The Tempering of Men (34 page)

“Of the cave ice?”

“Of you.”

Brokkolfr remembered Realgar and Orpiment throwing themselves between the men and the svartalfar children, even though Kari had a broken ankle and neither svartalf knew anything about fighting. “Are the stories told of men so terrible?”

“You are warriors,” Orpiment said. “The smallest aettrynalf knows that, just as she knows our cousins in the North are warriors. But men are not our kin and have no reason to spare us. We have hidden ourselves away for centuries out of fear of you.”

“We aren't
trolls,
” Brokkolfr said.

Orpiment shrugged, one of those complicated alfar shrugs that seemed to involve more joints than it should. “You have proved that you are not so terrible,” he said. “But we did not know then, and we held ourselves closed.”

“You've changed your minds,” Brokkolfr said.

“Yes,” said Orpiment. “You are helping repair what you destroyed, and you do it even though you cannot share in the making. You are not closed, even though you cannot sing.” He bowed over his folded hands, a gesture that Brokkolfr was not familiar with, but which clearly showed respect.

Clumsily, Brokkolfr copied him, and Orpiment gave him a small, shy smile.

“All right,” said Brokkolfr. “Show me what to do.”

*   *   *

When they—Skjaldwulf, Fargrimr, Randulfr, Grimolfr, Erik Godsman, and Ulfbjorn—were distributed around the ashes of a derelict fire, each man cupping a flagon of wine, Fargrimr leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and said, “I've been thinking about the future of the wolfheallan.”

Skjaldwulf snorted. “You are not alone, my friend—”

But here Fargrimr held up one hand, and Skjaldwulf paused. Of a sudden, the sworn-son had a commanding presence, and Skjaldwulf found himself imagining how he would capture it in verse.

Fargrimr had more to say. “I saw a lot of you and your brothers on the trail of war. And I know this—if the trolls really are all gone, you and your wolves must find other meat to hunt. Or there will be no tithes, no tithe boys, and eventually no wolfheallan.”

“We are,” Ulfbjorn said grimly, “aware.” Which led Skjaldwulf to wonder if the same conversation had been repeated over and over in every heall and keep the breadth of the northlands.

“You cannot become mercenaries,” Fargrimr continued. “But we have seen that there is nothing like your men and wolves for putting down the bandit trade, for keeping peace on the roads and in the townships. So I say, what must happen is that we, the jarls, must employ you.”

“You just said we could not become mercenaries.” Grimolfr shifted, dangling his free hand casually between his knees. “A viewpoint, by the way, with which I agree.”

There was a flash of the old grit and gray speech that had long made Grimolfr so terrifying, even though he and Skjaldwulf were not too different in age. Hrolleif, Vigdis' previous brother, had been a little older—

Skjaldwulf bit his lip rather than think too long on Hrolleif. He'd died a warrior, and he stood now at Othinn's right hand. And if Skjaldwulf's grief was bad, how much more so that of Grimolfr, who had been a friend, shieldbrother, and lover to Hrolleif since boyhood.

Unbidden, Skjaldwulf found himself thinking of Vethulf, and pushed it aside as an irritation. Much like Vethulf himself.

“You cannot become mercenaries, no. Not and fight for one jarl against another. But what if you fought for all jarls?”

There was fire in Fargrimr's voice, and from the nodding of Randulfr's head the two of them had worked out what Fargrimr would say in advance—or at least, Fargrimr had run it past his brother.

“How do you fight for all jarls?” Skjaldwulf asked.

“All jarls,” Fargrimr repeated. “All jarls, all women, all thanes, all bondi—even all thralls.”

Erik raked a hand through his hair, so it stuck up disarrayed around the thong that bound his eyepatch on. “What if you fought for Othinn, and for the Law?”

Skjaldwulf blinked. He glanced at Grimolfr and found the other wolfjarl sitting openmouthed, lost in contemplation. “Peacekeepers,” Skjaldwulf said.

“Lawgivers,” Ulfbjorn answered.

Silently Randulfr rubbed his wolf's stomach. There were cubs in there, cubs that would need bondmates, heallan, a future. Or they might as well be let run wild: they would be safer and happier. Trellwolves were not meant to be merely ornaments.

“Softly,” Skjaldwulf said.

“You hate it,” said Randulfr.

Skjaldwulf shook his head. “It just takes some getting used to. Herding bandits like cattle for their meat and milk—”

“‘Herding' implies some intentional cultivation,” Fargrimr said, eyes laughing. “This might be more like ‘gleaning' bandits.”

“Assuming we survive the war with these Rheans of yours, we'll put it to the Wolfmaegth,” Grimolfr said. And as simply as that, it was settled.

*   *   *

Two days later, Franangford and Othinnsaesc arrived together, having met up on the road. Isolfr was with the Franangford contingent, Skjaldwulf was pleased to see, walking with Viradechtis beside a rust-orange pony not much bigger than the trellwolf. But that gray wolf with her was Kjaran, and—where then was Vethulf?

Skjaldwulf started forward as the combined threat arrived, his heart hammering until he was almost dizzy with it. Three steps more, though, and he could see the litter the pony hauled and the red braids bundled up within it.

“Vethulf?” Skjaldwulf said as he came up to his wolfsprechend.

“Stupid fool is in the pony drag,” Isolfr said. “He was injured fighting bears and wyverns, and didn't have the sense to stay home in bed. He will live; it's just wounds and travel that exhaust him. You?”

There was strain in Isolfr's voice, so Skjaldwulf knew that the journey had not been easy. “We have lost none from the heall.” He'd mention Adalbrikt later.

“We, too, have come through unscathed,” Isolfr said. “Amma whelped four. Kari and Brokkolfr seem to have found a lost colony of alfar, but more on that later.”

Tease,
Skjaldwulf thought. “Ingrun is in whelp.”

“To Mar?” Isolfr said, without a hint of jealousy.

“To all four dogs,” Skjaldwulf said. “It took us on the road.”

Isolfr's eyebrows went up. “That must have been interesting.”

A tall man nearly as pale as Isolfr but far more year-weathered came up to them. “Skjaldwulf,” Isolfr said. “You remember my uncle Othwulf, of Othinnsaesc, and his brother Vikingr?”

“Of course,” Skjaldwulf said. Othwulf's arm clasp was strong and his smile broad. It was he who claimed half the glory of the Othinnsaesc trellqueen's death, the other half belonging to his brother Gunnarr. Skjaldwulf wondered if the two men had spoken since. He knew Isolfr was only barely on speaking terms with his father; Skjaldwulf hoped, although he was not about to say so, that the fact that Gunnarr had brought Halfrid with him might lead to some better understanding. His wolfsprechend had enough worries without being at feud with his kin.

Better to warn them both: “Nithogsfjoll, heall and keep, arrived two days ago.”

“Together?” Isolfr said.

“Grimolfr said it was Gunnarr's idea.”

“Truly, we live in an age of marvels,” Othwulf said with a sardonic and decidedly wolfish smile. “Well—” He clapped Isolfr on the shoulder. “Vikingr says my wolfjarl wants me. I am glad to hear Brokkolfr is doing well.” He strode off, his wolf a vast shadow at his side.

Skjaldwulf raised his eyebrows at Isolfr.

“Apparently, Brokkolfr's cohort bore the worst of Othinnsaesc's losses—his shieldbrothers, the men bonded to Amma's siblings. It was one reason they were willing to trade him to us: wolfsprechend and wolfjarl agreed that it might be better for him to go to a new heall, where he would not be reminded of the dead every time he turned around. I think it is working.”

Skjaldwulf was not deceived by that innocent tone. “You said something about a lost colony of svartalfar.”

Isolfr abandoned the struggle to keep a straight face. “Yes, and I will tell you about it once we are settled, I promise.”

“See that you do,” Skjaldwulf said, and let himself grin back, and not think too hard about where the Rheans were and what they were doing.

*   *   *

The trouble with having this many jarls (and wolfjarls) heaped up together in Arakensberg like a handful of pebbles was that one had to find ways to keep them from banging and rattling and knocking chips off each other long enough for an AllThing to be convened.

But the Franangfordthreat was the last group definitely expected—saving Siglufjordhur—and with their arrival a certain momentum began to infect the gathering. The knots of conversation and argument grew bigger, the handwaving more intense. Skjaldwulf began to notice the distinctive ribbon-topped staves of skalds wandering the town and the sprawling encampment that surrounded it. Seeing them still evoked a peculiar feeling in his chest, so that Mar whined and bumped him, but Skjaldwulf put his hand on the black wolf's solid shoulder and moved on.

After half a day or so, it dawned on him.
He
had begun this argument. It was his to bring to completion.

It was after midday, and he had been walking along the high street of Arakensberg, idly looking for old friends and acquaintances whom he had so far missed greeting and meanwhile marveling at how the town had been transformed to a metropolis that might rival Hergilsberg in population, if not in architecture. Now he turned and scanned the bustling street for one of those staves—there. Skjaldwulf raised a hand and his voice, pleased that he could still bring up a shout that would carry through the noise of a crowd. “Ho! Skald!”

The skald spun on one foot and came at a brisk walk in the midst of a flutter of ribbons, abandoning the duckling-trail of children who had no doubt been importuning him for sweets or stories. “My lord wolfjarl.”

My lord wolfjarl.

He looked prosperous, but it was in a skald's interest to look so. He also looked nervous, more so of man than wolf, which left Skjaldwulf wondering where, exactly, he had become the sort of person who made skalds hardened to the antics of drunken jarls and thanes—and their drunken daughters—nervous.

Skjaldwulf extended a coin and said, “Poet—”

“Throstr, my lord.” The coin vanished. Up his sleeve, Skjaldwulf suspected, having once practiced the same trick himself.

“Throstr. Pass the word for me: the AllThing commences at sunset, in the longhouse at Arakensbergheall.” Perhaps it was a mistake, perhaps it would be seen as still more evidence of partisanship, but Skjaldwulf found he did not much care. Either keep and heall would stand together, now, or they would surely fall apart.

If the trellwar taught us nothing else, let it have taught us that.

“As you wish, my lord,” the skald said, and stood awkwardly until Skjaldwulf realized he was waiting to be excused, lest he give offense.

*   *   *

Before sunset, the longhouse swarmed.

The majority of the Arakensberg wolves and wolfcarls decided that this would be a fine time to see to some hunting, leaving the heall in the possession of the AllThing—jarls, ladies, bondi, housecarls, horsecarls, thanes, heofodmenn, warriors of renown, skalds, smiths, wolfjarls, and wolfsprechends from all over the North were here, all packed in until when one breathed in, three must breathe out.

Or so it seemed to Vethulf as—trying to walk tall despite Isolfr on his left elbow and Skjaldwulf on his right, each of them holding up far more of his weight than they made apparent—he was led in.
Led in,
like an old man tottering between his sons.

“Gods rot it,” he snarled under his breath as Isolfr dragged a stool around for him. But he sat, because there was no renown to be won in measuring one's length on the floor. No renown such as a man would wish to carry, anyway.

Isolfr patted his shoulder mockingly. “Even a poisoned wound can't keep you down long.”

“The wyvern might die of biting you,” Skjaldwulf teased, and Vethulf shot him a glance that probably proved his point. But there was time for little else, because outside the wolves of twelve heallan raised their voices to sing the sun down—and inside the konigenwolves and their consorts answered the call.

The sound, as always, shivered along Vethulf's nerves like spirits of wine. He'd known trellwolves all his life, but they never quite sounded like living animals when they howled. Their chorus had the voices of ghosts, the harmonics of some otherworldly musical instrument. He felt the hairs across his arms and nape prickle erect.

The reaction of the wolfless men was rather more dramatic. Some of them paled; some huddled close to one another. Vethulf saw at least one lady snatch her skirts up, as if preparing to run. When she dropped them again a moment later and smoothed them overenthusiastically, everyone around her pretended not to notice.

Skjaldwulf gave his shoulder a squeeze, almost startling him off his stool, and as the singing subsided moved to the center of the heall, leaving Mar behind with Kjaran and Viradechtis. Kjaran sighed and rolled over on his side.

“Damn him and his skald's eye,” Isolfr muttered.

Vethulf nodded agreement.
That
would be in the songs, how Skjaldwulf had stepped into view amid the dying fall of wolf-howls. Vethulf wondered if Skjaldwulf even knew that he had planned it that way.

But the tall man was clearing his throat, turning in place, spreading his arms wide—wider on one side than the other, because of the old stiffness of his broken collarbone—and the unsettled throng were focusing on him. He had a staff in his hand—a blackwood bough, cut long and gnarled and fluttering with strips of scarlet cloth like a mockery of a skald's staff.

He raised it up. His voice boomed, became great, rang among the smoke-black rafters like a winded horn. “Jarls, thanes, bondi, wolfcarls, warriors, women! Attend, for we have a bright business before us. Attend, for I am Skjaldwulf brother of Mar, called Snow-soft, wolfjarl of Franangford, and I have fought fell trolls in fearsome winter that you might sleep unfettered and unfearing in your warm feather nests. Attend, for it was I who asked you here, and you have done me the honor to come! Attend, for I have gone down into the belly of the earth, and I have come out again, and some of you were there!”