She came to realize she was the eldest among them, at a score and three. The venture should not have gone so well, with a green crew and a patched-together boat, though old Frode had done a good job. They had done a good job working together.
She and Garik, who had always got on well, became fast friends. He and Helje were her second- and third-in-command. She liked Helje full well, but it was to Garik she turned in her rare leisure moments, and to whom she looked to share a laugh.
Often, as when Quarrie MacMurtray had been captive, she shared watch with him.
They were together one such night while the rest of the crew slept, not anchored but sliding through the dark as if, ja,Freyacould see her own way with her wooden dragon eyes. A rare moment of peace, for these days Hulda’s heart rarely stopped questing.
Quietly, barely above a whisper, Garik said, “Can you believe how well we have done? Mayhap it is true—this vessel is spelled for good.”
“I never paid for any charms,” Hulda returned, “before we left home.”
“Some of them may have.” Garik jerked his head at the sleepers and grinned. “A superstitious lot.”
“Not too superstitious to have a woman aboard.”
“I think we have laid that to rest. They do not think of you as a woman.” He grinned still more broadly. “No disrespect meant.”
She barelyfeltlike a woman.
“They adore you,” Garik told her. “They would die for you. I hope you know that.”
She looked at him, startled. “Nei. Why?”
“You gave them a chance, did you not? Younger sons, many of them are, and waiting in line for their faðirs’ attention.”
Even a younger son—or dottir—deserved a chance.
“They are as loyal a crew as you will find.”
“I know that, ja.” But she thought about it, there in the dark, about the power it gave her. Most members of a crew answered not only to their captain but to the man who backed the venture, often one who remained at home.
They, as a crew, had no one looking over their shoulders. They had an agile boat and a measure of—well, freedom.
Could she use that? Could she use it to return to Quarrie MacMurtray?
“Our targets have all been small ones,” she mused aloud. “And have fallen to us easily.”
“So far.”
“So far,” Hulda repeated. “I think it well that we do not reach too far above ourselves. If we have a good season and do not get too greedy, we may be able to afford another boat, in time.”
“The men back home,” Garik said with some relish, “are talking of us.”
“Oh?”
“They have never seen a venture such as ours, where the ownership as well as the wealth is shared. They wait for us to quarrel and fail.”
“Mayhap then,” Hulda said, gazing into the dark, “mayhap if they hold for us such ill will,Freyashould cease with going home.”
“Eh?” Garik cocked an eye at her.
“What is the goal, Garik? The greater goal?” When he did not answer, she went on, “Land. Land here, where the weather is kinder and we do not need to cover great distances of ocean to get where we need to raid.”
“Land? But…us?”
“Why not? Others have done it. In Orkney. In Shetland. Look at York—”
“We are not the powerful jarls who hold sway in York. Far from it.”
