Wolfskin

  It was nobody’s fault that the mist came in early and swiftly. One moment they were striding along, wondering exactly what King Engus meant when he said it wasn’t much farther, and the next they were enveloped in a thick, gray blanket and could scarcely see their own feet on the ground, let alone their companions. Eyvind halted. He heard Engus calling, and Tadhg translating, Stop! Stop here! They gathered in a hollow; it was quite clear they could not go on in any direction, not until morning. The plan had been to return to the western bay, where a scattering of fisherfolk dwelt, and spend the night there in relative comfort.

  “I regret this greatly,” Engus told them. “There is no choice but to settle down here and wait for tomorrow’s sun to disperse this mist. Are we all accounted for?”

  They moved in closer. Eirik was there, with long-legged Holgar and tow-haired Grim. But Ulf was not there, and neither was Somerled. And when King Engus counted his own men, two were missing. They called through the mist: “Ulf! Ulf, where are you? Somerled!” And once or twice, at first, they thought they heard a faint response. After a while, they stopped calling. The mist clung so close, it was no longer safe to attempt to bring a man to your side by sound, not with such treacherous ground to cover.

  “With luck they’re all together, as we are, and can shelter well enough till morning,” Eirik said. “A pity we can’t make a fire, they might see that. It’ll be a long, cold night.”

  As Eyvind lay miserably awake, shivering under his wolfskin, the last thing he saw between the shreds of mist before the light faded was the straight-backed figure of Brother Tadhg, sitting with his wooden cross in his hand and his lips moving in prayer.

  Morning came, and there was no sign of the others. Eyvind was eager to begin a search, for there was a chill feeling of dread creeping over him that could only be banished by immediate action. Engus made them wait. The mist still lingered, though a faint sun tried to pierce the veil; it was not yet safe to venture forth. Eyvind paced, biting his nails to the quick. Eirik watched him, frowning.

  “All may be well,” said Brother Tadhg. “If they are as wise as King Engus, they will be sheltering in a place of safety as we are. We may see them approaching as soon as the day clears.” But there was a pallor about his features, and his fingers seldom left the cross.

  At last the mist began to lift. They divided into four groups, two men in each, one of the islanders and one of Ulf’s party. King Engus himself set off with Eirik; Eyvind was paired with a silent, black-bearded fellow, who moved swift and sure on the difficult terrain. The only man left behind was Brother Tadhg. If the others returned before the search parties, he could explain what was happening and so prevent a pointless exercise of tracking in circles.

  Eyvind and his partner went northward and inland. The pace was relentless. When they could run, they ran. With what breath they could spare, they shouted the names of the lost men. They could hear the other searchers in the distance calling the same names, but there was no reply. Time passed. They rested briefly, and Eyvind shared the contents of his skin water bottle with the islander. They went on. Rain fell for a time; the rocks underfoot became slippery, and Eyvind was glad they had not taken the clifftop route. Yet perhaps they should have done. A long time ago, he had helped find straying stock and, on occasion, lost children in the mountains above Hammarsby. Maybe what he should do was go back, and look where nobody else was prepared to look. A pox on Somerled. It would be just like him to be sitting there neat and cool when they returned, saying with an air of faint surprise, Oh dear, Eyvind. It was only a game.

  The sun was at midpoint. They had been searching all morning, and were heading back to the start with nothing to show for themselves.

  “Shh,” Eyvind hissed suddenly, for he had heard a cry, faint but unmistakable. He cupped his ear and pointed so the islander could understand. There it was again, from higher up the craggy hillside, a sound that was the voice of a man in some distress. They scrambled up together and found one of Engus’s warriors lying behind a rock with his leg bent under him in quite an improbable position: broken, no doubt of it. The fellow was gray in the face and sweating hard. They worked quickly. The man screamed as Eyvind splinted the leg with arrow shafts and a binding torn from the other islander’s undershirt. There was no asking, What happened? The fellow was in too much pain to speak coherently. They carried him down as best they could; it was too far to the bay, where such useful items as a flat board or a flask of strong drink might be found. When they got back to the place where they had slept, there was Somerled, looking pallid and drained, and the other of Engus’s men who had been missing was sitting nearby, his expression angry and confused. Neither appeared hurt. There was no sign of Ulf.

  “Where’s my brother?” Somerled was demanding. “What’s happening here? There is surely some mischief at work!”

  “It is strange indeed that you were separated thus in the night, and stranger still that we have found all but your brother,” King Engus said. He, too, sounded edgy. “But there’s a decision to be made now. This man is badly injured. We must get him off the cliffs. And it is already late: not long before the mist closes in again.”

  “We’ll carry him down,” Eirik said, “my brother and I, and Holgar and Grim here. We can put together a sort of sling, using our cloaks; he’ll be more comfortable that way. It won’t take long to get to that settlement in the bay.”

  The man’s breathing was shallow; Eyvind thought he had fallen some way. Perhaps a broken leg was the least of it.

  “Very well,” Engus was saying. “But—”

  “What about my brother?” Somerled’s voice was shaking. “We must find Ulf. Perhaps he, too, lies somewhere in these accursed hills with broken bones. We must search again. These men cannot go back.”

  “My own warriors will remain and search,” Engus said, glancing at Somerled. “We’ve no intention of giving up. We may yet find your brother before nightfall.”

  Somerled’s face was white, his mouth a thin line. “Not good enough,” he said coldly. “My brother went missing in company with your own men. They are returned and he is not. How can I trust these same men to bring him back safely?”

  Tadhg translated, blank-faced.

  “What are you implying?” Engus drew himself up to his full height, brows creased ferociously. “Are you suggesting there has been some foul play here?”

  “Somerled,” said Eyvind quietly.

  “What?” The tone was like a whip crack.

  “I will stay and help you search. Both Holgar and I, if you like. King Engus has three fit men left to help carry the sling down the hill.”

  “I don’t—”

  “Somerled. We’re brothers, remember? Trust me. I’ll help you with this.”

  Tadhg had been translating as well as he could, while at the same time kneeling by the injured man, holding his hand in an attempt to provide comfort. Now he glanced up at Eyvind.

  “Brothers?” he queried. “Is it not Eirik here who is your brother?”

  Eyvind rolled back a sleeve to show the long scar that still marked his left forearm. “Brothers of another kind,” he said.

  Tadhg nodded. A small frown appeared on his tranquil brow.

  “Pledged to help one another,” Eyvind added, not sure why he felt some further explanation was required. “Now we must go and search. Ulf may be lying hurt somewhere, and it’s late.”

  “Go with God,” said Tadhg.

  There were not many gods in evidence that day, or if there were, they were cruel and savage deities, suited to these wild shores. Engus would not leave the Norsemen to search alone; he insisted one of his own men stay. Tadhg offered to help carry the sling. Holgar remained behind. They split up as before, Holgar with the islander going inland, Eyvind and Somerled tackling the cliff edge.

  There was no good reason to suspect they would find Ulf there. Still, something compelled Eyvind that way, a chill in the blood, a darkness in the mind, a feeling whose roots were ancient and shadowy.
Like a wolf, he scented evil in the air, but he did not flee from it, as a wild creature might in order to survive. Instead, he made himself hurry toward it, and for the first time in his life he thought he felt fear. It seemed to him they were poised on the edge of another cliff here, a cliff made not of stone and earth but of suspicion and jealousy, fear and hatred. Take a step too far, and all would tumble into darkness.

  Eyvind moved cautiously, with what speed he could. It was necessary to allow for Somerled, less fleet of foot, less clever at balancing, less strong in endurance. And Somerled was distressed; his white face and angry eyes attested to that. Perhaps that was not as surprising as it seemed, Eyvind thought, as he made his way gingerly down a crack in the cliff to a place where a ledge allowed better views to north and south. Maybe it only took one fright like this to make a man realize the worth of family. It was possible Somerled’s cutting comments about his brother were merely part of another game.

  Although the ledge was high above the ocean, still the salt spray stung him. The waves below were huge, smashing the cliff face with unremitting fury. Birds flew by with harsh cries, diving close enough to unsettle his balance. Eyvind made himself breathe slowly, but he could not change the rapid thudding of his heart. “Thor,” he whispered. “Help me to see. Help me to hear as the wolf does. Help me to be strong.” He hardly understood why he had said this. He was already strong. When there was no fighting to be done, he made sure he ran and swam and shifted stones, he made sure his body would be ready for whatever challenges it must face. Yet the words were on his lips: a prayer. Help me to be strong.

  Then he looked up and to the north, and he saw something. A scrap of color, blue, white, red, something suspended below the clifftop, an old net, an old sail, moving where the wind caught and lifted it.

  “Somerled!” he called. He narrowed his eyes against the sun, and put up a hand to sweep aside his hair, which the wind was blowing insistently across his face. “No, don’t come down here, it’s not safe. But I can see something, up yonder.”

  “What?” Somerled yelled from up on the clifftop. “What can you see?”

  “I don’t know,” Eyvind whispered. But he knew. What he had seen, though his mind was refusing to put the pieces together, was a man. That was a man hanging there, somehow dangling between land and water, held cruelly balanced in air. Ulf’s blue tunic, Ulf’s white face. Ulf’s blood.

  Heart pounding, Eyvind scrambled back up, forgetting caution. Pieces of rock crumbled and fell, his foot slipped, he snatched at a clinging plant for purchase.

  “Slow down!” Somerled was stretching down a hand to help him. “What’s wrong, what is it? You look as if you’ve seen a ghost.”

  “This way.” It seemed to Eyvind that if he did not tell, if he did not put into words what he had seen, then it might still prove to be a mistake, or some bad dream from which he would emerge sweating and relieved. They walked northward until they reached a spot Eyvind judged to be roughly above the place. There were no pathways, no convenient fissures or ledges, merely the clifftop, flat and grass-covered, then a sudden descent to oblivion.

  “No wonder they missed it,” Eyvind said, trying to keep his voice under control, not to alarm Somerled. “You can’t see anything from up here. Maybe I was wrong. Maybe it’s nothing.”

  “What?” demanded Somerled. “What did you see? Tell me!”

  “A man, I thought.” Now there was no choice but to tell. “A man down there on the cliff. I don’t know how we could reach him, Somerled. It could have been just an old sail or a net. It could have been just a trick of the light.” Nonetheless, he was casting about, seeking the smallest chink or crevice where he might climb down somehow, and make sure one way or another. Above them, afternoon clouds were building.

  “Ulf!” Somerled shouted, and strode so close to the edge that it seemed he would go straight over with no hesitation whatever. Eyvind grabbed his arm, and they both teetered off balance.

  “Don’t be stupid,” Eyvind gasped, using his full weight to wrench the two of them back to safety. “Holgar’s got a rope; we’ll use that if we have to. And it’ll be me going down there, not you. Take a deep breath and try to stay calm. I told you, I may be wrong.”

  They called out to the others and heard a faint reply. While they waited, Eyvind lay on his stomach and edged himself closer to the drop while Somerled held him by the ankles. After a little, Eyvind shut his eyes. It was not the sight of the boiling sea far below that chilled his heart and froze the blood in his veins. He wriggled his body back, and for a moment could only sit there on the ground with his hands over his face.

  “What? What?” Somerled’s tone was frantic.

  “Somerled, this is bad news. It looks as if he is down there; certainly, I see a man. But I can’t tell if he is alive or dead. He seems to move, but perhaps that is only the wind. There are many gulls squabbling around him, and there’s blood.”

  Somerled grew even whiter. “How can he be there?” he asked. “Is there a ledge, is he somehow wedged in the rocks? If he is dead, why doesn’t he fall?”

  Eyvind hesitated. “He seems to be…to be somehow caught,” he said, “though I cannot see clearly. He’s held by something, a net perhaps, which has been abandoned here; that’s all that keeps him from falling into the sea. He’s–he’s hanging in the air.”

  Somerled said nothing. They looked at one another. Between them, unspoken, were the words of the curse that had dogged Ulf since he was a child. Neither on land or water…

  The others came running up, and Holgar did indeed have a rope. After that it was quick. Eyvind tied the rope around his waist; the others anchored it while he climbed down. He had seen death before, death in many forms, most of them violent and bloody, for that is a Wolfskin’s very existence. But this made him tremble to the core, it made his heart quail. There was a net, as he had thought. The net was hooked on the rocks, perhaps flung there by some capricious wind, for this was a place where everything was larger than life, the cliffs tall beyond reckoning, the waves monstrous, the wind a demon’s flail. Perhaps this net had once held a fine catch of juicy cod or shining mackerel. Now it had captured a man: Ulf, dreamer of dreams. His face was bone-white; there was no blood left in him. One eye stared blankly seaward. Birds had feasted on the other, brazen gulls that swooped close to Eyvind’s face as he cursed and swung his arm to fend them off. There was something tied over Ulf’s mouth, a strip of stained cloth: a gag. Eyvind edged closer. His foot slipped, his hands clutched the rock, slick with the residue of birds. The rope tightened, holding him safe. Thank the gods Engus had let Holgar stay; only a Wolfskin had the strength for such a task.

  “All right, Eyvind?” came a call from above, and he called back, “Yes,” but it was not all right, it was desperately, terrifyingly wrong. He reached out a cautious hand. The gag was tight; behind it, strange, dark stuff blocked Ulf’s mouth, spilling out to stain the stretched cloth green. Seaweed. He would not think about the curse, Eyvind told himself. His fingers worked the fabric away from Ulf’s bloodless lips and cleared the other man’s teeth and tongue of their choking burden, for this seemed an obscenity that must be put right, never mind that Ulf was gone far beyond helping. He would not remember the foretelling. But it was there, all the same. Tastes the salt sea…

  He would have to cut Ulf loose somehow, so he could be hauled to the top. But he’d need to do it carefully or the dead man would simply drop, to be smashed by the rocks and the waves as they played out their hard battle far below. Ulf had been granted no dignity in the manner of his death; he must at least be brought from this place and laid to rest with proper ritual. Somerled would expect that. Margaret would expect it. Who would tell Margaret? He got the last of the weed from Ulf’s gaping mouth and paused, his hand resting on the other man’s neck. I’m imagining this, Eyvind told himself. It’s fear and shock and too much time for thinking. Ulf had been missing since yesterday: a whole day and night, almost. Here on the cliff, where nobody could see him.
His mouth plugged so nobody could hear him. Ulf was hideously, indisputably dead. And his body was still warm.

  Eyvind could not bring himself to think further; his mind recoiled from the possibilities. Quick, then, he must release Ulf from these bonds, and hold onto him, and get the others to haul them up. No, that wouldn’t work. The two of them together would be too great a burden even for Holgar’s strength. Eyvind himself was a very big man. That meant he must untie the line that kept him from that final fall, and tie it around the dead man. And then he’d have to hold on somehow, and wait.

  He called up to the others, telling them Ulf was here, telling them Ulf was dead. There was no way to soften that blow. They must wait, he yelled, until he tugged twice on the rope, and then they must haul it up.

  There was a tiny crevice near the net where he could wedge his toes, the merest illusion of a safe purchase. Letting the rope take his weight, he drew the knife from his belt and began to cut. He must free Ulf as far as he could until it became too perilous to cut more; he must fasten the dead man to the safety rope before he severed those last ties. Odin’s bones, the bonds around Ulf’s wrists were tight indeed, and the man had fought hard against them. There was blood down his left side, staining the blue tunic scarlet. Eyvind reached to find the strand of net that pinioned that left hand. His fingers encountered something hard and sharp: naked bone. In his desperate struggle to free himself from these bonds, Ulf had flayed the flesh from his wrist; he had nearly severed his own hand. It had not helped him, for it seemed the cords that held him had only grown tighter as he pulled against them. That wound in itself had been enough to kill him; his blood had drained from his body. How could the strands of a net wind so tightly around a man? What had he been doing, alone on the top of these perilous cliffs? If he had slipped and fallen, surely his natural path would have taken him out beyond this place where the old net hung. And what about the seaweed? Don’t think so hard, Eyvind, he told himself, hacking at the cord. It only hurts your head. And yet the thought he wished most fiercely to banish would not leave his mind, but played itself over and over. Somerled is so good at knots. It was not possible, he would not consider it; he had seen his friend’s distress, back there on the clifftop.