Blood Feud Read Online Free PDF Page B

voice lifted up in the great Viking war shout that I have heard since above half a score of battlefields, and then everything swam away into a buzzing mist. From somewhere a long way off, I was aware of a shout ‘
Sea Swallow
coming!’ and a rush of feet up the wynd; and then after a time of swirling and trampling tumult, everything was suddenly quiet, and I was swimming up out of a darkness that was not just the darkness of the night. I was sitting up with my back against the wall. Torchlight was still spilling through the open doorway, and by its yellow glow somebody was heaving a jack of ice-cold water over my head. I gasped, and fumbled up a hand, and felt the stickiness of blood in the old place, and for a moment was not sure whether this was a new fight or still the time of the shore-killing.
    ‘He’s coming back,’ somebody said.
    And then Thormod’s voice, with a kind of raw edge to itthat I did not understand, came cutting through the confusion in my head. ‘What in the Thunderer’s name are you doing here?’
    ‘Time enough for that later,’ said Haki out of the night and the flurrying sleet. ‘It’s too wolf-dark for comfort down here, and no knowing how far we’ve driven them off.’ He kicked something sprawling in the roadway, that groaned. ‘I’ve no wish for a knife in my back, if you have.’
    And another voice said, ‘Up, you.’
    I was already trying to scramble to my feet, but my legs seemed made of dough. Then Thormod’s arm came round me, heaving me up. ‘Here, Haki, take his other side, he’s as wankle as a wet sark.’
    ‘Poor shape for walking,’ Haki agreed, and added, only half in jest, ‘Well, if you think he’s worth it . . .’
    ‘I do,’ said Thormod. ‘And remember, if I lose my thrall, you don’t get your two gold pieces back.’
    I never had any very clear idea of our journey back to quarters; but suddenly the warmth and shelter of the sleeping-bothy were about me, and Eric was kicking the smoored fire into a glow. I could stand alone, by that time, but the room still swam unpleasantly round me, and after a few moments, I collapsed by the hearth. Thormod dipped a pannikin into the ale crock in the corner and jolted it against my teeth, while Haki, who had a long shallow gash on one forearm, felt along the rafters for a wad of cobwebs to stop the bleeding.
    My head was clearing, and I remembered the piece of amber, and began in sudden desperate haste to fumble in the breast of my tunic. It was still there. I pulled it out and held it to Thormod.
    ‘Your piece of amber – the thong’s broken and you must have pulled it off with your byrnie. I was afraid – I thought . . .’
    I was no longer quite sure what I had thought.
    Thormod took it, quirking an eyebrow. It was as if he said. ‘That harm might come to me without it?’ though he did not speak the words. ‘I’ll put a fresh thong on it in the morning, but this will serve for now.’ He slipped the thong over his head and stowed the great golden drop inside the neck of his sark.
    I had got to the stage, that comes sometimes either with drink or a knock on the head, in which one has to make sure that everything is explained to the last detail. ‘But I could not find you. Even Haki did not know where you were. And then I heard you shout –’
    ‘Have another drink,’ said Thormod. ‘And so you came to my rescue.’
    Eric snorted. ‘Rescue! He must have gone charging in as blind as a bull-calf! He was on the ground with you standing across him, when we arrived!’
    Thormod’s sudden grin flashed across his face from ear to ear. ‘That proves one thing, at least, that he was the first to reach me!’
    By that time someone had kindled the resin torch in its sconce against the roof tree; and by its smoky light, those of the Brotherhood who had taken some scathe in the fight, were cleaning up the damage. Haki looked up from the gash on his forearm. ‘Anyway, Thormod Sitricson, what were you doing, off on