Raven: Sons of Thunder Read Online Free PDF Page A

giving the slightest nod. Then he turned on his heel and marched up the beach, his left hand clasping his sword’s pommel, barking orders for men to find their own bit of high ground and keep a lookout for Fjord-Elk . For a moment I watched him go, taking a deep breath and filling my nose with the oniony smell wafting off the sea thrift’s crisp flowers. Then I turned to see Cynethryth appear from behind three sea-smoothed rocks in the surf. I wondered if she was already regretting her decision to leave Wessex and come with us, for she could not hope to enjoy such privacy often amongst the Fellowship. The sun had gone completely now, leaving only gashes of orange light in the grey clouds to the west. On a rockout at sea a cormorant, which had been drying its great black wings, took to the sky, its croak loud and hollow across the water. I sensed Cynethryth beside me.
    ‘He is troubled, your jarl,’ she said, her eyes following the bird skyward as it stretched its long neck and flapped away into the gathering night.
    ‘He thinks his luck is falling through his fingers. Like sand,’ I said, toeing a wet-looking tangle that looked like a worm. They were everywhere, as were the tiny holes from which they had been excavated. ‘He worries that the gods have turned against him and that he cannot give his men that which they desire above all else, above silver and furs and new ivory combs.’
    ‘And what do they want, Raven?’ Cynethryth asked and I knew she was really asking what did I want. Her eyes searched mine and I felt conscious of my blood-eye, the eye which had caused most men to hate and fear me but for which Sigurd had spared me, thinking I was touched by the gods, by Óðin himself. Before I could answer, something jabbed me in the back and I turned to old Asgot, Sigurd’s godi, who seemed about to poke me again with the butt of his spear.
    ‘I’ve swallowed it now, boy, so you might as well,’ he said in his ancient, cracked voice. I was upwind of the man but I still caught his stink and so did Cynethryth, because she put her knuckles to her nose.
    ‘Swallow what?’ I asked, as always wary of this man and his strange magic that fed on blood sacrifice.
    ‘You are Óðin’s brat.’ He screwed up his wind-ravaged face. ‘Or, at the least, your life thread is woven into the All-Father’s cloak.’ His brown teeth built a smile that sent a shudder through me. I wondered by what seidr he had known what I was thinking.
    ‘Sigurd was right about you, for all the good it has done us.’ He nodded, planting the spear’s butt in the sand. ‘You are marked. How else are you still breathing? Half of the warriors whoset out with Sigurd are gone. You have stood in the shieldwall with men four times your measure, some of the finest blood-loving wolves our land has weaned. Yet here you are alive and spitting.’ He shared that horrible grin with Cynethryth, who frowned back, ill at ease around the godi. ‘This one’s wyrd is safely hidden beneath the Far-Wanderer’s hat, girl,’ he said in Norse, which Cynethryth could not understand, ‘or the worms would have been sucking his guts by now.’ He screwed up his face, adding, ‘Isn’t that right, Raven?’
    ‘I have been lucky, Asgot,’ I said, aware that my hand rested instinctively on the sword hilt at my hip. We touch our weapons for luck and the Christians scorn us for it, but why should we not? Our weapons keep us alive. I have seen the Christians sign crosses over their chests with their fingers. Perhaps that brings them luck. I would like to see them try it in the clash of shieldwalls.
    ‘Lucky, you say?’ Again Asgot glanced at Cynethryth, the bones plaited in his hair rattling. His faded blue eyes widened, stretching the old wind-burnt skin at their corners. ‘Then perhaps that explains why our jarl’s luck is dripping away like snot from a troll’s nose. You have stolen Sigurd’s luck, Raven. It has jumped,’ he suddenly hopped from one foot