Byzantium

  I broke fast with the family, and began what was to become our custom: Gunnar and his son sitting on the bench at the hearth-end of the board, and myself at the stable-end perched on a three-legged stool with a wooden bowl balanced on my knee, while Karin and Ylva fluttered from hearth to board, cooing over the preparations. The Danefolk, I learned, liked their meals unbearably hot, and began almost every meal with a thick barley gruel which they slurped down from big wooden bowls, sometimes with wooden spoons, but most often without.

  When the gruel had been eaten and the bowls collected, then bread, meat, and pale white cheese was served. If fruit was in season, that was offered, too; Gunnar especially loved the bitter blue currants, and a puckery little red berry they called lingön, which Karin prepared in a boiled compote Gunnar poured on his bread. This sauce was so tart I could never get it down without honey.

  There was sometimes fish—fresh when they could get it, though usually salted or preserved in a solution of brine and vinegar, or lye. The lyefish, or lütfisk, stank to heaven with a stench to bring tears to the eye. They ate this abomination boiled in milk, and professed to like it; but the stink alone made the gorge rise in my throat and I could in no way abide it.

  If there was no fish, then sausages were served—boiled or roasted, it made no difference. Occasionally, there was a kind of meat which was prepared by soaking whole pork haunches in brine for several months and then hanging them in the rooftrees over the hearth so that the smoke would preserve them. This treatment made the meat turn bright red, like raw beef, but the taste was magnificent—sweet and succulent and salty all at once. I always enjoyed the rökt skinka, and ate as much of it as often as I could.

  The Danefolk liked their meat; they liked their bread, too—heavy and dark, served warm from hearth or oven. I soon grew to enjoy this strange custom. Karin’s ale was the same as her bread: dark, rich, and filling, and with a sweet taste that reminded me of nuts. Once Karin put spruce berries in the brew, to produce a most unusual beer. I could not drink it, but Gunnar thought it a wonderful diversion from his normal drink. Sadly, they disdained wine—which, after all, was difficult for them to procure—but I made up for that lack by acquiring a taste for Karin’s dark brown ale.

  I ate, as I say, with the family. To his honour, Gunnar never stinted in his care of me where food was concerned, nor was I given inferior fare: I ate the same food as my master, and in similar portions. And it shames me even now to say that I indulged myself sinfully, utterly without regard to the Rule of Moderation. How often I asked for more!

  I still see Karin’s broad, kindly face glowing with pleasure—and the heat of the hearth—as she laid the food on the board, her hands red from work, but her braids neat and her clothing spotless as her kitchen. She was a meticulous, hard-working woman, and enjoyed nothing more than to have the fruit of her labour admired and made much over. Sure, this was no hardship at all for any fortunate enough to find a seat at her table; her offerings, while simple, were never less than superb.

  There were two, however, not so fortunate in this respect—though in others perhaps they were far more so than I. These were Odd, the labourer, and Helmuth, the swineherd. Both were Saex-men, and both slaves. Odd was a large fellow, patient, tireless, and very nearly mute. Helmuth, a man of mature years, was a well-mannered and even-tempered soul, who, despite all appearances, happily possessed a smattering of learning, as I soon discovered.

  Owing to the pig stink that permeated his clothing and person, poor Helmuth was never allowed inside the house. When it rained or snowed he slept in the barn, but when the days were fine and warm, Helmuth slept outside with heaven’s vast starfields his only roof. Even had he not preferred it, he would have done so anyway to guard his precious swine from the wolves. Odd, when he was not working, stayed always with Helmuth.

  That I should take meals with the family while my brother slaves ate alone outside or together in the barn, caused me some little anguish on their account. But as no one else seemed to think it any hardship, and Odd and Helmuth were apparently content, I very soon came to accept the arrangement.

  After breaking fast that first day Gunnar, accompanied by young Ulf and the two hounds, went out to examine the state of his domain. In all it was a handsome holding, everything well made and neatly ordered; he was justly proud of what he had accomplished in the harsh northland. For his part, little Ulf was proud of his father; I observed that he never left his father’s side the whole day long.

  We walked the fields together, Gunnar and Ulf chattering away, myself lagging behind as, now and again, my master stopped to inspect some part or portion of his holding: a ploughed field, a new calf, an iron binding for a door, the level of grain in the granary, the fishpond, a length of newly-woven hurdle fencing—anything that came to hand. A blind man could have perceived how much this rough brawny Dane loved his land, concerning himself with every detail of its husbandry.

  All that first day we traversed the boundaries of Gunnar’s realm—a lonely island fortress, as it seemed to me, set in an evergreen sea, cut off from the wider world. As the days passed, I felt more and more distant to the world I had known. Our little abbey, by contrast, was a busy port on a well-travelled route where trade was conducted not in silver, but in words.

  Gunnar had saved me from certain death, that I will not deny. But the cost of my salvation was high indeed. I felt lost and very, very alone. Accordingly, I began to pray the daily round, and to say psalms when I had the chance. One night, at table, I prayed aloud over the meal while my master and his family looked on in amazement. So taken aback were they by this peculiar behaviour, it did not occur to them to prevent me. In time, they came to expect it and waited for me to say the prayer before eating. The ritual, I suppose, appealed to them. I have no idea what they made of it.

  That first evening, however, when I raised my head from the prayer, I found Gunnar staring at me. Karin stood at his shoulder, also gazing at me, and prodding her husband insistently. He spoke a few words to her and she desisted.

  The next morning, my master took me to Helmuth and, using a complicated series of gestures, indicated that I should pray again as I had the night before.

  This I did.

  The effect this produced upon the swineherd was extraordinary. He threw down his stick, sank to his knees and cried out, clasping his hands, his lips quivering in thanksgiving as huge wet tears filled his eyes and rolled down his cheeks. Then up he leaped, clutching me by the arms and crying, “Alleluia! Alleluia!”

  Gunnar watched this with a bemused expression on his face. Helmuth subsided after a moment, and fell to murmuring to himself. Gunnar spoke a few words to him, whereupon the swineherd seized his master’s hand, kissed it, and blubbered enthusiastically. The baffled Dane nodded curtly to his slave, then turned on his heel and left us there together with the pigs.

  “Master Gunnar says I am to be…” Helmuth paused, searching his dusty memory for the proper word. “Heya! I am to be pupil—nay, not pupil…scólere, nay…teacher! Alleluia!” He beamed ecstatically, and I had the uncomfortable feeling that I was seeing zealous Brother Diarmot in another guise.

  “I am to be the teacher of you,” Helmuth continued. “You are to be pupil to me.” He studied me for my reaction.

  “Forgive me, friend, I mean no offence,” I replied, “but how is it that every skald and swineherd knows and speaks good Latin?” I then went on to tell him about Scop.

  “Scop!” he cried. “Scop it was who taught me. An excellent man, Scop. I was sent to him as a boy to sit at his feet and learn the mirabili mundi! I was one of his best pupils!”

  “He was still a priest then.”

  “Priest he was, yes,” Helmuth confirmed, “and his name was Ceawlin, a most holy and righteous man—a Saecsen, like me. He taught me the love of Jesu and the veneration of the saints, and much else. I thought to be a priest myself,” he halted, shaking his head sadly, “but that was not to be.” He looked at me. “Though it is long since I ha
ve heard the Mass, I still believe. And I often speak to the All Father—I ask him to send me someone to talk to. He has sent you, I think.”

  We talked as best we could: despite what I had said, Helmuth’s Latin was not good, and it was polluted with many strange words in several languages. Even so, in the days to follow, we began to understand one another better and I pieced together the story of how he came to serve Gunnar. With many hesitations and much misunderstanding on both sides, Helmuth eventually explained about the war that left old Åke the Reticent and his bellicose son, Svein, dead, and Rapp the Hammerer on the throne. “Rapp was no believer in anything save the war hammer in his hand,” Helmuth observed bitterly. “Rapp made slaves of all the undead. No, ah—he made slaves of those who yet lived—”

  “The survivors.”

  “Heya, the survivors! Some he sold; some he kept. He reckoned Saecsens useful, so he kept Ceawlin and me; he thought we might make good hostages if the Saecsenfolk attacked him. We served in his hall until he died.”

  “What happened then?”

  “He had twice boychilds—”

  “Two sons. He had two sons.”

  “Heya. Thorkel, the elder, and Rägnar, the younger. After Rapp died—choking on a marrow bone in his drinking hall—Thorkel took the throne. He was not a bad jarl, but he was no Christian man, either.”

  “What happened to him?”

  “He went a-viking,” Helmuth said wistfully, “and never returned. They waited two years and then made Rägnar kung.”

  “King?”

  “Heya. Yellow Hair has been kung ever since.” The swineherd shrugged. “The people like him because he is more generous than his father and brother ever were. Whatever he has, he gives away with all regret—no regret, I mean.”

  “Including his slaves.”

  Helmuth sighed. “Including his slaves, heya. He gave me to Gunnar’s father, Grönig, who made me his swineherd—though I can read and write, mind—and here I have been ever since. I make no complaint; I am well treated.”

  “Have you never tried to escape?”

  Helmuth spread his hands and opened his eyes wide. “Where would I go? There are wolves in the forest, and wild men everywhere else.” He smiled a little ruefully. “My place is here; I have my pigs to look after.” He looked around, counted them quickly to assure himself that all were still in sight.

  “What of Odd?” I asked.

  “Gunnar bought him to work the farm,” Helmuth said, and explained how a blow on the head when he was captured had deprived Odd of all but the simplest speech. “Slow-witted he may be, but Odd is a hard worker, and very strong.” He paused, then said, “I would know, Aeddan—”

  “Aidan,” I corrected.

  “I would know how is it that you come to be here. Has Gunnar won you, or did he buy you in Jutland at the slave market?”

  “He captured me,” I answered, and told him about the night raid on the village—careful to omit any mention of the pilgrimage or the treasure. “Then, when we reached the settlement, he gave Yellow Hair three gold pieces for me.”

  “Gunnar is a good master, heya,” Helmuth told me. “He seldom beats me, even when he is drunk. And Karin is a woman worthy of praise in any tongue; she is master of the kitchen, and all that passes beneath her—” he hesitated, “eyesight?”

  “Gaze,” I suggested gently. “All that passes beneath her gaze.”

  “Heya. They are good people,” he said, adding thoughtfully, “Gunnar says that he shall carve out both our tongues if I do not teach you to speak like a Dane before the next full moon.”

  With such an attractive incentive before us, we began my formal instruction that very morning. Helmuth, faltering and tongue-tied, grew more certain as more memories of his childhood occupation under Ceawlin’s tutelage came back to him. After a shaky beginning, we soon worked out a system of learning whereby I would point to a thing saying the Latin word—thereby helping Helmuth recall his learning—to which he would reply with the appropriate word in the northern speech. I would then repeat this word aloud many times to impress it on my memory.

  After many days of such discipline, I obtained a rough sense of the tongue—if sense it was—and could name a good many of the common things around me. Helmuth gradually introduced words that implied an action: to chop, to dig, to plant, to make a fire, and so on. I found in him a willing teacher and easy companion, good-natured, patient, eager to help. What is more, I no longer thought he smelled of pig dung.

  Odd, finished with his day’s work, would sit and gaze at us in bewildered amazement. What he thought about it, I never knew, for in all the time I knew him, I only ever heard him grunt.

  During these days, Gunnar made few demands on me. I chopped wood for the woodstore, fed the chickens, carried water from the well, helped Odd feed the cows and mend the hurdles when the cattle kicked them down; I helped Helmuth with the pigs, removed ash from the hearthplaces, changed the straw in the barn, spread manure on the fields, dug stumps; I helped Ylva pluck geese and pull weeds…In short, I performed whatever tasks needed doing, but my toil was no more arduous or burdensome than any I had known at the abbey. Indeed, my master often preferred the more demanding tasks for Odd and himself. And in any event, no one worked harder than Karin. Thus, I formed the conclusion that Gunnar had no real need of another slave. Whatever reasons he had for buying me from Rägnar, labour was not one of them.

  I continued to take my meals in the house, and began to feel as much a part of the family as Ylva or Ulf. Sure, I was treated no worse than either of them. And when I learned to put word to word, forming crude, and often amusing, sentences, my master praised me highly and professed satisfaction with my progress—so much so that the day of testing came soon after my first halting conversation with him.

  Hoping to put my mind at ease, I determined to ask what happened the night of the raid. “Do you know what became of my brothers?” I asked, fumbling over the words.

  “It was very dark that night,” Gunnar observed mildly.

  “Were they killed?”

  “Maybe,” he allowed, “some men were killed. I do not know how many.” He then explained that, owing to the confusion which ensued upon the sudden arrival of the lord and his men, he could not be sure of anything. “The jarl appeared and we ran away, taking only what we could carry. We left much treasure,” he concluded sadly. “But I do not know about your friends.”

  The next morning Gunnar roused me in the barn and told me that he and Helmuth were taking some of the pigs to Skansun. “There is a market,” he told me. “It is one day’s walk. We will stay the night and return home. Do you understand?”

  “Heya,” I replied. “Am I to go with you?” I asked, hoping for a chance to see something of the wider world once more.

  “Nay.” He shook his head solemnly. “You are to stay with Karin and Ylva. Ulf will go with me, and Helmuth, too. Odd will remain with you. Heya?”

  “I understand.”

  “Garm I will take with us; Surt I leave here to guard the cattle.”

  A short while later, we were standing in the yard bidding the travellers farewell. Gunnar spoke a word to his wife, charging her, I think, with the care of the farm, then called the black hound, Garm, to him and strode from the yard without looking back. Ulf fell into step behind him, and Helmuth, with the pigs, met them at the end of the yard. We watched them out of sight, and then turned to our chores.

  The day was good and bright, the air warm and full of insects, for summer was speeding on. Odd and I spent the morning working in the turnip field and, after a midday meal, Ylva and I filled a small cauldron with the previous day’s milk which had been left to stand, built a small fire in the yard, and began making cheese. Once the milk was gently simmering, we left the tending of the pot to Karin, and I returned to the field.

  The first intimation I had that the situation was other than I believed it to be was when, at sunset, I happened to look up from weeding the turnips to see both Gunnar and Ulf s
triding across the meadow with Helmuth and his pigs straggling along some distance behind. Thinking something terrible must have befallen them, I dropped the hoe and ran to meet them.

  “What has happened?” I gasped, breathless from my run. “Is something wrong?”

  “Nothing is wrong,” Gunnar replied with a slow, sly smile. “I have returned.”

  “But—” I waved a hand towards Helmuth, “what about the market…the pigs? Did you change your head—ah, mind?”

  “I did not go to the market,” my master informed me. Ulf laughed aloud, as if they had perpetrated a handsome jest.

  I glanced from one to the other of them. “I do not understand.”

  “It was the watching-trial,” Gunnar explained simply. “It was in my mind to see what you would do when I was not here to guard you.”

  “You watched me?”

  “I watched you.”

  “You watched to see if I would run away, yes?”

  “Yes, and—”

  “You did not trust me.” The realization that I had been tested—albeit in a gentle and good-natured way—made me feel stupid and disappointed. Of course, I reckoned, a master has every right to test the loyalty of his slaves. Still, I felt ill-used.

  Gunnar regarded me with a deeply puzzled expression. “Do not take on so, Aeddan. You have done well,” he said. “I am satisfied.”

  “But I was never out of your sight,” I complained.

  Gunnar took a deep breath and drew himself up. “I do not understand you,” Gunnar said, shaking his head from side to side. “I,” he thumped himself on the chest, “I am well pleased.”

  “I am not well pleased,” I told him flatly. “I am angry.”

  “That is your concern,” he replied. “For my part, I am pleased.” His expression became haughty. “You think yourself a learned man, heya? Well, if you knew the proper way of things in Skania, you would be pleased too.”

  With that he strolled away, smug with contentment. Later, as I lay in my straw bed, I repented of my shameful behaviour. Sure, Gunnar was a good master; he fed me well, and since coming to the farm had not raised a hand against me. I had no just cause for my bitterness. I resolved to ask his forgiveness the next day. Alas, I never got the chance.