“No,” Stig agreed, then smiled. “After all, we’ll find plenty of necessary ways to poke him.”
Sigurd, seeing that the Herons were first to finish their breakfast and had cleared their plates and cutlery, dropping them into a copper cauldron filled with hot water, beckoned them to gather around him.
“Hal, I believe you’ve been officially elected skirl. Is that right?”
Hal nodded. Sigurd looked at the rest of the band.
“Good choice,” he said, to Hal’s surprise. Hal had no idea that Erak and Sigurd had watched him supervising the building of their barracks tent the day before. But he didn’t have further time to reflect on it. Sigurd handed him a bundle of parchment sheets.
“These are the tasks you’ll be ordered to undertake over the next two months. They’re not in order. You’ll only know on the day what task you have to perform, so you have to be constantly ready for any one of them. Teams must compete in every event. Any team that doesn’t is disqualified. Clear?”
The boys nodded. There was no more joking now. Stig and Edvin, standing close to Hal, craned over his shoulder, trying to read the list of tests they would be set. Sigurd claimed their attention again.
“You can read them later!” he snapped. “There’s no set schedule for these tests. We might ask you to do one tomorrow, or next week. Or the week after. We might ask you to do tasks two days running, then nothing for several weeks. In between, we’ll be assessing your skills and teaching you more of them. You might care to know, however, that you’ve already had your first test.”
He paused and it was Hal who asked the obvious question, although he thought he knew the answer.
“What was that, Sigurd?”
“Getting your living quarters organized,” the instructor told them. “You’ve already got points on the board for that. You did the best job of the three bands.”
The Herons murmured with pleasure.
Stig glanced at his friend. “Good work, Hal.”
Hal shrugged. “Long way to go yet, Stig.”
Sigurd noted the exchange. Erak could be right about this boy, he thought. Erak was usually right. He cleared his throat and got their attention once more.
“Head back and tidy your living quarters. Then get your kit together. We’ll be assessing your skills today so be back here with any weapons you already have in twenty minutes.”
The band hurriedly filed out of the mess tent. As they left, Hal could hear Sigurd addressing the other groups, who were cramming the last of their breakfast into their mouths.
“Hurry up. You’ve got two minutes left. Then come to me for your list of assessments. And by the way, do yourselves a favor and take a look at the quarters the Herons have built. You’d be wise to copy their design. They’ve already won assessment points for it.”
That’ll put a smile on Tursgud’s face, Hal thought. He made a mental note to talk to Stefan and ask him to put a rein on his tongue. The boy’s constant needling of Tursgud could only make life more difficult.
When their living quarters were spick-and-span, with bedding rolled and personal equipment and clothing neatly stacked in each sleeping space, Hal made a quick inspection. He found Ingvar’s bedding was unevenly rolled, so that it spilled out one end like a half-cooked sausage. His personal items were stacked any which way. He beckoned to Edvin.
“Can you give Ingvar a hand? Show him how to roll the bedding evenly and get his kit into shape.” Edvin nodded and Hal called to Ingvar. “Ingvar! This won’t do! It looks like a dog’s breakfast. Pay attention to Edvin and get this tidied up.”
“Yes, skirl,” Ingvar said sheepishly. He lumbered over and bent his head as Edvin showed him how to fold his bedding instead of bundling it into an unmanageable roll. Similarly, Edvin stacked his personal items, with the largest on the bottom, explaining to Ingvar that this was the most efficient way to do it. Hal watched as Ingvar listened, nodding his head from time to time. Like a lot of big people, he did tend to be clumsy, and his poor eyesight added to the problem. But Hal had noticed that Ingvar had a good heart. Another boy might have resented being told what to do by someone almost half his size. But Ingvar actually seemed to appreciate the fact that Edvin wasn’t criticizing him so much as helping him.
Edvin let him study the job he’d done, then unrolled the bedding and gestured to it.
“Now you try it again,” he said. “And don’t try to roll it so tightly.”
This time, Ingvar made a better job of it. The result wasn’t as neat and symmetrical as Edvin’s, but it was a big improvement. Edvin caught Hal’s eye and raised his eyebrows in a question.
Hal nodded briefly. “That’ll do.”
Edvin slapped Ingvar on his massive shoulder. “Nice work,” he said. “I’ll check you again tomorrow, to make sure you’ve got the hang of it.”
“Thanks, Edvin,” the young giant said. He was beaming with satisfaction. It occurred to Hal that nobody had ever praised Ingvar in the past. All he had ever received was criticism. Hal filed that thought away.
“You heard Sigurd,” he called to the others. “If anyone has personal weapons, collect them and bring them along. Then form up here in two files.”
Stefan hesitated. “Is that really necessary?” he asked.
“Possibly not,” Hal said. “But we’re a brotherband. That means we’re a team. It’s time we started acting as a team. All right?”
“All right,” Stefan replied.
Hal watched him for a few seconds. He still wasn’t totally at ease giving orders. But Stefan seemed to accept his reasoning. With a faint sense of relief, Hal entered the tent and retrieved his crossbow from beside his folded bedroll.
The crossbow had been a present from Thorn the previous year. The one-armed sailor, like all sea wolves, had a cache of money, jewels, weapons and assorted items that he had “liberated,” as the saying was, in his career as a raider. Mind you, his stash wasn’t as large as it used to be. In his lost years, Thorn had begun selling his plunder for ridiculously low prices in order to buy ale and brandy. Erak had eventually stepped in and confiscated what was left, ensuring that Thorn didn’t lose it all.
Thorn had taken the crossbow during a raid in Gallica many years ago. He had given it to Hal for his fifteenth birthday. The boy had been delighted. His mother was less so, but no mother was ever enthusiastic when someone gave her son a weapon capable of shooting a missile over two hundred meters.
At first delighted, Hal quickly saw a few faults in the crossbow’s basic design and went to work to correct them. The body of the weapon, for example, was a piece of timber in one straight line. That made it difficult to line up. The shooter’s eye line was always slightly above the line the bolt would take. He kept the trigger mechanism and discarded the stock, replacing it with one of his own design, shaped so that the shoulder piece sloped down from the body of the bow, bringing the aiming line up level with his eye. He carved the butt of the new stock in a curve so that it nestled firmly into his shoulder. Then he worked on the triggering mechanism as well. It was roughly formed and stiff. He filed it and oiled it so that the action was smooth and the release easy.
Then, after trying the weapon out, he added one more important modification.
At first, he had been nervous about showing the changes to Thorn. He worried that the shabby odd-job man might be insulted by the fact that Hal wasn’t satisfied with the crossbow as it stood. But Thorn had been delighted, patting him on the shoulder.
“Trust you to come up with a way to improve it!” he’d said. “I might have known.”
The other boys were ready now. They had a variety of weapons they had brought. They all wore saxe knives, the long, heavy knives that could be used as a weapon as well as for everyday tasks. In addition, Jesper had a small hunting bow, although it was a low-powered, short-range weapon compared to the crossbow. The twins had throwing spears and Stig had an ax. It had belonged to his father as a boy. It wasn’t a full-size war ax—such a weapon would be too heavy, even for Stig’s muscles—but it was a substantial weapon nonetheless. Stefan and Edvin had no weapons of their own.
Ingvar’s family didn’t have the money to buy him a weapon. Instead, he had fashioned a huge club from a branch of oak. It was a simple weapon but with Ingvar’s massive strength behind it, it would be devastating. Hal put out a hand to look at it.
“May I see?” he said and Ingvar handed it over. Hal was deceived by the ease with which Ingvar handled the weapon and he nearly dropped it when he felt the enormous weight. But he recovered, and swung it with two hands. For such a simple weapon, it was surprisingly well balanced, he thought. He handed it back.
“All right, form up in two ranks. Stig, call the step. Double-time to the training ground.”
This time, nobody asked whether it was really necessary. Hal took the front left-hand rank, with Jesper by his side. The others formed up behind them, with Stig at the rear, calling the step. They jogged through the trees to the training ground.
They had lost a little time when Edvin was showing Ingvar how to fold his kit and the other bands were already there. They looked up at the compact group of boys as they jogged in step onto the training ground, coming to a halt together as Stig called the order. It looked impressive. Tursgud sneered but Rollond was slightly annoyed that he hadn’t thought to bring his team here like that. They had simply ambled to the training field like a mob of cattle, in no fixed formation.
“In future,” he told his second in command, “that’s how we do it too.”
chapter
seventeen
T
here were three assistant instructors working under
Sigurd. Their names were Gort, Jarst and Viggo and each of them was responsible for one of the brotherbands. Gort was assigned to the Herons and he approached them now, eyeing them off as they stood in their two ranks, facing him.
“Very pretty,” he said, with a note of sarcasm in his voice. “But there are no marks for being pretty, if that’s what you had in mind.” He glanced at Hal. “Was that what you had in mind?”
“No, sir,” Hal answered, standing to attention. “We just thought it would be better if we all arrived together.”
“Hmmmphh,” Gort muttered. In fact, he and the other instructors had been impressed with the Herons’ disciplined arrival. But he wasn’t going to let them know that. He glanced along the line of them now, looking at the motley collection of weapons they carried.
“We’ll be assigning you weapons for training purposes, of course,” he told them. “But let’s see what you’ve got already.”
He walked down the line, studying the weapons, and stopped when he saw Jesper’s bow. He held out a hand and Jesper passed it to him. Gort flexed the bow several times, then grunted.
“All right for hunting small game,” he said. “Not much use in a battle. There’s no power there.”
He passed the bow back and moved on, stopping again when he noticed the huge club that Ingvar had grounded beside him.
“Good grief,” he exclaimed. “That’s nearly a tree! Let’s see what you can do with it.”
Ingvar peered at him, blinking rapidly, not sure what was expected of him.
“Sir?” he asked.
Gort beckoned him impatiently. “Step forward and let’s see you swing that thing. If you can,” he added doubtfully.
Ingvar nodded and blinked several times. He stepped forward, stumbling over his own feet and lurching awkwardly until Ulf caught his elbow and steadied him. He smiled apologetically at Gort, who raised his eyes to heaven. Thankfully, the expression was lost on Ingvar, who could see only a vague blur where the instructor was standing.
“Well, come on then!” Gort snapped.
Ingvar blinked in his direction. “Sir?”
“Let’s have you! Take a swing!”
Now in fairness to Ingvar, the command “Take a swing” could be interpreted as “Take a swing at me.” Ingvar wasn’t totally sure, so he hesitated still, peering at the blurred figure in front of him. He didn’t know if Gort was ready to defend himself.
For Gort’s part, he simply meant to see if Ingvar could wield the club with any dexterity, although he doubted that was possible, given its sheer size and obvious weight. As the boy hesitated, he prompted him again.
“Come on! We don’t have all—”
He was going to say “all day,” but he suddenly realized that the tree trunk–size club was whistling through the air at blinding speed, and in the next half second would knock his head clean off his shoulders. With a startled yelp, he dropped flat on the still-wet ground, feeling the wind of the massive weapon as it passed over his skull, missing him by a few centimeters.
“Lorgan’s dripping, bloodred fangs, boy!” he bellowed, invoking a highly unpleasant Skandian demigod. He scrambled to his feet, brushing mud and wet grass from his jacket. “Drop that club!” he roared as Ingvar swayed uncertainly, not sure whether to try another swing.
Obediently, Ingvar let the huge piece of timber fall to the turf. The dull thud it made sent a shiver of fear up Gort’s spine. The fear translated to anger.