The Great Pagan Army Read online

Heming clunked his goblet onto the table. He had drunk too much again. He drank in despair and he drank to dull the throb of his painful foot. Vaguely, he wondered why Bjorn hadn’t summoned him as he had the others. Did Bjorn think him a cripple? Was this a sign? Heming glowered. And in his glower he told himself that the cheater carried Ivar Hammerhand’s cup. Heming shook his head, frowning. The cheater? Bjorn was a cheater? Heming nodded slowly. Bjorn hadn’t fought his father fairly. Bjorn had not won the cup man-to-man. He had attacked Ivar Hammerhand by surprise. Bjorn had never given Ivar a fair chance.

  Bjorn now planted himself before the Sea King. The cut on Bjorn’s cheek had turned an angry red as it seeped a clear liquid. It made the eyelid above the cut flicker and twitch more than ordinary.

  “I told you to wait outside,” Sigfred said.

  Bjorn set the golden cup of Attila on the end of the table. He set it down loudly.

  “He is a cheater and a thief,” said Valgard. “No man can trust him, not even his king.”

  Bjorn sneered at Valgard. With a fist, Bjorn thumped himself on the chest. “I am the luck of the Great Army.”

  Valgard spat at the floor.

  Bjorn laid a hand over the cup. “This is the talisman of victory. Once it belonged to Attila the Hun. He almost conquered the world. Now it is mine, and through me, the magic of victory and the power of Odin flows into the Great Army.”

  “What victory?” Valgard asked.

  “Paris,” Bjorn said.

  “We only have half of Paris,” Valgard said.

  “Because we must shed more blood,” Bjorn said. “The cup is empty and it needs blood.”

  “We’ll give it your blood,” Valgard said.

  Bjorn scowled. He didn’t like that. His fierce gaze swept the assembled warriors. “Who here is man enough to spill my blood?” When no one spoke up, Bjorn faced Valgard. “Will you attack me in a mob as they did yesterday? Will you try to slay the warrior who has given you half of Paris? Will you anger Odin and throw away the army’s luck?”

  “Heming has the power of Odin,” Sigfred said. “It was Heming’s dream that gave us the Merchant Quarter.”

  Bjorn turned his gaze onto Heming.

  Heming noticed that Bjorn’s dark eyes no longer seemed like a bear’s. They seemed flat and cold like snake eyes.

  “Bah,” Bjorn said. “Heming is a cripple. Cripples have no luck.”

  “Luck?” Heming said, slurring his words. “Do you think cheating brings you luck?”

  Bjorn’s gaze tightened, and that pulled at the poorly scabbed cut on his cheek. That eye twitched. “Who calls me a cheater? Do you, Heming?”

  “Yes,” slurred Heming. “You are a cheater. You slew Ivar Hammerhand through cunning and surprise. You won the cup of Attila by cheating. Odin doesn’t love you.”

  Warriors began to murmur among themselves. Valgard Skull-splitter studied Heming. The Finn wizard stepped out of the shadows and whispered into Sigfred’s ear. The Sea King stroked his great black beard.

  “I will not be mocked by a cripple,” Bjorn said.

  Heming thrust himself to his feet. His wounded foot throbbed, but he was drunk enough so it didn’t matter.

  “I am no cripple,” Heming said.

  “You lay in the skalli every day like a sick hound,” Bjorn said.

  “You have never healed from a wound?” asked Valgard.

  “Is he still a warrior?” Bjorn sneered.

  Heming touched his Valkyrie amulet. He pressed his wounded foot against the floor. It throbbed, but the pain was bearable.

  Sneering, Bjorn turned away.

  “I am a warrior,” Heming said.

  Bjorn whipped back to face him.

  “I am a warrior who says you cheated,” Heming said.

  Bjorn’s lips curled.

  “I agree with Heming!” Valgard shouted.

  “So do I?” said one of Valgard’s men.

  Bjorn picked up the cup of Attila. “I say that whoever calls me a cheater must face me man-to-man. I will make him swallow his words, swallow his teeth and swallow my sword.”

  Heming sat down on the bench.

  Bjorn laughed. It was a low and ugly sound. “Men say Odin spoke through Ivarsson? That is not so. Heming has the courage of a magic-maker, which is say, none at all. Look how he wilts at my challenge. Do you think Odin truly speaks to him?” Bjorn shook his head. “I will sacrifice Heming’s slut to Odin. I will place her beating heart in the cup. Then I will pay Valgard wergild for his cousin’s blinding. I am Odin’s man and the rage of Odin came upon me yesterday. Odin will pay wergild by giving us the city.”

  As Bjorn spoke, Heming felt under the bench until his fingers curled around the haft of his she-troll. He stood up, lifting his axe above his head. He shouted, “I call Bjorn a cheater, and I accept his challenge. Yes. Let us fight. It is time for me to keep my word to my father.” He spoke at Bjorn. “Know, Cheater, that I swore to Odin, to Thor and by the cup of Attila to slay my father’s killer. That day had come. You are doomed to die.”

  Warriors looked to Sigfred. The Sea King nodded as he shrewdly studied Heming. “Let us see who Odin’s man is.”

  The Finn wizard stepped up and raised his hands, his voice shrill. “Surely Odin will give his chosen berserk the way into the Cite as Bjorn has said.”

  “So be it,” Bjorn said.

  ***

  Outside, Bjorn tore the great fur cloak from him, pitching it to a waiting berserk. With the low sliding sound of metal, he drew his sword, a fine blade of Rhineland-forged steel. It glittered in the afternoon sunlight. Bjorn wore his matted fur tunic, leaving his huge arms bare. Gold rings circled his biceps. He had won each ring through a valorous act. Bjorn smiled. It was a vicious thing. He was huge, troll-blooded, a throwback to primeval days. He was the deadliest warrior of the Great Army, the most feared. His strength was legendary. His wrath had become a byword. No man could kill him. That was well known. He was Odin’s man. He owned the charmed cup of Attila.

  Bjorn swished the sword through the air. He made savage, growling sounds.

  Hundreds of Danes circled the pair. Warriors stood hushed, watching. Few liked Bjorn. Many hated and loathed him, although they would never say that to his face.

  Heming tore away his tunic. He was lean, whip-corded, with his muscles writhing like ropes across his torso. There was no fat upon him. He was tall, had wide shoulders and lean hips. He looked like a starved wolf, and he limped. His eyes were glassy and warriors understood that he was drunk. Heming curled his fingers around the haft of his she-troll, yanking the axe-head out of the dirt where he had lodged it. Heming’s hair was tangled across his eyes. His sunken cheeks… there was something despairingly wild about the young berserk. He seemed like a creature of the half-world, one doomed and unlucky. Yet this warrior had seen dreams given by Odin. The dreams, or nightmares, had obviously cost him much of his humanity.

  Bjorn gnashed his teeth and his face turned crimson. “Come and die, Ivarsson.”

  Danes with shields nervously shifted their feet. They stood around the two. It would be their task to keep Bjorn from killing any others in his madness. Heming… could such a starved wolf slay the great bear of Odin that was Bjorn?

  Heming neither gnashed his teeth nor rolled his eyes. He peered at Bjorn with glassy stare. The youth seemed wooden, almost beyond his body. He swayed ever so gently and his lips moved as if whispering to unseen ghosts.

  Bjorn gripped his sword so his knuckles whitened. He hacked the air again. Froth bubbled from his lips. His dark eyes gleamed with madness and the veins on his neck stood up. Then he roared. It raised many nape hairs on those who watched. Bjorn shuffled toward Heming like a great bear. His muscles swelled and a terrible laugh bubbled from the depths of his being.

  Heming yet swayed, with his lips muttering their unheard litany. The glassiness of his eyes deepened, almost as if he received a vision. The youth seemed beyond the fight, somewhere else in his mind or perhaps communing with the gods.


  It seemed to the hundreds of Vikings that Heming was about to die a sacrificial death, that he would be slaughtered where he stood. Perhaps the youth had reasoned that in this way he would cheat Bjorn. Bjorn shuffled faster. If he had qualms about killing a motionless man, he didn’t show it. Bjorn’s mouth curved. He raised his sword to strike.

  “Move, Heming!” shouted Valgard.

  “Don’t let him kill you!” bellowed someone else.

  Heming fingers tightened, but that was almost imperceptible.

  The Finn wizard whispered to the Sea King, “He is a cripple and wants to die with a weapon in his hands so he may enter Valhalla. We made a mistake.”

  Sigfred the Sea King stroked his great black beard.

  Heming gave the faintest of smiles, a slight upward twitch of his lips.

  “We shall see,” muttered the Sea King.

  Other Vikings bellowed at Heming to watch out.

  Bjorn’s dark eyes seemed like little pin dots. He roared as he rushed Heming, the Rhineland-forged sword a blur as it struck.

  Only Heming no longer swayed gently. He leaped like a wolf. It was smooth, fast, with nothing of the drunkard about it. He leaped, spun and his she-troll flashed in a deadly arc. The iron edge clanged against the golden armband of Bjorn’s left bicep. It sheared through and bit flesh. Bjorn howled. For all his bulk, he was fast like an attacking bear. He jerked away and chopped down with his sword. Sparks flew as it clanged against Heming’s axe-head. The heavy sword drove the axe down. Bjorn let go of his sword then. He stepped in as he grabbed at the lean berserk. Heming also let go of his weapon. Neither sword no long axe would do any good at wrestling range. Both weapons were heavy and badly out of position.

  Vikings groaned. Everyone knew that once Bjorn got his hands on Heming that the fight would quickly end.

  Heming let go of the axe haft and drove the heel of his hands up against Bjorn’s jaw. Heming struck a vicious blow, and it would have snapped the neck of a lesser warrior. Bjorn’s neck muscles were too thick for that, however. Bjorn grunted. His head tilted back, and Heming wriggled free therefore as Bjorn’s fingers touched his flesh.

  Bjorn panted in surprise for only a moment. A fearsome grin twitched across his frothing lips. He bent down, and his thick fingers wrapped around the hilt of his sword. Heming also bent down. His fingers dug into the earth. As Bjorn stood, Heming flung dirt into the berserk’s eyes. Then Heming dove. His outstretched fingers grasped the haft of his axe. He tucked, hit the ground and rolled a complete summersault, spinning around as he regained his feet. It was a marvelous thing, and it put him far enough away from Bjorn so Heming could freely swing his axe.

  Vikings roared approval.

  Bjorn bellowed rage. He slashed air as he clawed his eyes and shook his head.

  Heming’s bad foot throbbed. It hurt. But he could fight. He could still move nimbly.

  “Behind you, Bjorn!” a warrior shouted.

  Bjorn turned.

  Heming hewed, driving his she-troll with the perfect twist of his hips and the full force of his shoulders. He did not aim for the more certain body blow. He knew how dangerous Bjorn was. If the axe lodged in ribs, Bjorn could survive and cut him down with the sword. Heming aimed at Bjorn’s head. The axe flashed and the razor-sharp, iron edge smashed against Bjorn’s left ear. It clove halfway into the skull, wedging in as if a woodsman chopped into an oak tree. Bjorn pitched sideways. The motion tore the axe out of Heming’s grasp.

  It didn’t matter. The captain of the Twelve, the owner of the golden cup of Attila, Bjorn the Bear, pitched onto the cold earth, dead.

  It took a half beat before the Vikings realized what had happened. Then they began to roar and cheer. Heming had done the impossible. He had killed the bear of Odin. He had slain Bjorn. Heming had become the new champion, and he’d fulfilled the vow to his father.

  56.

  Weeks on the road told harder on Peter. Dust coated his black robe. His face became gaunt and he hunched his shoulders. Yet there was a subtler change in his bearing. His eyes didn’t dart quite as they used to, and his step, although slower than before, had become surer. Before there had lingered about him something of the fox, the keen swivel of his head and with calculation in his eyes. That had been replaced with the feeling of a hound that sniffs a scent, determined to follow the scent to its source.

  The hard travel hadn’t changed Lupus much. The only difference was that he kept his knife out in the open, thrust through his rope-belt for easy use. He had kept his weight and found new garments. Lupus had decided to return north with Peter because he said that had grown weary of Rome and Lombardy and wanted to see what had happened in West Frankland. He was curious.

  Each wayfarer held a rope to one of the mules, trudging up a dirt path, with vineyards on either side of them. Clouds gently moved through the sky, occasionally hiding the sun. It was the middle of May and they neared the Loire River. Rumors had reached them that Paris yet stood, although the Merchant Quarter had fallen to the Northmen. It was just a matter of time before the rest of the city fell.

  Peter wheezed, and he tugged the coarse rope. His mule clopped along, hanging its head, carrying the great treasure of the pilgrimage: the bones of Saint Simplicius. Peter felt the steep climb in his thighs, but he pushed on harder than Lupus. He had to get back to Paris and rescue Willelda before the city fell. At night, he clutched the bones and whispered prayers, asking for insight on how to slip past the Danes and how to find Willelda.

  Peter reached the summit first, and he stopped, staring down at Tours far below. It was a city along the Lorie River. It had stout walls and held the great shrine of Saint Martin of Tours. It was also the city of Duke Hugh of Neustria. Men called the Duke ‘the Protector of West Frankland’, the greatest and most important noble of the kingdom. Once, Odo’s father, Robert the Strong, had been the Protector, until Vikings had slain him and destroyed his ducal host. Shortly thereafter Hugh had filled the vacated position and had helped raise Odo and his brother.

  Lupus joined Peter on the summit, the green valley of the Loire spread out before them. Serfs toiled in the fields far below and serfs toiled on the vines on the slopes. The Lotharingian jutted his chin at the knight heading toward them along the winding road.

  The knight wore mail and rode a great warhorse. He seemed an older man, with a huge, flaring moustache. Behind him followed several youths on palfreys. Those were squires, no doubt. The hooves clopped along the road. Unlike their mules, each of the horses was iron-shoed.

  In time, the knight—he was indeed older—reined to halt before them, glowering down from the height of his stallion. The great horse snorted, eyeing the mules as if he wished to bite them. The mules wisely kept Peter and Lupus between themselves and the warhorse.

  “Who are you?” the knight said, speaking roughly.

  “I’m Peter the Monk, milord. This is Lupus, who aids me in my pilgrimage. We went to Rome for a relic and now return to Paris.”

  “Paris?” the knight said, taken aback. “Don’t you know it’s under siege?”

  “We know, milord,” Peter said.

  “The Great Pagan Army squats around it,” the knight said. “No one can get into Paris with them there.”

  “I can, milord,” Peter said.

  Lupus glanced sharply at Peter and then he looked up at the knight.

  The knight stroked his moustache, deep lines appearing in his forehead. “You said you have a relic?”

  “I carry the bones of Saint Simplicius,” Peter said.

  “And you’re simple in the head if you think you can get into Paris,” the knight said.

  The youths on the palfreys laughed.

  Peter dipped his head. “Danes burned my abbey, milord. They captured my abbot and me. Before I escaped, my abbot laid a holy charge on me.”

  “That of gaining your relic?” the knight asked.

  “And rebuilding Aliquis Abbey,” Peter said.

  “There’ll be no rebuilding with
the Danes there,” the knight said.

  “The Lord will drive them off,” Peter said.

  The knight scowled, the deep lines once again appearing in his forehead. “Have you seen a vision of this?”

  “I have not, milord.”

  “Then how can you know what the Lord will or will not do?”

  “Saint Simplicius was a holy man, milord. I have his bones. He will now beseech heaven for us.”

  “We have many relics,” the knight said. “Yet none have driven the Danes from us.”

  Peter had acquired something more than holy bones in Rome. He now had the ability to smile serenely like a holy man. He had seen it on the faces of many of the pilgrims. More importantly, on the night of acquiring the bones he had come to believe in the efficiency of relics.

  “The Northmen burned my abbey, milord. My dying abbot gave me a holy charge. I have gone to Rome and returned with a new relic to help me in my task. The bones are a sign from God, milord. That He means to see the Northmen driven away so that I may rebuild the abbey. If that were not so, why have two men such as Lupus and I succeeded? We are not great men. We are quite ordinary.” Peter’s smile grew. “I think, too, milord, that God wishes to save the serfs, their wives and daughters.”

  “What about their sons?” the knight asked.

  “And save the sons, too, of course,” Peter added with a blush. He had been thinking about Willelda.

  The knight grunted as he eyed Peter. “Relics are well and good, monk. But it takes hard fighting to chase off Northmen. Serfs can’t fight. Churchmen can’t. It’s the knights that will do the fighting, and the dying. What does God say about that, eh? Will he save the knights of Frankland from death?”

  “As to that, I can’t say,” Peter said.

  The knight glowered.

  Peter lost some of his smooth serenity. The manner of a fox in the weeds returned. “Saint Simplicius was a man of the people, milord. In the arena, soldiers beat him to death with leaden whips. Simplicius was not a fighting man. Yet Count Odo wrote me a letter and gave me the coins that allowed the pilgrimage. He sent us to Rome. Perhaps God allowed us success to show that He favors Count Odo.”