The mead flowed as the meal progressed, the voices of Bloodsworn and drengrs rising as sagas were told and great deeds were bragged about. A noise drew Varg’s eyes, Einar arm-wrestling three of Logur’s drengrs at the same time. Half-Troll laughed as he slammed their arms into a trencher of vegetables, and other warriors roared their approval.
Thralls flitted among the tables, clearing empty trenchers, refilling jugs and horns and bowls, Varg looking at them with an uncomfortable feeling in his gut. It was not so long ago that he had been one of them. Varg knew that where he was sitting now was the least honoured position in the hall, furthest away from the jarl, but just to be sitting at the table was almost incomprehensible to him, an honour he had never expected or thought possible. Saved by the Bloodsworn, training with them in the weapons court, eating and drinking at a jarl’s table because he was one of them. It was more intoxicating than the mead in his drinking horn and belly. He felt laughter bubbling in his throat at the absurdity of it all, but he also felt a seed of pride swell his chest.
Fr?ya would be amazed to see this, and proud.
Another feeling swelled in his chest, something that was almost as incomprehensible to him as his freedom. He felt a glimmer of joy.
And with that came a flush of guilt, to be enjoying himself when Fr?ya lay cold in the ground.
There was something else. Something that Torvik had said squirmed through his thought-cage like a maggot in rotting meat.
All must prove themselves first.
He sucked in a deep breath, frowning.
A banging: Jarl Logur was thumping on a table.
“A fine feast,” he said, as silence settled, “and skál to you all.” He raised his drinking horn to them and drank deeply.
“SKáL,” voices cried, echoing from the rafters, as all reached for mead horns, Varg raising his own horn and drinking.
“But what is a feast without a saga-tale to stir our blood, eh?” Logur said, to more shouting and table-thumping. Logur grinned, mead dripping from his beard, and gestured to a figure standing in the shadows of a pillar. A man stepped out, holding a seven-stringed lyre crooked in one arm. Dark-haired and handsome, he wore a green tunic of wool, knotwork embroidered around the neck and hem, and silver arm rings glowing red in the torchlight.
A deep silence settled as he stepped up on to the dais.
“Galinn, the Skáld of Liga,” Jarl Logur said, “finest skáld in all the world.”
“My thanks, Jarl Logur, most generous of lords beneath the sun and moon,” Galinn said.
“Who am I to argue with famed Galinn?” Logur said with a smile, warriors chuckling. “And it is true, with half a loaf and a tilted bowl I have made me many a friend,” he added as he sat back down.
Galinn stood and looked out over the tables, then put his fingers to his lyre. Its music was sweet and melancholy, bringing to Varg’s mind the sound of water flowing, of wings beating, and then Galinn began to speak.
The Vackna rang loud,
Waking-horn bold and blaring,
In the hills ringing as red sun was rising,
Filling all Vigrie,
This Battle-Plain,
This land of ash,
This land of ruin.
Gods stirred from slumber deep,
Fell Snaka, the slitherer shed his skin, that slayer of souls.
Wolf-waking, hard-howling Ulfrir, the breaker of chains ran roaring,
Racing to the Guefalla,
The gods-fall.
Orna, eagle-winged came shrieking,
wings beating,
talons rending,
beak biting, flesh tearing.
Deep-cunning dragon,
Lik-Rifa,
Corpse-tearer from Dark-of-Moon Hills, tail lashing as she swept low.
Berser raging, jaws frothing, claws ripping.
Gods in their war glory, Brave Svin, mischievous Tosk, deceitful Rotta,
Gods and kin, their warriors willing,
Blood-tainted offspring, waging their war,
all came to the Battle-Plain.
Death was dealt,
Red ran the rivers,
Land laden with slaughter’s reek.
There they fought,
There they fell,
Berser pierced, Orna torn, Ulfrir slain.
Cunning Lik-Rifa laid low, chained in chamber deep,
Beneath boughs of Oskutree, the great Ash Tree.
And Snaka fell, serpent ruin, venom burning, land-tearing, mountain breaking,
cracked the slopes of Mount Eldrafell.
Frost and fire,
Flame and snow,
Vaesen clambered from the pit,
And the world ended…
And was born anew…
A silence settled, all staring at the skáld, though, if they were like Varg, all were lost on the Battle-Plain, seeing the war-hosts rage and Snaka’s fall as if they were standing there in its midst.