Brandewyne, Rebecca (7 page)

Ivar
was still locked in mortal combat with the giant wolf, twisting and turning to
avoid its great, snapping jaws and terrible, bared fangs. Another man would
have been dead by now, Wulfgar thought. But Ivar had the strength of two men
and was gifted, besides, with the uncanny ability to contort his body in that
unnatural fashion— as though he had no bones. He had his hands firmly about the
wolf's throat to hold the creature at bay, and he and the wolf thrashed and
tumbled across the ground as they grappled desperately for supremacy, a blur of
grey fur and brown leather, stained with blood— although whether this was from
wounds of their own or from the roe deer killed earlier, Wulfgar could not
tell. The snow was red with the blood that had poured from the injuries and the
opened throats of the roe deer, and the battle of Ivar and the wolf had brought
them near to one of the slain does that lay silent and still upon the earth, large,
liquid brown
eyes glassed over now, limbs already stiffening in the cold.

It
seemed forever before at last gathering their wits, Ubbi and Halfdan raised
their bows and notched their arrows to take aim at the wolf, only to have their
weapons abruptly and savagely struck from their hands by their father, who
swore at them wrathfully.

"By
the God of the Runes and Valhöll!" Ragnar roared as he cuffed his sons
again roughly, nearly knocking them down; and Wulfgar thought he had never seen
his father so angry— or so afraid. "You fools! 'Tis plain you did not
drink from Ymir's well of wisdom and wit at Jötunheim ere you were birthed,
else you'd have more of both, you stupid whelps of a mongrel bitch! Why, you
cannot tell man from beast in that fracas! Do you want to slay Ivar by
mistake?"

"Nay,
but neither are we of a mind to stand idly by while a crazed wolf mauls him to
death, Father!" Halfdan, younger and bolder than Ubbi, shot back, his
breath coming harsh with ire at Ragnar for shaming him before the hunting
party, and with fear for Ivar.

"So
you say!" Ragnar growled, his clear blue eyes blazing like sunlight
reflecting off ice. "But 'tis more like you cared not if your arrow
pierced him, Halfdan, for then would his death set Ubbi on my throne— and you
be one step
closer to it, by Odinn!"

"Nay,
Father!" Halfdan protested. "That was not the way of it—"

But
Ragnar, in his upset, did not want to hear Halfdan's indignant words; and with
his fist, he backhanded Halfdan across the mouth before roughly shoving him
aside; then, breathing hard, he strode toward Ivar and the wolf, spear in hand,
poised to strike. Now, of all Ragnar's sons, Ivar was not only his heir, but
also his best beloved, and this must have been foremost in his mind, Wulfgar
thought; for Ragnar's hand trembled ever so slightly as he watched for his
chance to intervene in the deadly struggle, and when he finally did thrust his
spear downward, he missed the wolf's side and instead drove it so savagely into
the creature's haunch that the shaft broke in two. Still, the wound did not
prove fatal. If anything, it only incited the wolf to further violence; for
after making a spine-chilling sound that was neither snarl nor squeal, the
creature appeared, incredibly, to gain strength and redoubled its assault with
a vigor, its jaws suddenly clamping viciously about Ivar's sword hand and
wrist. There was an audible snapping and grinding of bone, and a fearsome cry
issued from Ivar's white lips as he tried but failed to wrench free. The
hunting party gave a collective gasp, for
a man so maimed he could not wield a
weapon was better off dead, and it seemed to them all that the wolf would tear
Ivar's hand clean off his wrist.

That
was when Wulfgar decided his destiny, as Yelkei had warned he would that day;
for surely, he thought afterward, it was not ill chance alone, but fate, the
gods' decree that Ivar's battle with the wolf should have brought the two of
them so close to him, and at a time when the creature was on top, so that for a
moment, he had an unobstructed swing at it. If he had remembered Yelkei's words
in time, Wulfgar might have hesitated and the opportunity been lost. But he did
not think of Yelkei's warning; he had no clear thought in his mind at all,
really, except that of saving Ivar's life. Shouting a mighty cry as he yanked
his battle-ax from its leather scabbard at his back, Wulfgar whirled the weapon
about his head, then brought it down hard and true. The song Blood-Drinker sang
was a song of death as it bit deep into the wolf's neck, spraying blood, and
killing the creature almost instantly. As though in anger and protest and
certainly pain at its demise, the wolf growled low and fierce in its throat, an
anguished snarl; its back spasmed grotesquely. Then, finally, as Wulfgar jerked
his blade free, the creature toppled to one side
and lay still, its jaws still
locked about Ivar's wrist.

Only
the hard rasp of Ivar's breath broke the silence then; even the dogs were
quiet, as though sensing the import of the moment. All eyes were locked on
Wulfgar and the battle-ax he held in his hands, its blade slowly dripping blood
onto the soaked earth; and of a sudden, regaining his senses, he realized with
dismay that in the space of his weapon's descent, he had brought upon himself
what he had all his life sought to avoid: the attention of the
jarlar
and of Ragnar,
their king.

"By
the Norns!" Björn Ironside crowed in the hush. A powerful
jarl,
his fame and
exploits rivaled those of Ragnar himself, so there was a certain wariness and
enmity between the two men, with neither being loath to stick an oar into the
other's water. "That was a brave blow for one who is no warrior— and a
true strike against what was surely no ordinary wolf, but a mighty were-wolf,
Loki's get, loosed from the very gates of Hel! Well done, Wulfgar
Bloodaxe!"

At
the bestowing of this title, the rest of the
jarlar
and
thegns
roared their
approval. But although Wulfgar's heart soared with pride and joy at the sound,
his eyes were watchful; for neither Ragnar nor his sons joined in the cry, and
Wulfgar knew that his
deed had not won him their love, that they would rather have seen Ivar dead in
his grave than alive and beholden to an upstart bastard with a claim, however
slight and distant, to Ragnar's kingdom and throne.

"How
came you by that battle-ax, Wulfgar?" Ragnar asked softly when the
shouting had died down. The words were spoken pleasantly enough, but Wulfgar
was not deceived by their tone. A flame of fury burned deep in Ragnar's eyes,
and there was a flicker, too, of what, in another man, Wulfgar would have
called fear. " 'Tis the weapon of a
thegn
and not that of a lowly
bóndi.
Yet you had it
near to hand and were skilled in its use. 'Twould seem your free moments have
been spent aping your betters rather than in studying how best to serve your
masters."

"With
all due respect, lord, my free moments are my own." Wulfgar's reply, while
courteous, was not humble, for he had naught to lose now by any boldness, he
thought. If they had not been before, his father and half brothers had this day
become his bitterest foes, and caviling would not lessen their hate or soften
their hearts toward him; indeed, it would earn only their amusement and
contempt for his weakness. "The battle-ax I made with my own two hands,
lord, and
taught myself to wield. I named it Blood-Drinker, although it has tasted only
that of animals and not that of the Northland's enemies, for which it
thirsts."

"Spoken
like a true
Víkingr!"
Hasting
observed stoutly before Ragnar could answer. As close as brothers were Björn
Ironside and Hasting, each quick to support and to defend the other. "Why,
a
jarl
could
do a lot worse than to call you his man, Wulfgar Bloodaxe, I am thinking. At
the midspring
blót,
when
we make offering to the goddess of spring, Eostre, you must count yourself
among those who set their right hands to the sword hilt of a
jarl,
thus pledging
him loyalty."

"Wulfgar
is a
bóndi—
not a
thegn,"
Ragnar ground
out tersely.

"Is
the life of your heir worth so little to you, then, that you would not raise up
the man who spared it?" The words of Björn Ironside had a scornful sting,
which goaded, as he intended. "Or can it be that you wear so much gold
jewelry not as proof of your prowess as a
Víkingr,
but to blind us,
so we cannot see how small the great Ragnar Lodbrók is, in truth!"

There
was a huge clamor of laughter at this, for the Northmen were not so afraid of
their kings as the men of the Southlands were of theirs, and the Northmen loved
a
good
jest, besides— no matter if it were at the expense of a slave or a king. Gold
was rare and, so, highly prized; and indeed, Ragnar wore more than his fair
share of it. But Wulfgar did not join in the mirth, for he saw that Björn
Ironside's gibe had angered Ragnar, whose face had reddened and grown dark with
a scowl. Wulfgar knew that Ragnar would not forgive him the men's glee, but
would add it to the growing list of grievances against him.

"The
chance to swear oath at the festival, in exchange for my life"— Ivar spoke
for the first time as, gritting his teeth against the pain, he slowly pried the
wolf's jaws from his wrist. Then, grimacing, he staggered with some difficulty
to his feet, cradling his injured wrist and hand. But while a whole man might
be made the butt of a joke, a wounded
thegn
was an object of neither ridicule
nor pity, it being the lot of a warrior to suffer without complaint whatever
the Norns, the Fates, bestowed. So no one was foolish enough to offer Ivar
assistance. "It sounds like a fair bargain to me," he said, and then
he smiled a strange caricature of a smile, and his blue eyes leaped with a
queer light.

With
those coolly voiced words was Wulfgar's lifelong dream made possible; yet the
taste of it was as ashes in his mouth,
and a grue chased up his spine. What
had he done? Had Goscelin, his Saxon mother, not named him for his brother
spirit, the wolf, who would this day have slain Ivar? Too late, Wulfgar
recalled Yelkei's warning— and at last understood it; for had he not, with a
single stroke of his battle-ax, killed the wolf who would have disentangled his
destiny from Ivar's and, by doing so, thereby decided his own? Fool was he,
Wulfgar thought, the fool of all fools! He should have let Ivar die. Why had he
not? He did not know. He knew only that, like Ragnar, Ivar would neither forget
nor forgive this day— and yet was perversely glad Wulfgar was to become a
thegn,
a
Víkingr.

Long
did Wulfgar ponder this curious fact as the hunting party lifted the corpses of
the two slain men, and bound the dead roe deer to spear shafts, which the
freedmen, in twos, hoisted onto their shoulders for carrying back to the
sledge. The wolf, Björn Ironside declared, was Wulfgar's own prize; and when,
out of long habit, Wulfgar glanced instinctively to Ivar for confirmation of
this, Ivar slowly nodded his agreement, earning a glare from Ragnar, who
muttered a curse and then spat on the ground before turning away to mount up
and gallop off, leaving the rest of the hunting party scrambling to catch
up. Wulfgar
tied a rope about the body of the wolf to haul it home behind him. It was an
extraordinary beast, its hide worthy of a mighty warrior; and that, he would
strive to become, Wulfgar vowed, to honor his dead brother spirit.

The Betrothal

The
Southern Coast of Usk, Walas, A.D. 865

To
Rhowenna's great relief, her father did not die. But he never quite recovered
from the treacherous attack upon his life, either, being plagued thereafter
with a sudden weakness that would come upon him when he had taxed his strength,
and a shortness of breath he had never suffered before. Although the royal
manor had not come under assault, as had been feared, the King worried about
the security of his kingdom, nevertheless, afraid that because of the attempt
upon his life, Glamorgan or Gwent had come to view Usk as a tasty morsel and was
intent on devouring it. For this reason, when he learned that Cerdic, a prince
of Mercia, was in search of a wife, Pendragon sent messengers to Cerdic's
court,
proposing an alliance between Usk and Mercia, and offering Rhowenna as Cerdic's
bride to seal the bargain. Rhowenna herself knew nothing of this, however,
until the day when her father called her before him to tell her what he had
done, and that Cerdic had agreed to the proposal and to take her to wife. She
was as stunned by her father's words as though she had been stricken a dreadful
blow, for although she had known she was destined someday to wed a prince or
even a king, she had not thought to find herself betrothed to one of the Saxon
wolves east of Offa's Dyke, who, since the time of the High King Arthwr four
hundred years ago, had been Walas's bitterest enemies. Unable to restrain
herself, she cried out softly in protest at the news; and at that, so she knew
he was not without sympathy for her plight, her father said gently: