Paths of the Norseman, page 19
part #2 of The Norseman Chronicles Series
God, I was foolish to ask such things. An introspective Norseman? Huh! It is a dangerous thing to think! It is dangerous to question. Though I made many decisions, I had no choices in my life. Why should I believe I did? Nothing in my life thus far had shown me I retained control of anything.
Though I did have control over others occasionally, for I had been able to make a difference in someone else’s life by hastening them to a shallow, too-soon grave. I controlled death. Snorri the Elder was right in so many ways. I was to be a hermit, good for nothing but killing whenever an overlord needed killing done. I would have no friends. I would have no family of my own.
. . .
Thorfinn left several Greenlanders and a few of his thralls behind in the Straumsfjord settlement to construct more permanent shelters. Like my third father selecting Brattahlid, the most productive land in Greenland, for himself before other settlers arrived, Thorfinn found a picturesque rise of land overlooking the fjord and laid claim. He directed the men to build his personal estate on the choice morsel of dirt and timber, complete with a fenced pasture, a small blacksmith shop, and a large longhouse.
The rest of us travelled in the two remaining knarrs out of the fjord to find unknown lands. We were again explorers on the move that summer. For much of the trip I piloted The Merchant with one hand while I picked up the now toddling little Snorri. His steps were wobbly at best while on land, but on the pitching ship, he more closely resembled a dwarf who had enjoyed his mead too much. Over and again I made a big show to reach down, picking him up by the back of his tunic, so that his feet would fly free from the deck. While letting him dangle and swing from my hand with the ship’s motion, I would slowly lower him back down to his unstable footing. When he immediately fell to his backside, I repeated the process. Little Snorri found this all very enjoyable; in fact he often let out a great scream of excitement when he knew my hand was coming to pick him up once again. Gudrid and the small number of other women watched with broad smiles while they sat across baggage in the hold patching holes in a spare sail.
We sailed on and on along a coast that must have gone on forever, possibly all the way to Utgard where the giants tread. I never saw any signs of these Goliath-like men, but as we cruised, the trees changed from mostly tall, straight pines to mostly bushy oaks or maples. The coast line too changed, gradually shifting from the ruggedness to which I was accustomed to gently sloping land gracefully exiting the sea. Beaches, too, became more frequent. I was not certain how we would be able to tell when we crossed out of the land of men into the land of the giants, but was sure that the landscapes I then saw were too small for anything but men.
I say the coast must have gone on forever because after over two weeks of moving mostly southward, Thorfinn ordered our ships to tarry around a spectacular wonder before turning back northward. In all the many years I have lived, I never returned to see just how far south that coastline extended. It is something my clouded eyes still yearn to see, something my old bones long to feel.
Back to the magnificent wonder – a narrow cape, continuing for perhaps hundreds of miles curved out from the shore, creating a natural sound. Far to the south, the cape curved back toward the land to nearly seal the inland sea off entirely from the ocean. Only periodic channels connected the two bodies of water. The sound itself appeared quite shallow as did the inlets on the rougher, ocean side. The entire area had extreme tidal shifts, changing by many feet in a short time, leaving behind countless shoals. These shifting sand bars made navigating in the wind terribly difficult, as we would quickly find ourselves blown atop a mound of sand despite our shallow draft. This happened three times in the weeks we explored the area. Thankfully when it did occur, the weather was mostly agreeable so we merely had to sit and wait for the sea to lift us from where she had deposited us.
It was very hot there. The air was wet, and we sweat constantly even with the ocean breezes. My beard stuck to my chest. The men were shirtless most of the time, and we received punishing sun burns for our troubles. Thankfully, many of us had fair skin upon our backs so I was not the only one to suffer from the pain and humiliation of a peeling pink back. Just a few of the men and women with slightly darker complexions fared much better. Snorri the Elder, of course, was one such lucky soul, and he took great pleasure in ridiculing me and my fried hog skin for some time.
Days later we sailed up a shallow, winding river which emptied into the great sound. After travelling for some time, we came upon a man-made clearing filled with several large round huts. Their roofs were gently sloping and covered with dried grasses which extended out from the walls creating large eaves. A lonely boat, nothing more than a hollowed-out log, bobbed at the shore. The grounds immediately surrounding the huts were immaculately maintained with grasses kept short by a scythe or animal grazing. There were no well-worn paths between the huts, no drying hides, no smoke from fires so that the place almost looked abandoned. We saw not a soul, except a small naked skraeling boy carrying a tiny bow and arrow. His long black hair was tied into a single braid which hung lazily over one of his shoulders. A single white feather jutted from the braid and tapped his shoulder with each step. He was sneaking out of one of the houses and looked surprised when he saw us. His face said he was scared not of us, but that we caught him doing something he knew to be wrong. Without a word he ran away from the river into the far trees, quickly engulfed by the forest’s darkness.
Propelled on by the wind further up-river, we saw one more skraeling. This was a man of some immense age. His thin skin sagged all over his thin body, which was covered in tattoos of black and red and even blue. The old man sat cross-legged on a large boulder at the river’s edge. He held an ornately carved wooden implement that he pinched between his lips, before he blew puffy smoke trails out of his mouth. Behind him, extending for many, many ells into a pine forest was a carefully cultivated field of a plant I had never seen. It was broad-leafed, bushy and short, perhaps knee-high. The plants were spaced several feet apart with light green foliage.
We stared at him, and he at us while the ship lazily floated past. Snorri the Elder wanted to bury a javelin into his chest, but Thorfinn thought it unnecessary, telling his friend to tend the steering oar instead.
On our return trip downriver later that day, the old man still sat on his rock, blowing billowing smoke out of his mouth, at ease, apparently still paying us no heed.
Because of the treacherous seas and since we were so far removed from other Norsemen, certainly too far for Thorfinn to trade profitably, three days later we turned our bows northward to further investigate many of the inlets we saw on our outbound trip from Straumsfjord.
Eventually we came to a fjord which narrowed to a river, before widening again to a broad, long lake or lagoon. Because it too changed with the tides we called the place, Hop, which means tidal pool. North of the pool, the land again grew closer together to form a river which extended for many miles nearly straight north. Great hills grew from the edges of the river and lagoon and continued on rolling away in all directions like the waves of the sea. By the time we reached Hop it was late autumn and the changing leaves gave the colorful swells depth and character. It was beautiful.
We decided to stay for the winter and so, like in Straumsfjord last year, we built a hasty longhouse to squeeze into to keep warm. Another simple structure was built for the thralls to share and to get their filth out from our noses. When the weather came to us, we would invite our livestock inside. Hopefully, there would be room for them in the thrall shelter so I did not have to sleep with the scent of hog shit in my nostrils.
But the winter proved to be exceptionally mild. Snow never stuck to the ground. Twice we had a light, airy flurry, but the flakes rapidly disappeared, melting on the grasses.
Going into the cold season everyone feared a repeat of the hardships last winter brought after Christmas, so Gudrid led a heart-wrenching plea to the One God before our celebration. Perhaps because of that prayer, we ate heartily all year with the lagoon providing overflowing nourishment.
At the shore where the tide rose highest, we dug pits so that when the tide fell away, halibut rested at the bottoms. These were delicious fish and each fed us for many days. At times they were enormous – one weighed as much as a man and nearly broke my leg with his powerful flapping when I went into the hole to retrieve him. In the future I would shoot an arrow into the flesh from the safety above, but that day my father’s saex buried to the hilt in his eyes ended his movements. It took both Thorfinn and me to haul the beast up out of the pit and then drag it back to the longhouse.
We fished in the river and hunted the prolific game in the woods around Hop. Trees with delicious nuts like those of the walnut trees native to Tyrkr’s homeland were gathered by the basket. We lived in a land of plenty and never came across a skraeling, though I found a stone-tipped arrow on one hunting trip. From its condition, I could tell it had been lost years ago.
I began to have big thoughts, and one evening as Thorfinn and I sat across from one another at a campfire a single day’s walk from the settlement, I shared them with my friend, “We should carry the news of this place back to Greenland and Iceland, maybe even all the way back to Norway or our settlements in Ireland. I’ve lived in all those places and know from experience that both Iceland and Greenland are pitiful excuses to call them delightful.”
Thorfinn sat on a log gnawing at the last bit of meat from a rabbit that we roasted. The flames lit up his curious face and he said, “And what do you think telling everyone about this place would get us?”
Thinking of my life back in Ireland many years before, I answered at first mysteriously, “Profits, dear Karlsefni, profits.” Then clarifying, “Iceland and Greenland should just be resting points to bring Norsemen to Markland or Vinland and then here or beyond to settle. We have only the occasional skraeling to confront and from what I’ve seen, several determined Norsemen can triumph in any engagement with them.”
“What do I care if Norsemen settle here or in Iceland? It would take years to bring enough of our countrymen here and I need people with which to trade. How else can a merchant make a living, but through trade?” asked Thorfinn before spitting a bit of a sharp rabbit bone out from the corner of his mouth that had clearly been bothering him.
“My friend, you are not seeing the possibilities! In only several years Erik had Greenland covered with Norse transplants – and Greenland is awful! People will clamber to get away from their new overlord Sweyn Forkbeard in Norway. They will clamber to find land on which to farm, hump their women, and whelp babies. When they do this clambering, they will need a strong leader who already knows the land. They will need a strong leader who can settle disputes at the Thing. They will need a jarl.”
I let the idea hang there for a while. Thorfinn’s face told me before his mouth did that he liked the idea. “You’re right, you old man! We go back to Greenland and begin spreading the news that a vast new and mild world awaits them. All men want easy riches, and so they’ll bring their women and come. Maybe a trip to Iceland or Norway would help build support too.”
“Yes, exactly,” I nodded.
“And then we are rulers of all this,” he said with his large paws spread wide.
Then my military mind took over, “We must first make certain that Vinland and Straumsfjord are secure fortresses, with men under our employ to give safe haven to travelers on their way here to Hop. When they finally arrive, we rule. You rule that side of the pool, I rule this side.”
He scowled at me saying, “What if I’ll have this side for my rule?”
I scowled right back and hissed, “Then you’ll be dead.” We both laughed at our own joke, before draining two entire pots of ale and settling down to sleep. As I drifted away, I thought about how much simpler and more satisfying my life would be now that I would again focus on profits and not on the whims of love and fate.
. . .
So in the spring we set about making our plans become truth. The mild weather permitted us to break camp early, well before the equinox, and sail back to Straumsfjord. All of us returned to build the Straumsfjord camp and then Leifsbudir into permanent settlements in order for Norsemen to reach the lush, mild Hop safely.
When we arrived, we found that those left behind had indeed been busy. On the hill overlooking Straumsfjord, Thorfinn had a large longhouse in which to move. They had even managed to fit a flap-covered window into the side, overlooking the bay. His hall was surrounded by a fenced-in pasture that traversed both sides of the hill, toward the sea and away. Several of the least desirable trees were left within the pasture’s borders as they would only be good for firewood someday rather than immediate ship, house, or fence building. The hut holding the livestock and thralls was on the bottom of the hill on the side of the forest.
Thorfinn set me to the task of building an easily protected village with his new home as the centerpiece. The setting was not an ideal location like Dyflin or Kaupangen with their natural winding rivers, but I was determined to make it work. In any case, his own home on the hill would serve as a good refuge in the event of an attack by skraelings.
But our first encounter with the local population occurred long before I could make adequate defensive preparations. Nine boats filled with skraeling men came into Straumsfjord early one morning. At the bow of each boat, one of the men balanced himself gracefully on his feet while the others slowed their progress by dragging their oars in the water. The standing men each held a long, narrow wooden pole and they waved it in a sun-wise manner so that we could hear the whooshing sounds they made from the shore. They said nothing, but instead, looked to us to make some type of reply to their initial foray into communication.
Thorfinn was baffled, “What do they want us to do?”
Nearby, Folkvar asked, “Should I get more men and weapons?”
“I don’t think so,” was Thorfinn’s reply. “What do you say, Snorri?”
Snorri the Elder scrunched his forehead and said, “We should just leave them be. Let’s walk back to the village and let them alone with their poles.”
Thorfinn considered that for a moment before saying, “What about trading with them? I am a merchant, after all.”
Now shaking his head, Snorri said, “I think that we invite trouble if we talk with them.”
Folkvar remembered his last interaction with skraelings when ten men and Thorvald died, so he quickly agreed with Snorri, “Snorri’s right. Let’s go back and alert the village, we don’t have to pick a fight, but we should warn our men.”
“You’re not saying anything, Halldorr,” prompted Thorfinn. “What do you think they mean by this?” he said, pointing to the men in boats.
Folkvar was right to be worried, and in truth, Snorri was right; if we talked with them, they would be able to scout our village. I remembered when Leif and I had used a similar ruse to reconnoiter Aber Tawe before we sacked the town. Yet risks sometimes had to be taken, “I don’t think they mean us any harm,” I said, measured. “If they wanted to attack us, why come in full sun and make these motions? I think we should invite them ashore to trade with us as Thorfinn suggests.”
Thorfinn nodded, “He’s right. Now how do we get them here?”
“Folkvar,” I said, “go to the ships and get several white shields. Since we think they show us a peaceful gesture, let’s give them one of ours in return.” With a nod from Thorfinn, Folkvar went to retrieve the shields. In short order he returned, carrying several of the heavy round items, while the skraelings still sat in their bark-covered boats. I took a moment to admire their low boats. They appeared to be light-weight, perhaps only two men could carry them. The bark was wrapped tightly around thin ribs of cedar, sealed with pitch. I would build one of those someday, I thought.
Each party looking at the other, our band held the white shields above our heads with two hands, waving them at the skraelings. The men who had been turning the poles immediately stopped and started talking excitedly to the others in their boats. One of those in the bow eventually shrugged his shoulders and with hesitation again swung the pole. We smiled and returned the signal with our waving shields. This went on for some time until the oarsmen were ordered to slowly push the boats to shore.
We stood there, our two groups of men, staring at one another. They had all climbed out of their boats so that we must have been surrounded by thirty or forty skraelings. The four of us still held our shields, but eventually I set mine down and walked up to one of the men who looked to be the oldest. I extended my bare hand out in greeting, but the man looked confused. He leaned to his right to see if my hand held something he could not immediately find. I smiled and nodded that he should take my hand. Eventually, he understood and grasped my hand with his own, returning a genuine smile. He had a firm grip.
As we stood there, I studied the man while he nodded to his companions. He was at least ten years older than I was at the time, though it was hard to tell since I have never been able to properly decipher the age of skraelings. His long hair was mostly white with occasional clumps of its original black interspersed. He had many black and red tattoos that started from his hands and wound all the way up his arms and across his bare chest. When the man saw my Charging Boar tattoo, he grabbed my forearm and remarked something to his friends about it. They all nodded their approval, I think, while one or two frowned with wrinkled brows. Ignorantly, I broadened my smile and added a vigorous head-bobbing of my own.
Thorfinn could take the waiting no longer so he huffed, “Let’s take these men to the village to trade.” The other three set their shields down and waved on the crowd of skraelings who eagerly followed us to the scattered longhouses just a short walk from the water’s edge.
Once we crossed the narrow band of trees which separated the town from the fjord, other curious Norsemen saw our visitors, and we soon had a gaggle of admirers. We found a large, clear area and set blankets down for all the skraelings to sit upon. Thorfinn had Gudrid and the other four women of our party bring out chunks of cheese to give to our guests while we set ourselves on blankets across the way. This act proved to be fortuitous because the skraelings all smiled as they raved over the food, acting as if they had never tasted cheese before, nodding and grinning.
