Odin’s Child by Bruce MacBain Read Free Book Online Page B

roaring jet of Geysir.
    More hours of riding brought us, at last, out of the reek of Hawkdale and to the edge of Hoskuld’s fields. With the sun already slanting toward the hills, we straggled into his yard and slid from our horses.
    My uncle was an elongated man: long of neck, long of nose, long of tooth, and his body, too, was put together of long, brittle limbs. He stood in the doorway, peering owlishly at us until he could discern our shapes and a little of our features, for he was nearly blind. He put out his arms as we approached and embraced us gravely, one by one.
    â€œSister,” he pronounced in his mournful bass—a single word as good as a speech—stern, tender, and reproachful all at once. Jorunn leaned against his chest and dabbed at her eyes. “Gunnar the Handsome,” he spoke over her head, “you look fit as ever. And Vigdis Sveinsdottir. He bent down for her to kiss his cheek. “Odd Tangle-Hair, what a black, hairy face you’ve gotten.” He held my chin in his big-knuckled hand, turning me critically this way and that.” And of course, Thorvald … welcome to my hall.”
    The two men barely touched hands. There was no love lost here—not for these thirty years past, ever since Hoskuld took up the new religion and did everything in his power to get Jorunn to divorce her heathen husband. This was the one instance, as I have already said, in which she had disobeyed her brother.
    As hirelings and thralls took our horses, we trooped through the door into the glow of Hoskuld’s spacious hall, far larger than our own.
    In honor of our visit, the wooden walls were hung with tapestries—fine stuffs crowded with scenes of warriors and sailing ships, which I never tired of looking at. On the wall-benches, thick fleeces were spread where we would sit to dinner and later sleep. Along one wall stood tubs of butter and barrels of milk and beer, and over the long hearth hung simmering cauldrons of meat that filled the air with its savory aroma. My uncle lived well.
    â€œTowels to wipe away the dust of travel,” he ordered. They were brought promptly by the servants. “Ah, but don’t sit down yet, kinsmen,” he said, “for we’ve still time before dinner to walk the farm.”
    We always walked the farm. This was our ritual every spring upon arriving: to admire his new lambs, foals, and calves. Husbandry offered the only safe subject of talk between Hoskuld and my father.
    Kalf Slender-Leg came in the nick of time to rescue me. Kalf wasHoskuld’s grandson and my closest friend—to tell the truth, my only friend, besides Gunnar.
    â€œOdd, how goes it with you?”
    â€œPretty well, friend Kalf.”
    We always began shyly like that. Months at a stretch passed between our meetings and we surprised each other every time by being taller, gruffer, hairier, different in a dozen small ways. He was half a year younger than me, gangling and lean, with curly red hair and eyes quick to smile. His whole nature was brisk and lively.
    He had a sheaf of arrows in his belt and two bows. He handed me one.
    â€œHeh, what’s this?” said my uncle, frowning down on us from his great height. Even though he had a stoop, he was quite tall. He made some rumbling and expostulating noises but ended with the observation that, “Young dogs must go off on their own,” though, he warned, we should get no supper if we were late returning.
    We were always ‘young dogs’ to Hoskuld, which we took to be an affectionate name, for he was a kindly man at bottom, though inclined to be pompous.
    Promising to be prompt for dinner, we raced out the gate, followed by Kalf’s black-and-tan bitch and by an envious look from Gunnar.
    â€œHel’s Hall!” I swore, punching him on the back, “it’s good to see you!”
    â€œAnd you, by Odin’s crow!”
    Kalf liked to imitate my speech, swearing roundly by Hel, Thor,