When the Thoragassons learned of the deaths, there was consternation, and it wasn’t due entirely to an overabundance of sorrow at Harald’s and Tora’s passing. No, it was because there were no negotiated ties now to hold Merrik Haraldsson to their family.
Still, the elder Thoragasson, a bluff, hearty man with white threaded through his blond hair, slapped Merrik on his back, inquired, discreet as a wild bull, as to his current wealth after his summer trading, and pointed out with a sly wink the lovely attributes of his daughter. “Aye, she’s even more finely endowed than she was during the winter solstice when last you saw her,” he said. “Aye, more than a handful she would give a man.”
Merrik agreed that this was true.
Olaf Thoragasson frowned. “I wonder why her mother isn’t so, well, bountiful.”
Merrik wisely kept his mouth shut.
“You have reached your twenty-fifth year, Merrik,” Thoragasson said, his voice fraught with meaning.
Merrik only smiled. “I am not ready to lose my teeth or my virility just yet.”
“Ah, but to have children relieves a man’s mind, for there are his progeny to succeed him if he falls in battle of if struck by illness. Aye, a wife and children make a man’s life fuller and richer.”
Merrik agreed that this was probably so.
“A man needn’t just cleave to a wife,” Olaf said, lowering his voice, giving Merrik an understanding leer. “I know your brother Erik surrounds himself with women and enjoys all of them. A man may do whatever he wishes if he has the silver for it.”
“My father was always loyal and faithful to my mother.”
“He was, but he didn’t have to be. Heed me, Merrik, your father very much wanted to unite our families. He himself looked upon my little Letta and chose her for you. Surely you admired your father, surely you trusted his judgment.”
“In most cases, certainly,” Merrik said.
“Is not my little Letta a gem?” Thoragasson said, his voice sharp now, pressing, for he scented that things weren’t going as he wished.
“Surely a gem of more value than to be wasted upon a younger son who has no land.”
“Aye, but my Letta is a Viking woman. She would follow her husband wherever he wished to settle. Besides, there is more than enough land for you near our farmstead. The Bergson Valley is rich enough to support you and a family.”
Merrik hated the Bergson Valley. It rained too much; fog shrouded the fjord most days. He didn’t like the Thoragasson men. He looked over at Letta, who was seated next to Ileria, the old woman who had worked the loom for all his life. The soft gray tunic he was wearing she had woven for him during the spring from the finest wool. It was to be his lucky tunic for when he traded with the savages, she’d told him. Letta was helping Ileria, loading a shuttle with thread from a distaff. She looked competent doing it.
“Even now, she seeks more knowledge to make your life comfortable,” Thoragasson said near to Merrik’s ear. “She is always learning, always asking her elders what is right, what is good. She is a fine girl. She would be submissive to your wishes.”
Merrik doubted that, but said nothing. He even managed to smile. Thoragasson, pleased with himself, took himself off to speak to Erik. It wasn’t until after a quickly prepared feast that night that he sat back, patted his belly, and looked toward Deglin.
“Well, Deglin, what say you? Have you a special tale for me this night?”
Erik said in a loud voice that brought him everyone’s attention, “Nay, it is the girl here who is now our skald.”
There was immoderate laughter from Thoragasson, his family, and his men. “Who?” one of the men shouted. “That thin little wisp of a beggar that I could crush with one hearty breath?”
“Your breath could fell an oak tree,” one of his friends shouted.
There was good-natured banter, until one of Erik’s men insulted one of Thoragasson’s men with too much eagerness, and a fight broke out. It ended quickly, but one man’s arm was broken and another’s nose was bleeding profusely.
There seemed to be blood everywhere, not just from that single nose. Laren looked about the large room, at the havoc wrought in such a short time. Was it always so with men? Were they only content when they were eating, rutting women, or breaking each other’s bodies? They loved to yell and curse and strike each other. Then, suddenly, Erik rose from the floor, where he’d been pummeling one of his own men, reached for Megot and fondled her breasts in front of everyone. He kissed her hard, then smacked her bottom and told her to fetch him more beer.
Laren watched Sarla oversee the bandaging, watched another woman, Bartha, tend to the bleeding nose. She watched Megot give Erik his beer. She watched him fondle her buttocks and smile at Thoragasson as he did it. She waited, silent, knowing that Erik would say something soon. She looked at Merrik, who had himself flattened several men, and had bruised knuckles. At least there was no blood on him. He was grinning hugely and had just taken Taby from Cleve and was hugging him then tossing him into the air. The child shrieked and laughed. He kissed him and held him close. She saw Thoragasson staring at him, and she knew he wondered if Taby was Merrik’s child. He might as well be his child, she thought, for the bond between them was strengthening each day. She had to get Taby away from here soon, or losing Merrik would break the child’s heart. No, no, she told herself, children forgot quickly, they adapted easily as situations changed.
Laren looked away from him to the Thoragassons, and suddenly she saw them with new eyes. Now she saw them as a source of more silver pieces. She saw them as saviors. If they but knew it surely they would find it funny.
When Erik called for quiet and told her to begin, she rose, smiled at everyone, and began once again at the beginning. In order not to bore the Malverne people, she embellished the tale, giving more details, small new twists. Then she paused, and said in a lower voice, infusing new drama, new mystery into her words, “Selina remained on her knees staring after her husband. As for Parma, as soon as Grunlige had disappeared over a rise, he rose and laughed, so proud of himself and his cleverness that he did a little dance. He took a step toward Selina, then stopped. ‘Nay,’ he said, ‘I will only take you when Grunlige is dead and I have seen his body and spat upon it. I will cut off your witch’s head so all your evil will die with you.’ He laughed again and left her there, her body racked with her sobs.
“Grunlige felt filled with power and strength. Odin had saved him once and when he again proved his valor, Odin would reward him again, give him more power than before, and then he would slay all his enemies. He strode back to his farmstead and called his men together. They marveled at their lord who had come back to them whole and strong. But when he told them that they were voyaging to Iceland to trap furs for trade at Hedeby, they looked furtively at each other, fear scoring their faces. It was still winter; it would be dangerous, just as dangerous as it had been the first time.
“But Grunlige was their master and they put their faith in him and in none other. Had he not come back to them, whole and strong? Aye, he was near to Odin, all knew it, and all trusted him completely. They left Norway and voyaged into the North Sea, past the Shetland Islands and the Faeroes, then straight toward the settlement of Thingvellir in Iceland.”
