Fate's Needle Read Online Free PDF Page A

he might test it. He weighed it in his palm and stroked the air several times. “Sure enough, it’s a good blade. Your smith needs to work for me, Auden.” He returned the sword to Ulfrik as the assembled men laughed. “Something this fine deserves a name. What will you call it?”
    Ulfrik peered down the brilliant blue length of the sword, its blade thin and sharp as a needle. “Fate’s Needle,” he said. “That’s its name.”
    Approving nods bobbed around the crowd. “Use it to sew a strong destiny,” Orm said. Then he turned and mounted his Fjord horse. Ulfrik looked again to Grim, his smile fading. Grim’s face was blank. Saying nothing, his brother blinked and turned away.

Two
    The years passed quickly, and Ulfrik grew to manhood in Auden’s hall. He returned to Grenner often. On those visits, Orm would test him, setting him menial tasks. But he also taught him how to run the land and how to be a leader who made people feel confident.
    “Raiding is for desperate men with nothing to lose at home,” Orm used to say—until one year when he returned with a boat full of treasure, making Ulfrik wonder if raiding was as bad as Orm described. The riches had been shared among the men and Orm buried his share in the hall. Orm also ensured Ulfrik mixed with the men, learning their names and getting to know their families. Even as Ulfrik grew taller and stronger, his father never appeared any older.
    The years changed Grim little also. When he visited Grenner, Ulfrik still found him unimaginative, envious, angry and unsatisfied, traits that had now grown from childish drawbacks to man-sized defects. His temper was explosive; only Orm could keep him calm. Grim had not grown much taller, but his stout body rippled with ropy muscle. At nineteen years old, Grim was a physical match for any man. He seemed afraid of Ulfrik, yet avoided him all the same. Ulfrik did not mind.
    In the seven years Ulfrik had fostered with Auden, raiders had come only once more to Auden’s lands. A band of ragged men from Vestfold—new faces, the same old threats. Unrest in the north produced roving bands of men who had lost their livelihoods and homes. Those men had met the same end as the first Vestfold raiders. Ulfrik had wielded Fate’s Needle for the first time in battle and sent three men to Valhalla, cementing his reputation as a war leader.
    One sullen day in late autumn, a messenger from Grenner arrived at Auden’s hall.
    “Your father has taken ill,” the man told him, his blue lips quivering in the cold. “Healing broths, magic—the wise woman attending him has tried everything. He is not expected to live.”
    After rushed good-byes to his uncle and cousins, Ulfrik hurried home, deciding against the full day’s walk and riding one of Auden’s few horses instead.
    Later that same night, he saw up ahead the beams of golden light shining from the hall’s shuttered windows, pulled taut against the night’s cold air.
    “We thought you might come tonight,” said one of the guards.
    “Gods keep your father,” said the other, as Ulfrik dismounted and gave Auden’s mount over to his care.
    After a few strides, Ulfrik stopped and turned to the guards. “I don’t recognize either of you.”
    “Your father is expanding his forces,” the other said, patting the horse’s neck as he spoke. “You know, the problems with the Vestfolders.”
    “How did you know me?”
    “A messenger was sent north to summon you.” He pointed to Ulfrik’s side. “That’s the green-gemmed sword we were told you’d be carrying. Who else would you be?”
    Ulfrik nodded. The two new men smiled. It made sense, although he had not heard of Orm’s plan. He wondered why his father would enlist more men and not speak to Auden, since Vestfold always attacked through Auden’s lands. Giving it no more thought, Ulfrik threaded his way between the barracks to the hall.
    He threw open the hall doors, and heat and light bathed him instantly. Tables