Land of the Silver Dragon

SEVEN

It was a combination of light and hunger that woke me.

The rising sun was shining directly into my face and, when I raised myself on one elbow to look out at the sea flying past, it was as if tiny, golden fires had been lit on the top of every wave.

I was so hungry that my stomach was growling like an angry wolf.

A different crewman stood at the steering oar, and I did not like to disturb him. Other mariners were visible, all looking preoccupied with whatever they were doing, and I could hear sounds of activity from the fore part of the ship. Maybe that was where they ate? Hopefully, I stood up, intending to go and find out. They had taken care of me so far, I reasoned, and so it didn’t seem likely that they were planning to starve me to death.

My legs felt like feathers. Staggering, I grasped hold of the top of the gunwale, standing quite still. Fully expecting the dreadful sickness to start again, I looked round for the bucket. It was there, just by where my head had lain all night, and, again, someone had rinsed it out. These men, whoever they were, kept a clean ship.

I waited. Nothing happened, except that, after a while, I sensed that my legs were actually going to hold me up. I risked a step. Two steps. To my amazement, I realized that, as if utilizing some latent skill I hadn’t known I possessed, my body was reacting to the ship’s motion. I have, on rare occasions, ridden a horse, and this new sensation felt in some ways similar. The beautiful ship beneath me was galloping over the waves, responding to every nuance of the sea’s powerful restlessness. And I, standing on her narrow deck, was responding to her, my legs bending automatically to compensate for her movement, my body — my spirit, perhaps — in tune with that of the ship.

It was in that instant that I fell in love with her.

Buoyed up, exhilarated by my new confidence, I moved on along the deck, beneath the huge, full sail. In front of it, I spotted a small rowing boat, upturned and lashed to a thwart. It was, I guessed, the means by which the abductors had transported me from the narrow fenland waterways out to the ship. I went on towards the front of the ship. There were, indeed, crewmen up there, and they were sharing out food.

It was probably my hunger that made me take in that fact first. Then, in the same instant, I saw what reared up behind them and screamed.

The long, spiked neck of a dragon rose into the clear morning sky, soaring up, up, to the high, proud head, reddish in colour, the fierce mouth spouting a blaze of flame, the pale, wide eye staring out intently over the sea …

Somebody laughed, and as I unfroze from my terror, I saw what I should have seen instantly: this was not a real dragon, but a beautifully carved figurehead, up there above and in front of the ship, bravely leading the way through whatever perils the sea cast at it. At him, I corrected myself instantly. While the ship was undoubtedly she, the dragon could be nothing else but he.

The red-haired giant was beside me. The morning sun shone on his bare head, and in that bright, early light, he looked more fair than auburn. He was smiling. ‘Behold, Nidhoggr,’ he said, pointing up at the dragon. Then, frowning in thought, he added, ‘In your tongue, Malice-striker.’

A deep shudder went through me. Malice-striker. The name of the ship I had twice seen in my visions. And now here I was, on board the very same vessel.

I tried desperately to ground myself, absorbing the good, solid wood of the deck planks beneath my feet; the feel of the fresh salt-tasting wind on my face. As the dream world receded, and I saw with the eye of reason, I understood that the craft on to which my abductors had brought me was subtly different from the vision ship. Lean and graceful though she was, the vision ship had been shaped like an arrow, and shields had been positioned along both gunwales. My vision ship was, without doubt, a war ship. Whereas this craft was …

I spun round to the giant. ‘What do you call this ship?’ I demanded.

‘Malice-striker,’ he repeated, grinning again, as if in amusement that I appeared to have lost my wits.

‘No, I mean, what sort of ship is she?’

‘Ah.’ He nodded in understanding. ‘This is what we call a knarr. A ship for carrying goods, people, horses, cattle — anything that has to be ferried over the sea.’ He reached out a big hand and patted the gunwale behind him. ‘Broad and strong, high-sided and robust, the knarr is built to be reliably seaworthy.’

A knarr, I repeated silently. This Malice-striker was a cargo ship. In that case, there must have been a predecessor that shared her name. In a flash of intuition, I knew I was right. Gathering all my courage, I forced myself to look the giant straight in the eye and said softly, for I wanted only him to hear, ‘She is not the first ship to bear the name.’

His expression of astonishment gave me a brief but intoxicating moment of proud joy. He had captured me, bound me, made me his prisoner and was now speeding away with me on his ship, to God only knew what destination and for a purpose I didn’t even dare guess at. It was high time I struck a return blow, if only the feeble, pointless one of taking him by surprise.

He recovered very quickly. Grabbing my arm, he led me a few paces away from the avid eyes and ears of his crew. Leaning down to speak right into my ear, he hissed, ‘How do you know that?’

I pulled my arm out of his grasp, rubbing at it. There would be five little bruises there later. ‘Because I saw her predecessor,’ I said, forcing a calmness I was far from feeling.

Violently he shook his head, as if by so doing he could negate my statement. ‘It is not possible,’ he whispered.

I shrugged. ‘Possible or not, I did.’ I wondered fleetingly whether to go on, or to leave him guessing. I decided to tell him. ‘I saw a vision,’ I said. ‘From the past. A long, slender ship, sailing very fast along a wild shore. The figurehead was a dragon, just like yours.’ A little devil was prompting me to go on, and, dangerous though I knew it was, I did. ‘That ship was no knarr,’ I whispered. ‘No cargo boat.’ I emphasized the words, putting scorn into my voice. ‘She was a warship, and she carried fierce, brave warriors frantic for the fight.’

Dangerous did not begin to describe it. I saw the fury ignite in his light eyes, and the fist that caught the side of my head was so fast that it appeared to come out of nowhere. I fell, awkwardly, collapsing in the angle between the deck and the ship’s side. I felt something wet and warm on my head: my own blood. Then my view of the deck, the giant, the crew and the sky was invaded by darkness, and my head fell with a painful thump on to the deck.

It was night when I woke up. The moon rode high in the sky, but she was partly obscured by cloud. I was back in my place to the left of the steering oar, in the stern of the ship. Once again, I was lying on sheepskin, my head — bound in a bandage — on a pillow, blankets covering me. I had a terrible headache. I tried to look round for my leather satchel — it must be here, since I’d been carrying it slung across my body when they took me — but I couldn’t see it.

My movement alerted the broad figure sitting beside me, visible as little more than a black shape. I caught a glint of light from his bald head, and a deep voice said, ‘Einar regrets that he hit you so hard.’

Einar. The giant’s name was Einar. ‘He certainly did,’ I muttered.

‘You should not have provoked him. He is very aware that the glory days are no more, and he does not sail a longship as did his ancestors.’

Yes, I thought, that’s precisely why I said what I did.

I wriggled round to try to get a better look at the man beside me. He was older than the other crewmen, with a wrinkled, weatherbeaten face that told of years out in the rough elements. ‘Who are you?’ I asked.

He made a sort of bow, as much as anyone can when they’re sitting down. ‘I am Olaf,’ he said. ‘I am, among other jobs, the ship’s cook.’

Cook. Food. Oh, I’d been hungry this morning, and had been hoping to be fed when I’d gone exploring up to the prow. Now, a whole day seemed to have gone by. My belly felt concave. ‘Please could you find me something to eat?’ I pleaded.

He leaned forward and put a spark to the wick of a lantern, lowering the flame so that the light was small. Then he waved a hand, and I saw a rough wooden platter loaded with bread, strips of dried meat, some sort of pie, and an apple. Beside it there was a stone jar.

Olaf handed me the jar. ‘Drink first,’ he said. ‘Not too fast, or it will come back again.’

The water in the flask was cold, and only tasted faintly of the inside of the jar. I took some slow sips. My head throbbed even more now that I was sitting up. ‘I always carry a satchel with me,’ I said. ‘Where is it?’

Olaf reached behind him. ‘Here.’

I took it from him. To hold something from home, something from my normal life that belonged to me, was incredibly comforting. I unfastened the satchel’s straps — tucked inside, where I had stowed it before I left Gurdyman’s house, was my beloved shawl — and felt around for the remedy I sought: a strong painkiller made up of white willow, feverfew, valerian and just a touch of the powerful medicines that we extract from monkshood and poppy; the ones that are deadly if you are too heavy-handed. I put the bitter powder on my tongue, washing it down with a mouthful of water.

Olaf was watching me with interest. ‘You travel well-prepared,’ he remarked. Peering into my satchel, he added with a smile, ‘You appear to anticipate many injuries and much sickness.’

‘I’m a healer,’ I said.

His eyes widened. ‘A healer.’ He nodded, as if something had just become clear. Then, before I had time to ask, he pushed the platter towards me and urged me to start eating.

‘Of course,’ I said through a mouthful, as the first sharp edge of my hunger eased off, ‘I should have known better than to risk such a provocative remark to a man as violent as Einar.’

Olaf looked at me, and in the dim light I made out a quizzical expression. ‘Violent?’

So that was the game we were going to play, I thought. The crew were going to pretend they had no idea what their captain had done; that he had broken his way into several dwellings and committed assaults and a couple of murders. ‘Violent,’ I repeated firmly. ‘Two dead, one of them my aunt, one my sister’s mother-in-law. I suppose,’ I added with heavy sarcasm, ‘he would say they got in the way. Perhaps they provoked him.’

Olaf opened his mouth as if to speak, muttered something and then stopped. ‘Do not judge him until you know,’ he said.

Oh, yes, there would no doubt be some justifying explanation, I reflected angrily. Einar would say that he’d been forced to act as he did, since finding whatever it was he sought was more important than any other considerations.

He still hadn’t got his hands on it, I remembered. And now he seemed to be pinning his hopes on persuading the truth about the object’s whereabouts out of me.

Which was going to be a problem, since I had no idea where or what it was.

I looked down at the last scraps of food on my plate. Suddenly I wasn’t hungry any more.

I had been lulled into the illusion that I was going to be all right with this extraordinary band of mariners. Despite the fact that their leader, this Einar, had assaulted and killed in his quest for the object he sought, despite the fact that they had jumped on me, bundled me into their boat and were now sailing away with me, whether I liked it or not, they had treated me kindly. I had been fooled by soft sheepskins, warm blankets and decent food. Yet only that morning Einar had hit me so hard that I’d been unconscious all day.

From some dark hiding place, fear crept out and swirled around me, enclosing me in its tightening coils.

I must not let them see I was afraid. Must not even allow this Olaf, posing as a cheery, friendly ship’s cook, to read my true mind.

I turned to him. Gathering my courage, praying that my voice would sound convincingly firm, I said coldly, ‘And now, Olaf, I would like you to tell me who you all are, what you want from me and my family, and where you are taking me.’

He looked at me, and I thought I saw compassion in his eyes. ‘You must not …’ he began. Then he stopped. For a few moments he sat in frowning, silent thought. Then he said, ‘There is a purpose. We-’

‘A purpose, yes, of course there is!’ I hissed furiously. ‘You’re going to try to beat out of me what you believe I know, which is the whereabouts of this thing that Einar’s been hunting for!’ A shaft of pure dread momentarily froze me, as images of that huge fist being raised against me again filled my mind. I clenched my jaws together against the wobbling. ‘I’ll tell you right now, it won’t do any good, because I have no idea what it is you’re after or where it is!’

‘Hush.’ He breathed out the word on a sort of soft whistle, like a man soothing a spooked horse. Suddenly I felt his hand take mine, giving it a reassuring squeeze. ‘You have every right to feel afraid and angry,’ he went on, his deep voice quiet and gentle, ‘and to demand to know where we are taking you.’ He paused, and for one wonderful instant I thought he was going to tell me.

I was wrong.

After a long moment, he said, with an unmistakable air of finality, ‘I am not permitted to explain. But-’ He broke off, and even from where I sat, I sensed the struggle between obeying his alarming captain’s orders and answering my questions. Then he said, ‘You are a clever young woman. Think about everything that has happened to you since we took you, and decide for yourself if we are-’

Again, he stopped. It was very strange: as if, from somewhere quite near at hand, someone — Einar? — was aware of the conversation and was somehow controlling how much Olaf was allowed to say to me.

Even stranger was that, on that beautiful ship flying over the waves in the silvery moonlight, I fully believed this to be possible. If the ship and her crew were indeed under the command of a man who had such power, then, I reasoned, the way in which I was most likely to guarantee my survival was to do exactly what I was told. And, if I was to avoid any more blows to the head, it would be wise to stop antagonizing the ship’s captain.

Olaf stood up, stooping to collect my platter and mug. ‘Sleep,’ he said. ‘We have a long way to go.’

I settled down, pulling the covers over me. The stiff, stinky cover had once again been spread over me, I noticed. The air was damp with spray, and I realized now that this topmost cover had been treated with animal fat — which accounted for the smell — for it was waterproof. My face was wet, but elsewhere I was fairly dry. There was no covered accommodation on board, unless you wanted to go down below the deck level into the hold. Better to be up here exposed to the elements than shoved in down there; I was vastly relieved that Einar hadn’t felt it necessary to imprison me. There was no need, of course; there was no way to escape except by throwing myself into the sea. Whatever the future held, I was not that desperate. Not yet …

I thought about what Olaf had said. He’d told me to think over all that had happened, and decide for myself. Did he mean what I hoped he did — what, indeed, had already occurred to me? That making me comfortable, feeding me and refraining from shutting me up in the hold were significant? Was I to deduce from this treatment that I was more of a guest than a prisoner?

But they’d snatched me out of my pleasant existence against my will! And I knew without any doubt that Einar wanted something that he believed my family possessed. I was still very afraid that he intended to force me to lead him to it.

Why, then, asked the voice of reason in my head, is he even now speeding away with you as fast as he can, leaving your home and your kin far behind?

It was a question I just couldn’t answer.

I closed my eyes, but sleep was a long way off. How long since I’d been taken? This was only my second night on board, so nobody I loved would be worrying about me yet. I thought of my mother, then my father, who had been so desperate to keep me safe that he’d escorted me back to Gurdyman’s. What would my poor father suffer, once he knew I was missing? But that thought was far too painful, so I arrested it. Perhaps I’d be back again before anyone knew I was gone. Unlikely as it seemed, it was something to cling on to.

I slid a hand inside my under gown and my fingers found the ring that Rollo gave me, which I wear on a leather thong round my neck. Rollo: my mysterious stranger, who drops into my life with no warning, and, equally unpredictably, out of it again. Rollo: as of last year, my lover. Rollo: part of me till I die. Shaped like a serpent devouring its own tail, the ring is made of solid gold. I don’t dare wear it on my hand because, apart from being a constant temptation to thieves, it looks like a very magical object. Rollo told me it belonged to his grandmother, and she was a witch. I thought he might have been joking, because so far the ring had shown not the least sign of magical power.

Now, grasping it in my hand, it comforted me simply because Rollo had given it to me. He had carried it with him for many years and through many dangers, this heirloom of his bloodline, and the fact that he’d wanted me to have it filled my heart with joy. I had no idea where he was, or when I would see him again. I only knew that, as long as we both lived, our lives were entwined and our fates lay together. Sooner or later, he would find me. Or, perhaps, I thought as the ship sped me along to an unknown future, I would find him …

I was drowsy now. In that half-state between waking and sleeping, small fragments of dreams flitted through my mind. I saw the village, and there was Edild, speaking softly to Hrype. As if it had been an extension of that vision, all at once I sensed a warm, furry body snuggling next to me. My spirit animal had come to comfort me and, knowing Fox, he would stay close all the time I needed him. Yes, he was probably part of my dream, but I didn’t care.

The voyage went on, and I counted three more nights. There was nothing much for me to do, although I did help Olaf with some of his more straightforward tasks, such as doling out the food and scrubbing the wooden platters with sea water after the crew had eaten. As we worked together, he began to instruct me in that strangely familiar language he and his crewmen spoke, and I realized that I knew quite a lot of it already. There have always been traders who visit the fens, and I’d come across many more since spending so much of my life in Cambridge; unwittingly, I must have been absorbing this alien tongue.

I think Olaf saw that time was hanging heavily for me, and took pity on me. When there was something for my hands or my mind to do, it was easier not to feel anxious and scared.

I studied Malice-striker and her crew. The ship was indeed a living thing, just as I had first suspected, and my initial rush of love for her did not diminish. She was some twenty paces long, perhaps five paces across at her widest, although she tapered gracefully fore and aft. It was as if whoever had built her kept in his mind and his heart a memory of her predecessor, that long, lean hound of a ship that I had seen in my dream vision. Her hull was strengthened by a series of fourteen ribs, with extra ones at the prow, stern and just before the mast. The cargo hold yawned in the gap between the fore and aft decks. As far as I could see, other than ballast there was nothing down there except for the crew’s supplies and their small, well-wrapped bundles of personal belongings. Everyone slept as I did, up on deck in the meagre shelter afforded by the ship’s high sides.

The crew totalled eight: five more in addition to Einar, Olaf and the tattooed man with the bronze beard whose name was Thorben. Nobody, apart from Olaf, paid much attention to me. They all looked much the same to my eyes, being to a man big, brawny and with a lot of light-coloured hair, blond-ish or auburn-ish. In age, they ranged from old Olaf down to a white-fair lad who was probably younger than me. Einar seemed to be making a particular effort to ignore me. I hoped it was because he felt bad about having hit me. I feared it was because he did not want to risk getting to know someone he was going to have to interrogate once we reached wherever it was we were going.

There was an awful day, perhaps halfway through the journey, when land was close at hand to our left (I’d learned from Olaf to refer to that as port). The wind was howling, the seas were huge, and half the crew, including me, were set to baling out the vast quantities of water flooding into the ship. Everything was soaking wet, and, on that exposed deck, there was nowhere to shelter.

I couldn’t have been the only person on board to be frightened, and, indeed, I caught more than one of the crew muttering prayers and casting hopeful eyes upwards towards the realms of the gods and, more frequently, forward to that magnificent dragon at the prow. They, however, had the advantage of experience. Olaf — kindly Olaf — put it into words, taking a precious moment’s rest from working hard enough for three men to take my hand and say, ‘Einar is a skilled mariner, and this is but a small storm. Together, he and Malice-striker will bring us through.’

He was right. The storm blew itself out, the furious black clouds melted away and the destructive waves slowly flattened. The wind blew powerfully from behind us and to our left, constantly and steadily filling the sail. Looking back, I saw what I thought was a faint black smudge. If it was the last tip of land, then already we had left it far behind.

More days passed. I felt anxious all the time, desperate to know where we were going. If only I’d learned more from Gurdyman and made more study of his map, I might have had some idea. We had sailed north — that I knew — and now, to judge by the sun’s position, I guessed we had turned north-west. If there was anything out there except sea, then I had never heard of it. I took a glance at the food and water supplies when I thought nobody was looking, and, at a rough estimate, I calculated we had enough for a few more days. We were living on dried fish and meat, both salty and strong, neither very appetizing. The fresh water had run out, and now the choice was weak beer or sour milk. It occurred to me that, had it not been for my presence on board and the possibility that I’d try to run away, the crew would surely have made landfall while they still could to take on fresh supplies. That, no doubt, would be what they usually did.

We sailed on for four more days. Early in the morning of the fifth day, the young crewman on watch in the prow called out something in a voice made high by excitement. All the others took up the cry, yelling the same word repeatedly, jumping around in a sort of heavy-footed dance, slapping each other on the back and giving each other the sort of hugs that could crack ribs. It was Olaf who thought to explain to me.

‘Land is in sight!’ he said, and I thought I saw the suspicion of tears in his eyes. He pointed, and, following his extended arm, I could make out a vague, dark hump on the horizon.

He muttered something, but softly; it sounded almost like an incantation. It would not have surprised me if it was, because what I thought he said was, ‘The Land of the Silver Dragon.’