The Thrall of Leif the Lucky Part 1

The Thrall of Leif the Lucky.

by Ottilie A. Liljencrantz.

FOREWORD

THE Anglo-Saxon race was in its boyhood in the days when the Vikings lived. Youth's fresh fires burned in men's blood; the unchastened turbulence of youth prompted their crimes, and their good deeds were inspired by the purity and whole-heartedness and divine simplicity of youth. For every heroic vice, the Vikings laid upon the opposite scale an heroic virtue. If they plundered and robbed, as most men did in the times when Might made Right, yet the heaven-sent instinct of hospitality was as the marrow of their bones. No beggar went from their doors without alms; no traveller asked in vain for shelter; no guest but was welcomed with holiday cheer and sped on his way with a gift. As cunningly false as they were to their foes, just so superbly true were they to their friends. The man who took his enemy's last blood-drop with relentless hate, gave his own blood with an equally unsparing hand if in so doing he might aid the cause of some sworn brother. Above all, they were a race of conquerors, whose knee bent only to its proved superior.

Not to the man who was king-born merely, did their allegiance go, but to the man who showed himself their leader in courage and their master in skill. And so it was with their choice of a religion, when at last the death-day of Odin dawned. Not to the G.o.d who forgives, nor to the G.o.d who suffered, did they give their faith; but they made their vows to the G.o.d who makes men strong, the G.o.d who is the never-dying and all-powerful Lord of those who follow Him.

The Thrall of Leif the Lucky

CHAPTER I

WHERE WOLVES THRIVE BETTER THAN LAMBS

Vices and virtues The sons of mortals bear In their b.r.e.a.s.t.s mingled; No one is so good That no failing attends him, Nor so bad as to be good for nothing.

Ha'vama'l (High Song of Odin).

It was back in the tenth century, when the mighty fair-haired warriors of Norway and Sweden and Denmark, whom the people of Southern Europe called the Northmen, were becoming known and dreaded throughout the world. Iceland and Greenland had been colonized by their dauntless enterprise. Greece and Africa had not proved distant enough to escape their ravages. The descendants of the Viking Rollo ruled in France as Dukes of Normandy; and Saxon England, misguided by Ethelred the Unready and hara.s.sed by Danish pirates, was slipping swiftly and surely under Northern rule. It was the time when the priests of France added to their litany this pet.i.tion: "From the fury of the Northmen, deliver us, good Lord."

The old, old Norwegian city of Trondhjem, which lies on Trondhjem Fiord, girt by the river Nid, was then King Olaf Trygva.s.son's new city of Nidaros, and though hardly more than a trading station, a hamlet without streets, it was humming with prosperity and jubilant life. The sh.o.r.e was fringed with ships whose gilded dragon-heads and purple-and-yellow hulls and azure-and-scarlet sails were reflected in the waves until it seemed as if rainbows had been melted in them. Hillside and river-bank bloomed with the gay tents of chieftains who had come from all over the North to visit the powerful Norwegian king. Traders had scattered booths of tempting wares over the plain, so that it looked like fair-time. The broad roads between the estates that cl.u.s.tered around the royal residence were thronged with clanking hors.e.m.e.n, with richly dressed traders followed by covered carts of precious merchandise, with beautiful fair-haired women riding on gilded chair-like saddles, with monks and slaves, with white-bearded lawmen and pompous landowners.

Along one of those roads that crossed the city from the west, a Danish warrior came riding, one keen May morning, with a young English captive tied to his saddle-bow.

The Northman was a great, hulking, wild-maned, brute-faced fellow, capped by an iron helmet and wrapped in a mantle of coa.r.s.e gray, from whose folds the handle of a battle-axe looked out suggestively; but the boy was of the handsomest Saxon type. Though barely seventeen, he was man-grown, and lithe and well-shaped; and he carried himself n.o.bly, despite his clumsy garments of white wool. His gold-brown hair had been clipped close as a mark of slavery, and there were fetters on his limbs; but chains could not restrain the glance of his proud gray eyes, which flashed defiance with every look.

Crossing the city northward, they came where a trading-booth stood on its outskirts--an odd looking place of neatly built log walls tented over with gay striped linen. Beyond, the plain rose in gentle hills, which were overlooked in their turn by pine-clad snow-capped mountains.

On one side, the river hurried along in surging rapids; on the other, one could see the broad elbow of the fiord glittering in the sun. At the sight of the booth, the Saxon scowled darkly, while the Dane gave a grunt of relief. Drawing rein before the door, the warrior dismounted and pulled down his captive.

It was a scene of barbaric splendor that the gay roof covered. The walls displayed exquisitely wrought weapons, and rare fabrics interwoven with gleaming gold and silver threads. Piles of rich furs were heaped in the corners, amid a medley of gilded drinking-horns and bronze vessels and graceful silver urns. Across the back of the booth stretched a benchful of sullen-looking creatures war-captives to be sold as slaves, native thralls, and two Northmen enslaved for debt. In the centre of the floor, seated upon one of his ma.s.sive steel-bound chests, gorgeous in velvet and golden chains, the trader presided over his sales like a prince on his throne.

The Dane saluted him with a surly nod, and he answered with such smooth words as the thrifty old Norse proverbs advise every man to practise.

"Greeting, Gorm Arnorsson! Here is great industry, if already this Spring you have gone on a Viking voyage and gotten yourself so good a piece of property! How came you by him?"

Gorm gave his "property" a rough push forward, and his harsh voice came out of his bull-thick neck like a bellow. "I got him in England last Summer. We ravaged his father's castle, I and twenty ship-mates, and slew all his kinsmen. He comes of good blood; I am told for certain that he is a jarl's son. And I swear he is sound in wind and limb. How much will you pay me for him, Karl Grimsson?"

The owner of the booth stroked his long white beard and eyed the captive critically. It seemed to him that he had never seen a king's son with a haughtier air. The boy wore his fetters as though they had been bracelets from the hands of Ethelred.

"Is it because you value him so highly that you keep him in chains?" he asked.

"In that I will not deceive you," said the Dane, after a moment's hesitation. "Though he is sound in wind and limb, he is not sound in temper. Shortly after I got him, I sold him to Gilli the Wealthy for a herd-boy; but because it was not to his mind on the dairy-farm, he lost half his herd and let wolves prey on the rest, and when the headman would have flogged him for it, he slew him. He has the temper of a black elf."

"He does not look to be a cooing dove," the trader a.s.sented. "But how came it that he was not slain for this? I have heard that Gilli is a fretful man."

The Dane snorted. "More than anything else he is greedy for property, and his wife Bertha advised him not to lose the price he had paid. It is my belief that she has a liking for the cub; she was an English captive before the Wealthy One married her. He followed her advice, as was to be expected, and saddled me with the whelp when I pa.s.sed through the district yesterday. I should have sent him to Thor myself," he added with a suggestive swing of his axe, "but that silver is useful to me also. I go to join my shipmates in Wisby. And I am in haste, Karl Grimsson. Take him, and let me have what you think fair."

It seemed as if the trader would never finish the meditative caressing of his beard, but at last he arose and called for his scales. The Dane took the little heap of silver rings weighed out to him, and strode out of the tent. At the same time, he pa.s.sed out of the English boy's life.

What a pity that the result of their short acquaintance could not have disappeared with him!

The trader surveyed his new possession, standing straight and slim before him. "What are you called?" he demanded. "And whence come you?

And of what kin?"

"I am called Alwin," answered the thrall; "and I come from Northumbria."

He hesitated, and the blood mounted to his face. "But I will not tell you my father's name," he finished proudly, "that you may shame him in shaming me."

The trader's patience was a little chafed. Peaceful merchants were also men of war between times in those days.

Suddenly he unsheathed the sword that hung at his side, and laid its point against the thrall's breast.

"I ask you again of what kin you come. If you do not answer now, it is unlikely that you will be alive to answer a third question."

Perhaps young Alwin's bronzed cheeks lost a little of their color, but his lip curled scornfully. So they stood, minute after minute, the sharp point p.r.i.c.king through the cloth until the boy felt it against his skin.

Gradually the trader's face relaxed into a grim smile. "You are a young wolf," he said at last, sheathing his weapon; "yet go and sit with the others. It may be that wolves thrive better than lambs in the North."

CHAPTER II

THE MAID IN THE SILVER HELMET

In a maiden's words No one should place faith, Nor in what a woman says; For on a turning wheel Have their hearts been formed, And guile in their b.r.e.a.s.t.s been laid.

Ha'vama'l

Day after day, week after week, Alwin sat waiting to see where the next turn of misfortune's wheel would land him. Interesting people visited the booth continually. Now it was a party of royal guardsmen to buy weapons,--splendid mail-clad giants who ate at King Olaf's board, slept a his hall, and fought to the death at his side. Again it was a minstrel, with a harp at his back, who stopped to rest and exchange a song for a horn of mead. Once the Queen herself, riding in a shining gilded wagon, came in and bought some of the graceful spiral bracelets.

She said that Alwin's eyes were as bright as a young serpent's; but she did not buy him.

The doorway framed an ever changing picture,--budding birch trees along the river-bank; men ploughing in the valley; shepherds tending flocks that looked like dots of cotton wool on the green hillsides. Sometimes bands of gay folk from the King's house rode by to the hunt, spurs jingling, horns braying, falcons at their wrists. Sometimes brawny followers of the visiting chiefs swaggered past in groups, and the boy could hear their shouting and laughter as they held drinking-bouts in the hostelry near by. Occasionally their rough voices would grow rougher, and an arrow would fly past the door; or there would be a clash of weapons, followed by a groan.

One day, as Alwin sat looking out, his chin resting in his hand, his elbow on his knee, his attention was caught by two riders winding swiftly down a hill-path on the right. At first, one was only a blur of gray and the other a flame of scarlet; they disappeared behind a grove of aspens, then reappeared nearer, and he could make out a white beard on the gray figure and a veil of golden hair above the scarlet kirtle.

What hair for a boy, even the n.o.blest born! It was the custom of all free men to wear their locks uncut; but this golden mantle! Yet could it be a girl? Did a girl ever wear a helmet like a silver bowl, and a kirtle that stopped at the knee? If it was a girl, she must be one of those shield-maidens of whom the minstrels sang. Alwin watched the pair curiously as they galloped down the last slope and turned into the lane beside the river. They must pa.s.s the booth, and then...

His brain whirled, and he stood up in his intense interest. Something had startled the white steed that bore the scarlet kirtle; he swerved aside and rose on his haunches with a suddenness that nearly unseated his rider; then he took the bronze bit between his teeth and leaped forward. Whitebeard and his bay mare were left behind. The yellow hair streamed out like a banner; nearer, and Alwin could see that it was indeed a girl. She wound her hands in the reins and kept her seat like a centaur. But suddenly something gave way. Over she went, sidewise; and by the wrist, tangled in the reins, the horse dragged her over the stony road.

Forgetting his manacled limbs, Alwin started forward; but it was all over in an instant. One of the trader's servants flew at the animal's head and stopped him, almost at the door of the booth. In another moment a crowd gathered around the fallen girl and shut her from his view.

Alwin gazed at the shifting backs with a dreadful vision of golden hair torn and splashed with blood. She must be dead, for she had not once screamed. His head was still ringing with the shrieks of his mother's waiting-women, as the Danes bore them out of the burning castle.

Whitebeard came galloping up, puffing and panting. He was a puny little German, with a face as small and withered as a winter apple, but a body swaddled in fur-trimmed tunics until it seemed as fat as a polar bear's.

He rolled off his horse; the crowd parted before him. Then the English youth experienced another shock.

Bruised and muddy, but neither dead nor fainting, the girl stood examining her wrist with the utmost calmness. Though her face was white and drawn with pain, she looked up at the old man with a little twisted smile.