that was not the only difference. Jack felt the air tremble as she looked at him. A lazy, drowsy warmth crept over him, and Olaf’s voice seemed to fade away. Nothing registered except this strange, dark woman staring at him. Then she laughed, and the drowsy feeling went away. “I like thiss boy,” she announced in a heavily accented voice.

“Now, Heide, I’m not giving him to you,” said Olaf.

“You haff not the giffing uff this boy,” Heide said.

“And you have not the getting, woman. See, I brought you pots of herbs and medicines, as you asked.”

Heide nodded, accepting the tribute. “How about the girlll?” Her voice was low and husky. Lucy hung on to Jack’s hand, her thumb in her mouth. She stared at the smoldering fire in the middle of the room and appeared to be miles away in one of her fantasies.

“She belongs to Thorgil.”

“Thorgil?” cried Dotti and Lotti together.

“It was her first capture,” Olaf said. “She was pleased as anything about it.”

“Thorgil,” said Heide in her smoky voice, “iss not pleased about anything.”

“Yes, well, I’m not going to break my rules and deprive her of her first capture.”

Jack was fascinated to see how careful Olaf was with Heide. He might knock his crew around, and he probably smacked Dotti and Lotti as well, but this woman was in a different category. If anything, Olaf was afraid of her.

“What iss Thorgilll”—the name was drawn out—“going to do with the child?”

“Give her to Frith.”

“No!” cried the other wives, and Olaf looked apologetic.

“She wants to be admitted to the Queen’s Berserkers,” he said. “It’s her dearest wish. I can invite her along on trips, but I haven’t the authority to admit her. The gift of Lucy—that’s the little mite’s name—will win her entry.”

“It iss not well done,” said Heide. “It iss supreme foolishnesss, my ox-witted Northman. It will end in disasterrr.”

Now Jack did expect Olaf to strike her, but he only grimaced. “Don’t try your witchy stuff on me, Heide. I’m tired, I’m dirty, and the only thing I want is a long sweat in the sauna and a nice bucket of mead.”

“Bucket” was exactly what Olaf had in mind. Dotti filled one from a keg in one of the storehouses, and Olaf drank until his beard was dripping. “By Aegir’s mighty shoulders, that’s good!” he said. “Honey wine from your own fields. You can’t beat it.” Lotti hastily brought him bread and cheese.

“You know what would go with this?” said Olaf. “Graffisk. Fetch me some graffisk!” Lotti sped out the door. “You’re in for a treat, boy,” he told Jack. “Many’s the time I dreamed of this dish while at sea. It truly means I’ve come home. Because I like you, I’ll let you have some.”

“Thank you,” Jack said uncertainly. He wouldn’t have minded the bread and cheese, but that hadn’t been offered. Suddenly, an unbelievably foul odor wafted through the door. It was like toenails and rotten teeth and ancient bilgewater. Jack couldn’t begin to describe it. He had all he could do to keep from bolting from the room.

Lotti danced in with a bowl. “I opened a fresh keg,” she warbled.

Fresh? thought Jack. The bowl was full of purplish lumps floating in a slimy gray liquid. It looked every bit as horrible as it smelled.

“Graffisk!” said Olaf. He smeared some onto a chunk of bread and gobbled it down. A smile of contentment creased his beard. “Have some.” He held out the bowl.

“I—I’m not hungry,” Jack said.

“HAVE SOME.”

So Jack took a morsel of bread and dipped the tiniest corner of it in the liquid. He put it into his mouth. He swallowed quickly, but not quickly enough. The taste coated the inside of his mouth like the mud coated his legs when he mucked out the barn. Jack ran for the door, bent down, and retched for all he was worth.

“Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Brjóstabarn!” Olaf said, guffawing. His wives and children joined in with merry peals of laughter. After a while Heide took pity on him and brought him a cup of water.

“That’s hiss favorite joke with outsiders,” she said. Jack stumbled after her, back into the room. He’d finally figured out what graffisk meant: “grave fish”, as in dead, as in rotten.

“Graffisk is what we make when we have no salt,” explained Olaf, who was mopping up the nauseous stuff with his bread. He really did like it! “Sometimes we find a herring run—thousands and thousands of herring!—so many, the sea is thick with them. You can lay an axe on the water and it will not sink. So! We bring the herring home. What then? We can only eat so many. If it’s raining, we can’t dry the rest.

“So we put the fish into barrels and bury them in the earth. For months we wait. The fish ripen like fine cheese. They turn purple. They get a delicious smell. The longer we wait, the better they taste.”

“Why don’t they poison you?” said Jack, thinking, I wish they would poison you.

Olaf grinned and slapped his stomach. “We Northmen are strong. Not like Saxons.” All this while Lump and She-Lump had been stoking up the sauna. Lump came to the door. The giant stood up, brushed the crumbs from his beard, and followed the glum slave.

Jack went over to sit by Lucy. She was watching the fire in the middle of the room with rapt attention. “Lucy?”

No answer.

“Lucy?” He took her hand. She seemed strange, almost as if she wasn’t there.

“It’s so pretty,” she said, staring at the fire. One of Olaf’s girls came over and shoved her off the bench.

“Hey!” Jack yelled.

“Toad Face,” said the girl. “I think that’s what I’ll call you. Toad Face. It’s my turn to name a thrall.”

“Leave him,” said Heide, who had come up behind them as silently as a wolf. The girl fled. Jack put Lucy back on the bench. She stared at the fire as though nothing had happened.

“What’s wrong with her? Is she sick?” Jack cried. Inside, he thought, Is she insane?

“Her spirit hass fled,” said Heide. “It iss wandering in a strange place—a nice place, I think.”

“Father used to tell her she was a lost princess,” Jack said, somewhat reassured. “He said that someday knights would find her and take her back to the castle. I’m afraid Lucy believed him.”

“I haff seen thiss before,” said the dark woman. “In my land the winters are long and dark. People’s spirits wander sso that they do not go mad. When spring comes, they return.”

“I hope spring returns for Lucy.”

“It may with your help. You are a special boy. I know. I haff looked inside.”

“Are you a wise woman?” Jack asked.

Heide laughed, a sound as smoky as her voice. The other people in the house stopped what they were doing. It seemed everybody walked carefully around Heide. “Thank you for not calling me a witch,” she said. “That iss what they think.” She indicated the others in the room. “But yess, I practice seiðer.”

“Isn’t that… witchcraft?” said Jack.

“It iss woman’s magic. What skalds do iss man’s magic. It iss only witchcraft iff the two are mixed up.”

Jack wasn’t sure he understood, but it relieved his mind. He was a skald, and so the magic he did was all right. Thorgil wouldn’t be able to accuse him. “Where are you from?” he asked.

“Olaf won me in Finnmark. My father wass the headman uff a village, and Olaf wass trading for furs.”

So the giant doesn’t always kill people and steal things, Jack thought.

“I had many suitors. Many. A wise woman iss very valuable. But my spirit chose Olaf. I should haff married one uff the others, but”—Heide shrugged—“he wass so big and beautiful. I am not like them.” She frowned at Dotti and Lotti, who were examining their children for head lice. “I only stay iff big ox-brain treats me right. Iff he insults me, I will go.”

Heide went back to her pots of medicine and herbs. Jack stayed with Lucy. The little girl seemed happy enough, staring into the flames. When Jack brought her the wooden toys Olaf had carved, she set about playing with them. Jack asked Lotti for bread and cheese. He didn’t really understand his status—perhaps thralls got beaten if they asked for food—but Lotti gave him what he wanted and a cup of buttermilk besides. Jack fed the milk to Lucy.

One thing resulted from Heide’s interest in him: Jack and Lucy were left alone. No one pushed her off the bench again, and no one threatened to name him Toad Face.

Late in the day Thorgil showed up, and Jack was horrified to learn that she lived with Olaf’s family. She burst into the house, glowing and sweaty from her romp with the dogs. Heide ordered her to the sauna. Rune arrived for dinner, and Jack learned that he, too, was part of the household. “My wife died years ago, and none of our children lived past infancy,” he whispered. “Olaf’s hall is always as warm and friendly as a summer afternoon. It’s like a great light in the midst of a wilderness.”

Jack shivered. He’d heard those words before. “You mean it’s like Hrothgar’s hall before Grendel got to it.”

“Did I quote that poem? Yes, I suppose I did. It was Dragon Tongue’s finest work.” Rune stretched his feet toward the fire pit in the middle of the room. “I have lived long enough to know that nothing lasts forever. Such joy as Olaf’s will sooner or later attract its destruction. But I also know that to ignore joy while it lasts, in favor of lamenting one’s fate, is a great crime.”

Heide brought him a steaming cup of medicine to sooth his ravaged throat. They smiled at each other, and Jack felt the air tremble between the ancient warrior and the wise woman.

The evening meal was spectacular. Olaf’s wives and servants had toiled all day to make it memorable. The giant’s chair was dragged to the upper end of the fire pit. Tables set with wooden platters, spoons, and cups were lined up on either side. Each diner was expected to supply his or her own knife, but Jack was given one since his own was long gone.

Fine wheat bread, rounds of cheese, salmon baked in fennel, geese oozing delicious fat, stews wafting the seductive odors of cumin and garlic—all these and more were carted in by the servants. Buttermilk, cider, beer, and mead were there for the asking. Bowls of apples sat on every table. Jack had never seen so much food. It made up for the ghastly graffisk earlier.

Olaf sat in his great chair at the head of the fire pit. Rune and Jack were to one side of him, while his sons brawled for the best cuts of meat on the other. The wives and daughters, when they weren’t fetching things from the outlying kitchens, dined in a more orderly way farther down the hall. Heide looked after Lucy. Even the thralls were given a place near the door. As far as Jack could tell, they got the same food as everyone else.

It was a joyous gathering with much impromptu singing. Only one person sat apart and did not join in the festivities. Thorgil was placed midway between the male and female family members. Olaf had relented on his threat of placing her with the thralls. Yet she was not in the place of honor and Jack was. She sat alone, a little patch of misery, in the noisy celebration. Where is her family? Jack wondered.

“You can help with the clearing up,” said Heide to the sullen girl.

For answer, Thorgil dashed her wooden platter to the floor. “I do not do women’s work!” she cried.

“There iss no shame in it. You are one of us, like it or not.”

Everyone stopped talking. A breathless silence fell over the hall, broken only by the crackling of the fire.

“Pick up your things!” roared Olaf suddenly, sending a shock wave through the gathering.

“I’m not like them! I’m a shield maiden!” shouted Thorgil.

“You’re an orphan living on my goodwill. If any of my men behaved as you did, I’d grind his face into that mess you’ve just created. NOW MOVE!”

Thorgil knocked over her stool and fled out the door. No one tried to stop her. Heide shook her head and bent down to clean up the scattered stew and bread.

Jack sat back, his heart pounding. He felt sick to his stomach. He’d been next to Olaf when the giant roared, and his ears still rang. Even worse, the rage and anguish coming from Thorgil had struck him like a blow. He couldn’t understand it.

He was trained to serve the life force. When his mind was calm, he could feel its currents in the air, in the earth. He felt it between Rune and Heide, but that was no surprise. Heide was a wise woman and Rune was a skald. He liked them.

He absolutely hated Thorgil. She was crude and vicious. She gloried in death. There was nothing remotely attractive about her character, and yet… Jack remembered her walking up the street without a single person to greet her. Olaf had called her an orphan, so she had no family. He looked sideways at Rune calmly dipping his bread in his stew. “Where will she go?” Jack asked.

“Thorgil? She’ll sleep in the sauna.” The old warrior didn’t seem worried about it. “If there’s enough moonlight, she’ll go up the hill and crawl in with the king’s dogs.”

“Her brothers and sisters,” said one of Olaf’s sons, a stocky lad with the beginnings of a beard. His eyes were slightly tilted, and Jack guessed his mother was Heide. “They’re the only ones who’ll put up with her.”

“That’s enough, Skakki,” said Olaf. “She can’t help her rages. She gets them from her father, and Odin knows, there was never a finer berserker.”

Everyone murmured assent. “Are the king’s dogs big and gray?” asked Jack.

“I see you’ve met them,” said Olaf.

It was amazing how quickly the giant could switch from fury to cheerful good-naturedness. But Jack knew he could switch back just as fast. “They ran at Lucy and me this afternoon, but they didn’t hurt us,” he said.

“They’d never hurt a child,” Skakki said. “You could put Hilda in their food dish”—he pointed at a somewhat overblown infant suckling noisily at Lotti’s breast—“and they wouldn’t even growl.”

“Don’t let them see a wolf, though,” said Olaf. “Thor himself couldn’t hold them back then.”

“You might as well tell him the story,” said Lotti, moving Hilda, who screamed at the interruption, to the other breast.

Olaf leaned back in his great chair, making it groan dangerously. “Thorgil’s father,” he began, “was the greatest berserker who ever lived. His name was Thorgrim. He was always the first into battle and the last to leave. By the time he was sixteen, he had a necklace of troll teeth. His greatest bane, though, was his rage. When it came upon him, he neither saw nor heard what was around him.”

“You couldn’t stop him,” said Skakki. “I remember.”

“He had no proper wife—no one would marry him,” Olaf said. “But he had a thrall. A Saxon. I forget her name.”

“It was Allyson, dear ox-brain,” said Heide. “Trust you to forget a woman’s name.”

“Anyhow, this Allyson gave him a son called Thorir. I told you what happened to him.”

“Yes,” said Jack, remembering the terrible murder.

“Afterward Allyson wasn’t the same. She hardly seemed aware of anything around her. When she had a baby girl, the only word she said was ‘Jill’. That was her name for the child.”

“Only she had no right to name it, being a thrall,” Skakki said.

“The midwife took it to Thorgrim, and he rejected it.”

“Rejected it?” cried Jack. Such a thing was unheard of. No matter how ugly a baby was, it was sent by God. You had to love it.

“It is a father’s right,” said Olaf, looking sternly at his numerous offspring. It was obvious he’d never rejected one, and they didn’t look at all worried about it.

“He wanted a boy,” whispered Rune. Everyone fell silent to let him be heard. “He wanted one to replace Thorir, and when the child was a girl, he ordered it thrown out into the forest.”

Jack was so shocked, he couldn’t speak.

“So the midwife took it far from the house and laid it under a tree,” Olaf continued. “King Ivar had received a pair of Irish wolfhounds as a gift, and the bitch had given birth not long before. She went for a run in the forest and came upon the infant. I guess it was screaming.”

“Like my Hilda,” Lotti said fondly, unplugging her infant.

“She threw herself down and nursed it, just as though it were a puppy. When the keeper went to look for the bitch, he found her curled around the infant, keeping it warm.”

“You keep saying ‘it’ when you talk of the baby,” said Jack. “Wasn’t it a girl?”

“It was nothing yet,” said Rune. “It had not been accepted.”

“But now Thorgrim had a problem,” Olaf said. “Our law says that a child, once suckled, cannot be abandoned. Like it or not, the royal dog had suckled it. Thorgrim was forced to take it—now her—back. He named her Thorgil and handed her over to Allyson.”

“Who never looked twice at her,” said Heide. “She fed her and that was all. Thorgil’s father ignored her too. The only one to give her any love was the bitch, and afterward her puppies.”

So that was the story! It was as amazing as any tale the Bard had taught Jack. It would make a wonderful poem, except that it was so sad. It needed a happier ending, one Jack promised himself to work on.

The conversation turned to other things. After a while the warmth and good food made Jack extremely sleepy. Heide led him away to an outlying hut, where he was given a heap of straw and a rough blanket. Several young thralls were already snoring. Lucy had been put to bed in a corner of the great hall.

The blanket was full of fleas—Jack felt them hopping about—but he was too sleepy to care. He was vaguely aware when Pig Face, Dirty Pants, and Thick Legs came in later, smelling of sour beer and sweat, to burrow into the straw.