Birth Of The Kingdom Part 16

'And we need more hides than we can get from our own slaughtered livestock,' said Cecilia, 'and more meat, especially lamb, than we have on hand now to get through the winter. And fodder for all the livestock, especially the horses.'

'Yes, there you see, my love. You see everything so clearly.'

'Well, one of us has to keep accounts so we can do the right thing at the right time, and that's not a simple calculation!' she declared at last when she had thought things over. She envisioned difficulties piling up like a mountain in the near future.

'Can I ask you, my own dear wife, to take charge of this?' asked Arn, a bit too eagerly, she thought.

'Yes, you can. I have my abacus, but this task will be more than anyone could hold in their head. I need writing implements and parchment in order to handle this work. And I'll have to talk to many people, so it will take some time. But if we don't start making calculations soon, we're going to starve this winter!'

He promised her at once that she would receive everything she needed to begin keeping the account books. He added self-confidently that here at Forsvik they would never go hungry. After that he seemed to forget about the whole matter and went back to his own frenzied work.

When King Knut told Arn that the castle church at his Nas would be the closest for residents of Forsvik, it was not entirely true. There were closer churches. But if the winds were favourable on Lake Vattern, it was still faster to get to Nas than to any other church, since King Knut still retained Norwegian oarsmen and sailors.

At Olsmas, early in the morning Arn and Cecilia went on board the ship called The Snake. The Snake. Cecilia was glad when she saw the slender black ship, and she hoped that the helmsman was the same one she had met before. And it was, she soon found out, but his long hair had now turned white. Cecilia was glad when she saw the slender black ship, and she hoped that the helmsman was the same one she had met before. And it was, she soon found out, but his long hair had now turned white.

Arn was not happy to see this ship again. He had been aboard during its first journey, which had ended in the death of a king, but he said nothing of this to Cecilia or anyone else when he bowed his head, crossed himself, and climbed aboard. The Norwegian oarsmen smiled to one another, since they thought they had another West Goth pa.s.senger who had never sailed before. They still told the merry tale about the n.o.ble lady who asked Styrbjrn himself whether he wasn't afraid that he would get lost sailing on little Lake Vattern.

They had to row only for an hour before they caught a good wind and could set the sail. Then the crossing proceeded at a furious pace, with the white foam spraying up from the bow of the ship.

After the ma.s.s and the bride's third purification in the castle church, the two Cecilias went off by themselves, while Knut took Arn up to the battlement between the two towers. There he ordered benches and a table to be brought, along with food and drink, which he was unsuccessful in pressing on Arn on this holy day.

There was much to discuss and one day would not be enough, Knut explained sadly, stroking his almost bald head. But they might as well begin with the simplest problem, which was to arrange the wedding between Magnus Mneskold and the Sverker daughter Ingrid Ylva. Knut said that he understood that both Arn and the bride's father Sune Sik might be reluctant to have Arn act as the groom's spokesman and thus negotiate with the man whose brother he had helped to kill. But Birger Brosa had solved that problem as easily as cracking a nut in his hand.

Magnus Mneskold had grown up as Birger Brosa's foster son, and now was more of a younger brother. If Birger Brosa instead of Arn spoke on behalf of the groom, they would avoid all difficulties quite elegantly and insult no one. Besides, the king's brother Sune Sik would have the honour of meeting the jarl of the kingdom as his future son-in-law's negotiator.

Arn merely nodded his agreement and muttered that no more time need be wasted on this question if there was something that was more urgent.

The next matter to be discussed mixed pride with wisdom, so it could not be solved with wisdom alone. Still, Arn had to reconcile as soon as possible with his uncle, Birger Brosa.

Thinking that all the difficult topics of discussion had now been dealt with, Arn began asking eagerly how the kingdom was now being governed. He had understood that a great deal had changed since they were young, when everyone gathered at the ting ting of all Goths with the king, jarl, and judge and perhaps two thousand men. He hadn't heard a word about such a of all Goths with the king, jarl, and judge and perhaps two thousand men. He hadn't heard a word about such a ting ting since he came home, so that must mean that the power had shifted away from the since he came home, so that must mean that the power had shifted away from the ting. ting.

King Knut sighed that this was indeed true. Some things had improved with the new manner of governing the kingdom, others had grown worse.

At the ting ting free men decided now as before all matters amongst free men. At the free men decided now as before all matters amongst free men. At the ting ting they could present their disputes, determine fines for manslaughter, hang one another's thieves, and settle other petty matters. they could present their disputes, determine fines for manslaughter, hang one another's thieves, and settle other petty matters.

At the king's council, on the other hand, matters were decided that dealt with the kingdom as a whole: who would be king, or jarl or bishop; taxes due to the king or jarl; building of cloisters; trade with foreign lands; and the defence of the realm. When Finns and Russians sailed into Lake Malaren five years before, plundering and burning the town of Sigtuna, and killing Archbishop Jon, there was much for the kingdom's council to decide. It could never have been done at a ting ting with a thousand arguing men. A new city would have to be built to obstruct the inlet to Malaren, at Agnefit where Malaren met the Eastern Sea. Now a start had been made; defensive towers had been built, booms and chains had been stretched across the rivers so that no plunderers from the East could come back, at least not unnoticed as they did the last time. Such things were decided at the king's council. This was new. with a thousand arguing men. A new city would have to be built to obstruct the inlet to Malaren, at Agnefit where Malaren met the Eastern Sea. Now a start had been made; defensive towers had been built, booms and chains had been stretched across the rivers so that no plunderers from the East could come back, at least not unnoticed as they did the last time. Such things were decided at the king's council. This was new.

Arn was well aware of where Agnefit was situated, since he had once ridden that way and past Stocksund when he was returning from ostra Aros on his way to Bjalbo. He once proposed that it was there the king ought to have his seat rather than down at Nas in the middle of Lake Vattern.

No matter how impatient King Knut was to find the discussion moving in a completely different direction from that he had intended, he couldn't help asking Arn to tell him more about this unexpected idea. What was wrong with Nas?

'The location,' replied Arn with a laugh. Nas was built by Karl Sverkersson for one simple reason. The king wanted to have a castle that was so safe that no one with murder on his mind could reach him. Arn and Knut knew better than anyone how futile that thought was, since it was at Nas that they had killed King Karl, less than an arrow-shot from the place where they now sat many years later.

'The king should ideally have his seat where the gold and silver for the kingdom flow through,' Arn went on. 'Considering the present trade routes and how they might look in the future, this site should be in the east of the kingdom rather than in the west. For to the west lies Denmark.'

From Linkoping in Eastern Gotaland they could certainly handle the affairs of the kingdom, especially trade with Lubeck, and better than from remote Nas. But Linkoping had been the Sverkers' city from olden times, and for a king from the Erik clan that would be like seeking a home in a hornets' nest. Instead the king should build himself a new city, by the Eastern Sea, a city that belonged to no one else.

Knut argued that Nas was safer. Here they could either defend themselves or flee, and for a good part of the year it was inaccessible to any enemy. If they built a new city it could be taken by storm and burned. Arn countered that the site at Agnefit and Stocksund was suitable for building a city that could not be taken. Besides they had only one enemy, and that was Denmark; if the Danes wanted to go to war against Western Gotaland they could simply take the land route north from Skne. And sailing past the Danes from Lodose down to Lubeck would no longer be possible if the Danes should deny them pa.s.sage. Denmark was a great power. But the east coast of the realm was not as easy for them to reach. And from Agnefit it was closer to Lubeck than from Nas, if reckoned in the same way that Knut had reckoned when he said that the closest church to Forsvik was the one at Nas. It would be the same if they moved the power of the realm from Nas to the east coast.

They twisted and turned the idea of the new city by the Eastern Sea, but finally Knut wanted to get back to matters he had planned to discuss. Most difficult was the intractable Archbishop Petter, or Petrus as he called himself. Having a hostile archbishop on his neck was the worst thing that could befall a king. Archbishop Petter was a Sverker man, and he made not the slightest effort to hide his ties to the clan. And his ambition was clear. He wanted to tear the crown from his own king and hand it to Sverker Karlsson, who had lived his entire life in Denmark.

The king's council appointed every bishop in the realm, Knut explained. A bishop received his staff and ring from the king, and no one could become bishop without the king's will. Unfortunately it wasn't quite as simple with the archbishop, for the king could neither refuse nor appoint him. It was Rome that decided, but now Rome had a.s.signed that power to Archbishop Absalon in Lund, which was the same as handing it to Denmark.

So the Danes decided who was going to be archbishop in the land of the Swedes and Goths. No matter how backwards that might seem, nothing could be done about it. And even if Knut did what he could to cleanse the crowd of bishops of all Sverker men, those rogues changed their loyalty as soon as they received their ring and staff. Then they obeyed the archbishop regardless of what secret promises they had made to the king before receiving power. A cleric could never be trusted.

And that wily Petter never ceased arguing that Knut had not sufficiently atoned for the killing of King Karl. As long as the deed was not atoned for, it meant that he had unjustly seized the crown, even though he had been crowned and anointed. And a crown unjustly seized could not be inherited by the eldest son, Petter claimed.

There was also much grumbling about the claim that Queen Cecilia Blanca had actually taken cloister vows, so that her sons Erik, Jon, Joar, and Knut were all illegitimate. And illegitimate sons could not inherit the crown either, according to Petter. Archbishop Petter kept pulling on these two reins, sometimes in one direction and sometimes in the other.

Arn argued that the Church could not defy the king's choice of successor. If the council decided to name Erik jarl as king after Knut, the bishops could grumble about it, roll their eyes, and talk about sin. And of course they could refuse to crown Erik. But there had been uncrowned kings of the realm before.

Unless all the bishops then went off to Denmark and crowned that Sverker instead, Knut put in, sounding disconsolate.

'Then no man in the lands of the Swedes and Goths would take the matter seriously, and such a king in foreign service would never be able to set his foot in the realm,' Arn said calmly.

'But what if such a king came leading a Danish army?' asked Knut, now looking anxious.

'Then whoever wins the war will triumph, that's nothing new,' said Arn. 'It's the same as if the Danes wanted to turn us into Danes today; who we select as king will not determine the outcome.'

'Do you think the Danes could do that? Could they conquer us?' Knut asked, tears visible in his eyes.

'Yes, undoubtedly,' said Arn. 'If we were so foolish as to meet a Danish army on the battlefield today, they would enjoy a great victory. If I were your marshal I would advise you not to fight them.'

'So we'd be lost, and also disgraced because we refused to fight for our honour and our freedom?'

'No,' said Arn. 'Not at all. It's a long way from Sjaelland to Nas, and even further to the Swedes' ostra Aros. If a Danish army invaded our land, they would naturally want to have a quick and decisive victory, as long as the season was favorable and their supply lines were good. Now imagine if we didn't give them that opportunity. They would be expecting, just as you are, that we would immediately call for a campaign, that every man in the realm would put on his iron helmet and come with axe in hand to be crushed by the Danish cavalry. They would die bravely and with honour, but they would die. What if we didn't do that?'

'Then we'd lose our honour, and no one will follow a king without honour!' Knut replied with a sudden flash of wrath, pounding his fist on the table.

'No one follows a dead king,' said Arn coldly. 'If the Danes don't get the big battle they're hoping for, they won't win. They'll burn a city. They'll plunder villages, and it will cost us much misery. But then winter will come. Then their supplies will melt away, and we'll take them one by one and cut off their supply lines home to Denmark. When spring comes you'll be the great victor. More honour than that you cannot win.'

'In truth you think like no one else when it comes to war,' said King Knut.

'There you are wrong, absolutely,' replied Arn with a smile that was almost impudent. 'I think like a thousand men, many of whom I knew. In the Holy Land we were no more than a thousand men against a superior force infinitely greater than that which the Danes can mount. And the Knights Templar fought with great success for half a century.'

'Until you lost!' King Knut objected.

'Quite true,' said Arn. 'We lost when a fool of a king decided to risk our entire army against a far superior enemy in a single battle. Then we lost. If we had been allowed to continue as we were accustomed to doing, we would have possessed the Holy Land even today.'

'What was that king's name?'

'Guy de Lusignan. His advisor was named Gerard de Ridefort. May their names live in eternal infamy!'

For the brothers Jacob and Marcus Wachtian the journey to Skara was one of the strangest they had ever taken, and yet they were both well-travelled men.

Sir Arn had first intended that the brothers should travel with only a few of his thralls as guides, but they had refused this offer in fright and disgust, saying that they would have a hard time making purchases in a language they didn't understand. Actually it was the dark nights along the deserted riverbanks that they feared. This Nordic land was a land of demons, they were both convinced of that. And the people they encountered were often hard to distinguish from animals, and that was frightening too.

At first Sir Arn had been unwilling to leave his construction work, but he gave in to their objections and decided that both he and his wife would come along, since she had purchases to make as well. The brothers had pointed out that it seemed unwise to travel carrying the gold and silver necessary to buy such a long list of items when they had no armed hors.e.m.e.n with them. But Sir Arn had only laughed, giving them an exaggerated chivalrous bow, and a.s.suring them that a Templar knight was at their disposal. He would be travelling in battle attire, taking with him his bow and quiver in addition to the sword and battle-axe he always carried.

As they loaded their cart with two oxen onto the ship, along with their horses and travelling accoutrements, Sir Arn realized that they needed someone to drive the ox-cart when they proceeded further on land. He called over two boys who were full of eagerness; with bow and quiver in their hands they came running just as the ship was about to cast off.

They had engaged an empty riverboat with eight foul-smelling and sly-looking oarsmen for the journey. The Wachtian brothers thought they were risking their lives to venture out into the uninhabited and terrifying countryside with gold and silver right under the noses of such men. But they soon changed their att.i.tude when they saw with what submissive and almost terror-stricken looks these river hooligans watched Sir Arn.

The route took them via Askeberga, the same way they had come, and on to the lake called ostansjo. From there they did not continue northwest toward Arnas, but south for many hours on a different river, until they came to the place where everything had to be unloaded onto horses for the rest of the journey.

From the boat landing by the river the road to the nearest town pa.s.sed through a dense forest. Because it was the only route and because those who wanted to go to the market in town had to travel this way, it wasn't hard to reckon what dangers might await them in the depths of the forest.

The brothers' premonitions were confirmed, for in the midst of the forest Sir Arn, riding at the head of the column, suddenly reined in his horse, raised his right hand as a sign to halt, and put on his helmet. He examined the ground in front of him closely, then looked up into the overhanging crowns of the trees before he called out something in a language that made the forest come alive. Robbers climbed down from the trees and appeared from behind bushes and tree trunks. But instead of rushing forward in an attack that would have gained them considerable riches if they had succeeded, the robbers lined up with heads bowed and weapons lowered and allowed the small column to pa.s.s without loosing a single arrow. They had never seen less effectual robbers.

Marcus jested happily about this when they emerged from the forest and saw a little town with a church in the distance. Robbers like these would not have been long-lived, and certainly not fat, if they had plied their trade in Outremer.

Jacob, doubting that this could be a typical way for Nordic robbers to behave, rode up alongside Sir Arn and asked him what had just happened. When Jacob fell back and slipped in beside his brother, he was able to explain with some amus.e.m.e.nt.

The robbers were not merely robbers, they were also tax collectors for the bishop in the town, and it seemed that the role they a.s.sumed depended on who came riding. From some people they collected taxes for their bishop; others they plundered on their own behalf, since they received no other payment for their work as tax collectors.

But this time it was to be neither taxes nor plunder. For when Sir Arn discovered the robbers waiting in ambush, he told them how it was. First, that he was Arn Magnusson and could singlehandedly kill them all if he was provoked. Second, that he was of the Folkung clan. That meant that no robber, in service to a bishop or just out for his own benefit, would live longer than three sundowns after having loosed an arrow, even if he managed to escape from Sir Arn. The robbers had found this argument entirely convincing.

The clan that Sir Arn belonged to must therefore be almost like a Bedouin tribe, Jacob thought. This barbarian land did indeed have a royal power and church like all others. There were worldly armed forces and ecclesiastical ones. They had seen that at the wedding feast with their own eyes. So the law was upheld in much the same way as in other Christian lands.

But in what land could someone ride up to robbers or tax collectors and say that he belonged to a certain clan, and that statement alone would make them all lay down their arms? Only in Outremer. Anyone who attacked a member of certain Bedouin tribes could be a.s.sured that he would be hunted by avengers until the end of time if necessary. The same was apparently true here in the North. At any rate, these northern Bedouins could be considered safe company.

They rode right past the first stinking puddle of a town, which clearly housed a greedy bishop. They didn't even stop for food. Jacob and Marcus were both relieved and disappointed by this, since their b.u.t.tocks ached from many hours' riding, but the smell coming from the town was extremely repellent to them.

But eventually they were rewarded for what they had endured, for a few hours later as the evening cold came sweeping in as a raw mist, they found themselves approaching a cloister. There they would stay for the night.

For the Wachtian brothers it was as if they had suddenly come home. They were quartered in their own room with whitewashed walls and a crucifix in the hospitium hospitium of the cloister. The monks who greeted them all spoke Frankish and behaved like real human beings, and the food that was served after vespers was first-cla.s.s, as was the wine. It was like coming to an oasis with ripe dates and clear, cold water in the middle of a burning desert just as astonishing, just as blessed. of the cloister. The monks who greeted them all spoke Frankish and behaved like real human beings, and the food that was served after vespers was first-cla.s.s, as was the wine. It was like coming to an oasis with ripe dates and clear, cold water in the middle of a burning desert just as astonishing, just as blessed.

Jacob and Marcus were not allowed inside the cloister walls, but they saw Sir Arn put on his white Templar mantle and go inside to pray. According to what his wife told them in her amusing and pure church Latin, he was visiting his mother's grave.

The next day they left a good deal of their clothing and travelling food at the hospitium hospitium, as they would be returning for another night after the day's bargaining in the town, which was called Skara.

They had been told that Skara was the biggest and oldest town in all of Western Gotaland and thus their expectations were high. But it was hardly Damascus they rode into that morning. Here was the same stench of waste and foul air as outside the smaller town whose impossible name they had already forgotten; here were the same unclean people and streets without either cobblestones or gutters. And the primitive little church with the two towers that was called the cathedral was dark and oppressive rather than inspiring any sort of blessing. But as good Christians they couldn't refuse when Sir Arn and the rest of the party, his wife and the two boys, went inside to pray. Yet Jacob and Marcus felt that this was a church where G.o.d was not present, either because He had never arrived or because He had forgotten where it was. Inside it was damp and smelled of heathendom.

On the outskirts of the town there was a street that was clean and swept like a Frankish town or one in Outremer. Here there was a different aroma, of cleanliness and coffee and food and spices, which seemed familiar, and here Frankish was spoken, as well as some other languages which were not Norse.

They had come to the street of the gla.s.s masters, the coppersmiths, and the stonecutters. Samples of gla.s.s and stone and copper pots were displayed along the street, and interpreters came running from every direction to offer their services when they saw the fat money purses hanging from Sir Arn's belt. They soon learned that their skills were for once not needed.

They visited one booth after another, sat down and accepted cold water in beautiful gla.s.ses, politely but firmly declining the ale tankards that were also urged upon them. It was like a little Damascus; here they could converse with everyone in understandable languages, and learn about things that were impossible to discover outside this little street.

They learned how gla.s.s sand with copper inclusions or copper sulfate could be ordered from Denmark and Lubeck if they wanted to produce gla.s.s with a yellow or blue colour. The substances for green or rose colour, or colourless gla.s.s, were available locally if one knew the right place to find them. Sir Arn soon sent the two youths to fetch the ox-cart they had left with guards outside the cathedral, and then he went out buying. Eventually the cart was heavily loaded with substances for gla.s.s production; from some booths he bought everything they had on hand. There was also lead in great quant.i.ties, since the gla.s.smasters worked mostly on church windows. Many merry bargains were concluded that day. Sir Arn spent a great deal of money without bothering to d.i.c.ker about prices, which seemed to annoy his wife as much as it did the Wachtian brothers. It was an unusual day for these mostly Frankish gla.s.smasters, as they were used to speaking through interpreters and selling finished gla.s.s, not speaking their own language with a Northerner who was as fluent as they were. Nor had they been involved in selling tools and materials for making gla.s.s instead of the gla.s.s they made themselves. But Sir Arn did buy a few gla.s.s pieces to take along, to be used as samples, as he said.

It was the same with the coppersmiths. Judging by the hammered and tin-plated vessels displayed outside the coppersmiths' booths, both the Wachtian brothers and Sir Arn could easily see that they could produce much better wares with their Damascene coppersmiths at Forsvik. Sir Arn did buy one vessel, but just to be polite. He bought mostly copper rods and tin ingots.

When their cart was already heavily loaded and they had visited every gla.s.smaster and coppersmith along one side of the street, they returned slowly along the other side to meet the stonemasters or their servants and apprentices who were at home. Many of the masters themselves were out at church construction sites that required constant visits. Jacob and Marcus learned to their astonishment that the business of building churches was flourishing more in this small country than anywhere else in the world. Here more than a hundred churches were being built simultaneously. With so many orders for church construction, the stonemasters could charge twice as much as anywhere in France or England or Saxony.

One of the stonemasters was more expensive than all the others, and outside his booth drawings had been set up to show his commissions from the construction of the cathedral itself. They all went from one picture to the next guessing what they were seeing, which was often easy for those familiar with the Holy Scriptures. Sir Arn's wife in particular appeared to take a great interest in this master's artistry. Sir Arn then took his entire party inside to meet the master, who at first seemed peevish and dismissive, complaining that he had neither the time nor the inclination to converse. But when he grasped that he could speak his own language with this buyer, his att.i.tude quickly changed; he began eagerly explaining to them all the ideas behind his work and what he would like to do. Sir Arn mentioned that he wished to rebuild the church that belonged to his own clan, that it would be new construction from the ground up, but it would also be consecrated anew. This church would be dedicated not to the Virgin Mary, like almost all the other churches in Western Gotaland, but to the Holy Sepulchre.

The stonemaster grew even more attentive when he heard this. For many years, as he said, he had carved the Virgin Mary in every conceivable situation: gentle and good, strict and admonishing, with Her dead Son, with Her Son as a babe, at the Annunciation by the Holy Spirit, on the road to Bethlehem, before the star, in the manger, and in whatever other scenes could be imagined.

But G.o.d's Grave? Then he would have to rethink the whole design. It would take the right man, and it would also take time to contemplate the design. But as to time, the stonemaster, whose name was Marcellus, unfortunately had commitments all over the land which would keep him occupied for a year and a half. Before that it would be impossible to leave without breaking contracts.

Sir Arn didn't think that the delay would be any problem; it was more important that the work would be beautiful for all eternity, since what was carved in stone was meant to endure. So he agreed to hire the stonemaster.

Both Marcus and Jacob felt alarmed when they heard how hastily Sir Arn allowed himself to be persuaded to put down an advance, and a shamelessly large sum at that. But they saw no opportunity to interfere in the matter. The negotiation ended with Sir Arn paying the outrageous sum of ten besants in gold as an advance on one year's work, and he promised another ten for each additional year the work would take. Stonemaster Marcellus was not slow in accepting this proposal.

On the return journey to Varnhem cloister in the early evening, it seemed at first that Sir Arn's wife reproached him, although mildly, for his irresponsible way of handling silver and gold. He was not in the least fazed by this, but answered her with a happy expression and eager gestures; even for someone who did not speak Norse it was obvious that he was describing his grandiose plans.

Finally he began to sing, and then she could not help singing along with him. It was a beautiful song, and both brothers understood that it was churchly and not worldly.

In this way they approached the cloister of Varnhem with heavenly singers leading the way before the sun set and the raw evening cold swept in. The brothers agreed that this journey had not only presented surprises, but also more good than either of them would have expected.

The next day their departure was delayed while Sir Arn's wife did business buying parchment and also roses that she bought in wet leather sacks with earth inside, pruned down so that only the stalks stuck up from the packing material. They didn't have to understand Norse to see that this woman was better than her husband at business. But they did have to wait while she and the cloister's garden-master bargained over every little coin. Sir Arn made no move to intervene. At last his wife had in the cart the plants she wanted, and judging by the roses climbing up the walls of Varnhem in red and white, she had purchased much beauty for the adornment of Forsvik.

Between the bustling days of Bartelsmas, when the last of the harvest was brought in, and Morsmas, the summer returned briefly to Western Gotaland with a week of stubborn south winds.

This time was just as busy for Cecilia as it was for Arn. Everything had to be harvested in the gardens, and then she had to try to save whatever she could. She toiled as hard as the thralls she had engaged to dig up the apple trees with their roots to replant them on the slope down toward Bottensjon. There the water would always be plentiful.

After supervising all the gardening work, she went to the Wachtian brothers at their workshop and asked about what they intended to start with and what would come later. She also persuaded them to accompany her to the smithies and pottery workshop to translate. Besides their own language and Latin the brothers had also mastered the completely foreign tongue that many of the men from the Holy Land spoke. They showed her arrow points of various types, some long and sharp as needles to penetrate chain mail, some with broad cutting edges that were meant for hunting or the enemy's horses, and others that served purposes she didn't understand. She visited the sword smithy and the workshop where they made wire for chain mail. And she went to the gla.s.sworks where she asked which of the gla.s.s samples that were set up along a bench they might make at Forsvik and which were still beyond their skill. She went to the stable thralls and asked how much fodder a horse consumed, to the livestock barn and learned how much milk a cow gave, and to the slaughterhouse to ask about salt and storage barrels.

After each such visit she returned to her abacus and writing implements. The best thing about their visit to Varnhem was not the purchase of the famous Varnhem roses, but the fact that she had laid in a good stock of parchment for making her account books. It was accounting, after all, that she knew best, even better than gardening and sewing, because for more than ten years she had kept books and taken care of all the business at two cloisters.

Finally she had everything in order and knew down to the penny the state of the economy at Forsvik. Then she went to find Arn, although it was only early evening and he was just finishing up his work with the cooling houses next to the big stream. He was happy to see her. He wiped the sweat from his brow with his index finger as was his habit, and immediately wanted her to praise the finished cooling houses. She couldn't say no but was surely not as effusive as he had thought she would be when she saw the big empty room clad in brick. Rows of empty iron hooks and rods hung there, waiting to hold food that they didn't yet have. She pointed this out so sternly that he almost ceased his lively chatter.

'Come with me to the accounting chamber and I'll explain everything to you, my beloved,' she said with her eyes lowered. She was well aware that those words would soften him. But she also knew that they were true words and not merely the wiles of a woman. It was true that he was her beloved.

But that did not lessen the necessity of telling him the truth about all the foolishness she had discovered and could prove with numbers. She prayed to herself that he would have an understanding of such things, even if thus far he had shown no interest in anything other than building for the winter.

'Look here, my love,' she said, opening up the ledger to show how much was eaten and drunk each day by both humans and livestock at Forsvik. 'This is what a horse needs in fodder every day. Here you see the total for a month, and here is what we have in our barns. So, sometime after Kyndelsmas in the midst of the bitterest cold of winter, we will have thirty-two starving horses. The meat we have slaughtered and can slaughter in the future will be gone by Annunciation Day. The consumption of lamb is such that we will have eaten it all before Christmas. The dried fish has not yet arrived. You can see that this is true, can't you?'

'Yes, these seem to be very good calculations. What do we have to do?'

'With regard to feeding the people here, the dried fish must arrive as promised, preferably long before Lent. As far as meat is concerned, you have to hire some hunters, because there are plenty of deer and boars in the woods, and inside Tiveden Forest there is an animal as big as a cow that gives much meat. As for the horses, I a.s.sume you don't want to see them slaughtered by Kyndelsmas.'

'No, of course not,' said Arn with a smile. 'Each of those horses is worth more than twenty Gothic horses or more.'

'Then we'll have to buy fodder,' Cecilia cut him off. 'It's not normal practice to buy fodder for animals, since everyone usually takes care of his own. So you'll have to tend to this matter at once before the ice begins to form and the time comes when neither boat nor sleigh can reach us. The earlier you begin in the fall, the easier it should be to buy fodder, I should think.'