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IT WAS ANUNDI WHO WOULD do most of the teaching and the first lesson was to make it from one end of the ship to the other without stepping on anyone or falling overboard. He explained how to either slip under the sail or hold on to it and swing out to reach the other side. Stefan chose the latter. The first couple of times, he nearly fell overboard, but with a little more practice, he excelled and his father was pleased, not so much that he had mastered it but that he was willing to try.
For the remainder of the day, the boy watched the men adjust the sail according to the wind, watch for sea monsters or unfriendly ships, sharpen their swords and break out the food for their evening meal. Then as the sun began to set, they lowered the sail, stowed it, dropped anchor and began to settle in for the night.
It was not until after the rest of the men were settled that Donar motioned for his son to join him in the bow. Both wore their warm cloaks and as they sat down, Donar reached for his son’s blanket and handed it to him. “I am pleased to have ye with me, Stefan. I have dreamed o’ it often.”
Stefan’s jaw dropped, “Ye would have taken me to sea even without all me beg’n?”
“Aye, but I enjoyed yer beg’n. As soon as ye learned to speak ye began to demand it. When ye were five, ye threatened to kill me if I dinna take ye.”
Stefan smiled. “I meant it too.”
Donar scooted back until he could comfortably lean against the large cloth sacks stowed in the bow. “For these many years ye have had questions and I have had no time to answer them. Now there be the time...ask, my son.”
Stefan had to think about it for a moment. There were thousands of questions, or at least seemed to be, but he could only think of one just now. “I want to know...”
“Go on, I will answer any question ye ask.”
“Ye will think me still a wee laddie.”
“If ye are, the fault be mine for not having helped ye become a lad.”
Stefan quickly glanced at the exhausted men laying between the benches and taking up every inch of available space on the deck. Only four of them were still sitting upright with their eyes held out watching for other ships and the dreaded sea monsters.
“‘Tis that my aunt will not speak o’ her and I dinna even know my mother’s name.”
“Ah, well yer aunt loved her sister very much and ‘tis painful to speak o’ her. ‘Twas painful for me too, but I dinna mean to neglect telling ye about yer mother. Her name was Sheena and she asked me to give ye this.” He tossed one side of his cloak over his shoulder, found the thin strap around his neck and pulled a pouch out from inside his tunic. All the men wore small pouches to carry a scrap of clean cloth, coins, flint, tinder and a small piece of “c” shaped metal with which to strike the flint. But Donar’s pouch was larger and from it, he withdrew a gold medallion.
Stefan’s eyes grew wide. “Never have I seen such a treasure.” He leaned forward so his father could slip the long leather string over his head and then lifted the medallion with his hand to study its beauty.
“Scotland has many great treasures. This was a gift to yer mother from her father.” He watched the boy admire the medallion for a while longer and then decided he might as well tell him all of it. “Yer mother made me promise not to let ye go to sea.”
Stefan was stunned, “Why?”
“Because she loved me.”
“I dinna understand.”
“Then I will explain it. She was the most beautiful lass I have ever seen. Ye have her eyes, I think, and her shade o’ yellow hair. Sometimes, particularly when something dinna please ye, ye look exactly like I remember her when she was riled.” Donar paused to take a breath. “I love her still and there be not a day goes by I dinna think o’ her.”
“Ye were not there when she died.”
Donar winced at the pain his son’s words brought. “I stayed away too long and yer mother was already in the ground by the time I came back, she and the bairn with her. ‘Twas a daughter, or so the seer said. Yer aunt swore she would never forgive me for that as well as the other, but she did agree to keep ye until ye were grown. Ye were treated well?”
“Aye, very well. What other?”
Donar smiled at the memory, took a deep breath and slowly let it out. “It was a glorious battle, the best I have ever seen. The Scots put up a fierce fight and we might have lost had we not been better trained. Out o’ the corner o’ my eye, I saw a lass running from the village. I feared she would bring other forces against us, so I chased after her.”
“Was it my mother?”
“It was.”
“She was Scottish?”
“To the bone. Did yer aunt not teach ye Gaelic?”
“Aye,” Stefan answered with a smile. “‘Tis not so different from our language.”
“I too had a Scottish mother and we will practice it now. The lads dinna speak it and this way we will have privacy.” He pulled up his sleeve, showed a scar and then pulled his cloak back around him for warmth. “When I laid hand on Sheena, she bit my arm hard and drew blood. I let go and she nearly escaped, but I grabbed her again and pulled her to the ground. She thought I meant to force her.”
“Did ye?”
Again Donar smiled. “My mother made me take a pledge not to and I have honored that pledge. Mother dinna say, but as I grew up not looking at all like the man I called father, I believe she was forced.” He paused, giving his son a little time to absorb the revelation. “The lad I called father was unkind, so when I was o’ age I killed him and took to the sea.”
“Did yer mother scorn ye for killing him?”
Donar nodded. “At first, but when I brought back gold and silver from England, I was quickly forgiven and in the end, she confessed she was grateful I killed him.”
“Then I am pleased too.”
“Aye, he deserved to die for what he did to her.”
“What did he do to her?”
“Whatever he wanted. A lass who be forced has few choices. She, and the child if one be conceived, will starve if she dinna marry the first lad who will have her, even if she knows him to be unkind. For a lad, pleasuring himself takes but a few minutes. For the lass he forces, the misery dinna end until the day she dies.” Again he kept quiet for a time, hoping his son was old enough to grasp the true meaning. “Now I will have yer pledge never to force a lass. Do ye give it?”
He waited for Stefan’s nod and then continued. “As to yer mother, I held her to the ground, made her promise not to hurt me again and let her up. It was then I saw how beautiful she was and I believe it was then she began to love me.”
“Because ye did not force her?”
“Aye, she said as much later. There was little time, so I picked her up and carried her toward the ship. When she realized what I was doing, she folded her arms and glared at me. ‘I’ll not go without me sister,’ she said. I only meant to take her away from the fighting and talk her into going with me. But she told me which was her sister and then hid behind the rocks until I returned.”
At first Stefan was astonished, but then he began to smile. “Ye took them both and for this my aunt hates ye.”
“She does indeed. Sheena said she was pledged to marry a deceitful lad and if I wanted her, I had to spare her sister a dreadful marriage.”
“But my aunt dinna see that?”
“Nay, she believed she was in love. Even now that she loves her husband very well, she still thinks I robbed her o’ the life she was to have. Her betrothed was a laird and she would have been his mistress.”
“His miserable mistress.”
“True. A lad must learn to know what be best for those he cares about. He must be stronger and wiser even when everyone else disagrees.” Donar studied the worried look on his son’s face for a moment, found a more comfortable sleeping position and closed his eye. “Fret not, I will teach ye.”
*
STEFAN DID NOT KEEP count but believed crossing the sea took more than a month. His days were spent sailing, watching for sea monsters, learning to row in sync when the wind was slack, eating and sometimes slipping over the side to bathe in the ocean. He learned to read the stars and to discern the placement of the sun by watching the shadow cast beneath a round disk affixed to the top of an iron peg in the deck. His chores included taking a flask of water from man to man quenching their unrelenting thirst and seeing that not a drop was wasted. His was also to open the water barrels to catch the rain during storms.
In times of lull when the wind was lax and the men tired of rowing, they delighted in telling Stefan stories about the years of Viking conquests in places as far away as North Africa and the Middle East. They described fierce battles, the weapons used against them and how they managed to stay alive. Yet they all agreed the plight of the Vikings was becoming more dangerous and less rewarding, which was why they preferred destinations closer to home.
Invariably, the discussion turned to a debate between the men who preferred a plump lass to a thin one, and then to the abilities and attributes of all women, half of which Stefan was not at all certain he believed. Occasionally, he looked to his father to see the truth of it and welcomed his slight nod or the shake of his head.
After that, the men struck a more somber note as they remembered the fallen and told of carving their names in the Snoleved Stones back home so eternity would remember them.
It all sounded glorious and Stefan was mesmerized. But when he and his father spoke Gaelic, Donar was careful to tell his son the truth about war, death and dying in great detail so he would not find it quite so enchanting. “A lad must know what be worth dying for and what be not. Wealth be not.”
Stefan wrinkled his brow, “But we are Vikings.”
“We are lads afore we are Vikings. Only the protection of yer family be worth dying for. Everything else comes and goes like the tide. Today yer wealthy, tomorrow yer wife dies and ye have wasted yer life trying to bring her treasures – when all she wanted was more time with the lad she loved.” He crossed himself in his wife’s memory and then looked up at the brightest star. “Soon ye will see Scotland. Many a Viking lives in Scotland and so will we.”
“What?” Stefan swallowed hard. “Why?”
“Because I promised yer mother. The only way to prevent ye from going to sea be to let the ships leave without us.”
“But father...”
“Stefan, ye dinna have my rage and rage be what it takes for a Viking to stay alive. Ye are a gentle soul with yer mother’s kindness. I would have ye live free o’ war, loving a good lass and giving me lots o’ grandsons. Do ye agree?”
Stefan did not agree. His mind was filled with the excitement of fierce battles, women and plunder. But he loved his father and so he reluctantly relented with the slightest of nods.
For three days, the men used the sail to shield themselves from driving rain while a massive storm tossed the ship around. If they were to be eaten by sea monsters, a storm was the most dangerous time and all the men worried – all but Stefan, who would have been delighted to see at least one.
On the fourth day, the heavy fog lifted, the sun broke through the clouds and Donar was relieved to see they had not lost a single ship. They were, however, off course. He studied the disk shadow on the deck, corrected their course and headed them once again toward Scotland.
When he could, Stefan stood in the stern hoping to be the first to sight land. Like most of the men, he wore a braid on each side of his face and then tied the two together in the back with twine to keep his long hair out of his eyes. He wore his dagger, sword and sheath proudly. His boots that laced up the sides were nearly too small, but it meant he was still growing and that was a good thing, especially for a Viking.
Being a Viking was a dream he had not yet given up. He fervently hoped his father would change his mind, perhaps when he saw how completely boring living on land day after day could be. He hardly paid attention when his father came to stand next to him, but when Donar pointed to a bird, Stefan took notice.
“The gulls tell us we are near land.” Donar pulled another string from around his neck, put it over his son’s head and dropped the heavy pouch inside his son’s tunic. “They will expect me to have this instead o’ ye. We will trick them.” He winked and then folded his arms. “When the commander o’ a ship dies, he be put out to sea and the ship set afire.” He playfully nudged Stefan and leaned a little closer. “‘Tis a waste o’ a good ship.”
Stefan smiled and went back to keeping a sharp eye out for land. The death of his commander was not something he wanted to contemplate now...or ever.
