Nikulaus and Gaute accompanied Ivar south to have a look at the widow, but Kristin wanted to stay home with Bj?rgulf. When her sons returned, Naakkve could tell his mother that Ivar was now betrothed to Signe Gamalsdatter. The wedding would be celebrated at Rognheim in the autumn.
Not long after his arrival back home Naakkve came to see his mother one evening as she sat sewing in the weaving room. He barred the door. Then he said that now that Gaute was twenty years old and Ivar would also come of age by marrying, he and Bj?rgulf intended to journey north in the fall and ask to be accepted as novices at the monastery. Kristin said little; they spoke mainly about how they would arrange those things that her two oldest sons would want to take with them from their inheritance.
But a few days later men came to J?rundgaard with an invitation to a betrothal banquet: Aasmund of Skjenne was going to celebrate the betrothal of his daughter Tordis to a good farmer’s son from Dovre.
That evening Naakkve came again to see his mother in the weaving room, and once again he barred the door behind him. He sat on the edge of the hearth, poking a twig into the embers. Kristin had lit a small fire since the nights were cold that summer.
“Nothing but feasts and carousing, my mother,” he said with a little laugh. “The betrothal banquet at Rognheim and the celebration at Skjenne and then Ivar’s wedding. When Tordis rides in her wedding procession, I doubt I’ll be riding along; by that time I will have donned cloister garb.”
Kristin didn’t reply at once. But then, without looking up from her sewing—she was making a banquet tunic for Ivar—she said, “Many probably thought it would be a great sorrow for Tordis Gunnarsdatter if you became a monk.”
“I once thought so myself,” replied Naakkve.
Kristin let her sewing sink to her lap. She looked at her son; his face was impassive and calm. And he was so handsome. His dark hair brushed back from his white forehead, curling softly behind his ears and along the slender, tan stalk of his neck. His features were more regular than his father’s; his face was broader and more solid, his nose not as big, and his mouth not as small. His clear blue eyes were lovely beneath the straight black brows. And yet he didn’t seem as handsome as Erlend had been. It was his father’s animal-like softness and languid charm, his air of inextinguishable youth that Naakkve did not possess.
Kristin picked up her work again, but she didn’t go back to sewing. After a moment, as she looked down and tucked in a hem of the cloth with her needle, she said, “Do you realize, Naakkve, that I haven’t voiced a single word of objection to your godly plans? I wouldn’t dare do so. But you’re young, and you know quite well—being more learned than I am—that it is written somewhere that it ill suits a man to turn around and look over his shoulder once he has set his hand to the plow.”
Not a muscle moved in her son’s face.
“I know that you’ve had these thoughts in mind for a long time,” continued his mother. “Ever since you were children. But back then you didn’t understand what you would be giving up. Now that you’ve reached the age of a man . . . Don’t you think it would be advisable if you waited a while longer to see if you have the calling? You were born to take over this estate and become the head of your lineage.”
“You dare to advise me now?” Naakkve took several deep breaths. He stood up. All of a sudden he slapped his hand to his breast and tore open his tunic and shirt so his mother could see his naked chest where his birthmark, the five little blood-red, fiery specks, shone amid the black hair.
“I suppose you thought I was too young to understand what you were sighing about with moans and tears whenever you kissed me here, back when I was a little lad. I may not have understood, but I could never forget the words you spoke.
“Mother, Mother . . . Have you forgotten that Father died the most wretched of deaths, unconfessed and unanointed? And you dare to dissuade us!
“I think Bj?rgulf and I know what we’re turning away from. It doesn’t seem to me such a great sacrifice to give up this estate and marriage—or the kind of peace and happiness that you and Father had together during all the years I can remember.”
Kristin put down her sewing. All that she and Erlend had lived through, both bad and good . . . A wealth of memories washed over her. This child understood so little what he was renouncing. With all his youthful fights, bold exploits, careless dealings, and games of love—he was no more than an innocent child.
Naakkve saw the tears well up in his mother’s eyes; he shouted, “Quid mihi et tibi est, mulier.”2 Kristin cringed, but her son spoke with violent agitation. “God did not say those words because he felt scorn for his mother. But he chastised her, that pure pearl without blemish or flaw, when she tried to counsel him on how to use the power that he had been given by his Father in Heaven and not by his mother’s flesh. Mother, you must not advise me about this; do not venture to do so.”