Homecoming

V

Fanns allri nannan som Ynglingen hanmilt som mjok (onar leene), stark som storm (men allri raste), vis som jodens salva annen.

A varelse var han, aj dykt.

[There was never other like the Youngling, mild as milk (his eyes smiling), strong as storm (but never raging), wise as the spirit of the earth.

And living man he was, not myth.]

Prefatory verse of THE JARNHANN SAGA,

Kumalo translation

The long low ridge extended eastward from the foothills a considerable distance into the open plain. Its cool north-facing slope was green with new grass. At intervals, shallow draws ran down it, thick with low shrubby oaks whose soft, late-emerging leaflets tinted their gray with pink. Along the crest, broken rock let rain and melting snow penetrate deeply, and a ragged line of scraggly shrubs grew there, overlooking a semi-barren south slope.

The sky was cloudless and immense, the sun warm. Gnats hung in the air, celebrating the absence of wind, and an eagle soared, tilting and swaying in the updrafts. A mouse scurried between two spiny shrubs and a sparrow hawk darted toward it, rising again with the furry victim in its small talons.

The two adolescents, prone within the screen of shrubs, watched the brief tiny drama with sharp eyes, then looked southward across the plain again. Sweat oiled their dirty foreheads. Gnats hovered and bit unheeded. After several minutes the younger said softly, “There is something else I like about this country; you can see so far.”

The other nodded curtly, and for a time they said nothing, did nothing except scan the plain.

“Look,” the younger spoke again, and pointed southward.

“Jaha. Men on horseback; it looks like three.”

They watched awhile. “There is one trotting ahead on foot,” the older added. “About a hundred meters ahead.”

The other squinted. “I see him. It looks as if they plan to cross the ridge over east, where it isn’t so steep.”

They crawled back from the crest, then ran downslope to their horses tethered to a clump of oak shrubs. Untying them, they scrambled to their backs and started eastward at a gallop. A kilometer farther they angled up the slope and tied their horses again, then ran toward the crest, wriggling the last few meters on their bellies to lie panting among some shrubs.

They were startled to see how near the running man was, perhaps seventy meters off. He stopped.

“He’s looking at us!” hissed the younger. “How can he see us?”

The man raised his hand, halting the others-two men and a woman.

“They are our people!” the younger added.

“I can see that!” the older whispered with irritation.

The warrior started diagonally up the slope toward them, trotting easily. They could see as he came how big he was, an agile giant, shirtless, glistening, thick muscles moving smoothly in torso and limbs.

“It’s the Yngling!” the younger whispered.

“You don’t know; you never saw him.”

They stayed on their stomachs, eyes large, until their necks were craned backward and the man stood above them. Sweat dripped from his nose and trickled down his grimy torso. Strong teeth showed between the long sparse tow-colored mustache and an even sparser growth on his chin.

“Just what we need,” he said. “Someone to guide us to the People.”

Both boys got up.

“You are the Yngling, aren’t you?” asked the younger.

“Some say so,” the man said grinning. “I am Nils Jarnhann, warrior of the Wolf Clan, of the Svear. And you are lookouts. Where are your horses?”

The older boy pointed. “But one of us must stay here on watch. I am the oldest, so I will stay. Alvar will guide you.”

Nils nodded and gestured for the others. “Fine. What is your name?”

The boy stood straight. “Ola Gulleson, sword apprentice of the Reindeer Clan of the Svear.”

They shook hands and then parted, Nils and Alvar walking toward Alvar’s tethered horse. “I am Ola’s brother,” Alvar volunteered. “He will be sixteen when the leaves fall, and I was fourteen when the snow was melting. I am a sword apprentice too.”

“Good.”

“You think I’m too skinny to be a sword apprentice, but things are different than they used to be. Lots of things changed this winter. And I am growing.” He untied his horse. “Do you want to ride him? I can walk. Many people say we young don’t want to do anything but ride. They say if we aren’t careful we will be weak-legged like the horse barbarians who can walk only a short way before they are tired out. I don’t want to be weak-legged. Is that why you were running? So your legs won’t lose their strength?”

“I was running because we have only three horses,” Nils answered matter-of-factly. “And as you say, it’s good to run. When we fought the orcss in the battle of the neck, we won despite their numbers because they tired.”

“You ride now,” the boy said decisively. “It will be my turn to run.”

The others rode up to them and the boy loped off. “The runner is also the scout,” Nils called after him, “so keep your eyes and ears open.”

Nils let Alvar jog some five kilometers, then called for him to wait. “I think we can do without a scout now, and I need answers to some questions. You can share Miska’s back with Ilse while we talk.”

As soon as he was aboard, the boy asked, “Where did you get such fine horses?”

“From the Magyars.”

“Did you steal them?”

“They gave them to us. I have friends among the Magyars; I was a soldier in their royal guard once. We wintered with them.”

“Why didn’t they give you four horses so you all could ride?”

Sten and Leif laughed aloud at the way the boy controlled the conversation, but that didn’t faze Alvar.

“There were five of us then,” Nils explained, “and they gave us ten horses, but bandits attacked us in the mountains and when they fled we were only four, with three horses.

“And now a question for you: How did the People winter?”

“The clans wintered separately, to get enough food. They were in many places in the South Ukraine. The Reindeer Clan was at a place called Kishinev. There had been villages but the orcs had burned them.” Alvar paused to make a face of disgust. “House burners and barn burners! They have no shame. And they’d killed most of the people. The ones that were left had made little huts in the forest, and that’s what we did too. All their warriors were dead or gone away, and the orcs had taken most of their cattle, but some had been hidden in the forest so there still were some for us to take. The Ukrainians would come and beg for food.

“After we made camp there, the Council of Chiefs decided that all men must train to fight because we had too few warriors; so many had been killed, you know. And we needed to practice fighting from horseback because we were not skilled at it. And all boys from thirteen to sixteen were made sword apprentices unless something was wrong with them. We trained as hard as the hunger would let us. I’ll let you feel my muscle sometime. Here.” He tapped Ilse on the shoulder and doubled his right arm. “You feel it.”

She turned in the saddle-awkwardly, for she was eight months pregnant-and squeezed his bicep. “It isn’t very big yet,” she said, “but it is hard as a rock.”

Alvar blushed. “You talk funny,” he said. “You are not of the People. Even the Sydnorskar talk better than that.”

“True,” Ilse said. “I am Deuts, and I’ve only been learning your tongue since last fall. But now I also am one of the People because Nils is, and I am his wife.”

They rode without talking for a bit, but shortly Alvar asked: “Are you a thought reader, like Nils, that can look into people’s minds?”

“Yes.”

Alvar blushed again.

“But I have always been able to do that,” she went on, “all my life, and I’m used to people’s thoughts. I think you are a fine boy with a good mind. Before long you will be a good man and an able warrior. I tell you that honestly.”

Nils grinned across at her.

“Our sword master curses me sometimes,” Alvar launched on. “Quite often in fact. But he curses most of us a lot. He curses Ola least of all, and one of the Ukrainians the clan adopted that we have named Tryn because his nose is so big. They are the two best with swords in our whole ring.

“By the time the snow started to melt though, we were too hungry and didn’t train much. And the horses were thin. Some of the old people died, and many of the Ukrainians. We left as soon as the ground was bare enough in the open and the horses could eat the dead grass. Ukrainian grass is very nourishing for horses. And as we traveled we ate everything we came across-deer, wild cattle, wild horses, wolves, hares-everything. The acorns bound up our bowels so that everyone was sick.” He grimaced. “Then we made bark soup to loosen them, and that was worse. But since we arrived in the orc land we have had all the cattle we can eat, and fresh blood and milk to drink, so we are all hard-fleshed again and everyone feels strong.

“The People like this land. They didn’t want to stay in the Ukraine because it was so poor in cattle, and the warriors say it is shameful to rob the Ukrainians who have so little.” He shook his head. “But it’s a pleasure to raid the orcish herds. And here we can live where the mountains meet the Great Meadow, with all the timber we need and endless pasture. We will force the orcs to attack us and then kill them. Kniv Listi is our war leader now. He is of the Weasel Clan, of the Jotar.” They were riding up a narrow foothill valley now, and Nils looked it over with interest. Its walls were forested, the south-facing with open pine stands, the opposite mostly with dense fir. The valley floor was meadow, encroached upon trom the sides by pines and broken with groves of birch and aspen. A stream meandered about its midline, swollen by melting mountain snow.

Alvar chattered on. “Some of the mountain people attacked a party of us when we first camped here. They liked to hunt in this valley and wanted to drive us away. We let two of them go, and afterward a chief came who spoke some Anglic and talked with some of our people who speak it. The mountain folk are terrified of the orcs and do whatever they tell them, even deliver their prettiest girls. We told them we are going to kill all the orcs we can and drive the rest out of the country. We told them if they don’t bother us we will not kill them, that it is only the orcs we feud with, but they must not spy on us for the orcs. A few of their young men have come to join us, and they are teaching us the country and some of the language.”

Emerging from a birch grove they came in sight of a large encampment of tiny huts with low log walls, in loosely ordered rows instead of the customary neoviking ring. The clan totem stood near the center, a crude representation of an otter.

“We have not built real villages yet,” Alvar explained. “It was decided we probably will have to move: we must be light on our feet. And the orcs will burn whatever we have built.”

That night the Council of Chiefs and the War Council, from all the neoviking clans, met around a tall fire beneath the stars. A chieftain, referring to him as the Yngling, suggested that Nils Jarnhann replace Kniv Listi as War Leader.

Nils stood in the circle of firelight, greasy braids resting on his wide heavy shoulders, and looked around him. “I thank Ulf Vargson for his faith in me. But I know of Kniv Listi, of his cunning and resourcefulness. His raids have been told of in the longhouse of my village. I prefer to leave the leadership in his experienced hands and act as counsel to him, as I did to Bjorn Arrbuk when he led us in humiliating the orcs and horse barbarians time and again.

“Having said this, I will ask something of you. I would like to search the tribes for those who have prophetic dreams, or who sometimes seem to know what another will say before he says it. Some few of them will prove to have psi-power, as I have, but undeveloped. Trained, their minds can be as valuable to us as swords or bows.”