were banished by the blessed Patrick? No snake will bother us, for it knows where my feet have trod.’
‘In any case,’ Sighvat added, ‘I have deer antler to hand.’
Now Brother John looked bemused, so Sighvat told him how a deer cannot get with young until it has eaten a snake and so rush to hunt them whenever they see one. Which is why snakes, in their turn, will run from deer, so that deer horn is a talisman against them and even burning the shavings in a fire will kill serpents with the very smell.
Brother John nodded and I could see him tuck that away, like the find of a new and strange feather, or shell on the beach. Other Christ priests – Martin, for sure – would have made the sign of the cross to ward off evil and called Sighvat a heathen devil.
The next day we sweated against a bad wind, so that it took a long, hard sail to finally snug up in the harbour at Larnaca. I approached warily, tacking in almost against an unfavourable wind, so that it could be used to sweep us out if there was any sign that Starkad was there.
The town was a sprawl of white buildings, Christ churches and a considerable fortress on a hill, while the crescent curve of the sanded bay was studded with tiny fishing boats, all brightly painted and with eyes on the prow, which we had come to note was a Greek warding sign. Behind was what we now realised was the look of all the islands here: grey rock and dust, spattered with grey-green shrubs.
‘Pleasant spot,’ Kvasir noted, rubbing his hand and scenting the air, which was laced with the subtle wafts of cooking. ‘I smell drink,’ he added.
‘I would curb your thirst,’ Finn growled and nodded to where people were gathering, at once curious and afraid. From the fortress, winding down the short road to the quayside, came a snake of armed men, spears glittering, led by a man on a horse.
Men muttered and looked to their weapons, but I smiled and pointed to the curled-up cat sleeping under a strung fishing net on the beach.
‘There will be no battle here today,’ I said and Sighvat chuckled and nodded. The rest just looked bemused, but Sighvat had remembered. See many strange things in battle. But you never see a cat on a battlefield.
I had a brief flash of Skarti’s fever-racked face as he shivered in the shieldwall before the pocked-walls of Sarkel, telling me this in ague-stammers after we had both seen, like an Odin sign, a bird fly into that dusty hell of arrows and blood, perching on a siege tower to sing.
Minutes later, Skarti had an arrow in his throat and never spoke again, so it had been a bad omen for him and maybe he had known it.
Now I hoped he read the omens true. I had considered the chances of Starkad putting in here and discounted them; he had sent a boatload of men with a letter and would want to avoid being sucked into the quest, would want to sail hard and fast for Serkland and find his monk. I offered prayers to Odin that it would take him time to find out the lie I had told him, time I needed to rob him of this prize that would bring him rushing to us on ground we chose.
Yet here were soldiers, snaking their way down to the quayside, people parting to let them through. They formed up neatly in two ranks with their studded leather coats and metal helmets, round shields and spears.
The officer was splendid, in that armour of little metal leaves over leather that they call lamellar and a splendid helmet made to look like it was fashioned from the tusks of a boar, surmounted by a falling wash of horsehair plume.
‘You could beat them all with an empty waterskin,’ growled Finn and spat over the side. ‘These are half-soldiers.’
He was right: half-soldiers, called-out men who were tradesmen most of the time, but issued battle-gear when need or ceremony demanded. I felt easier, until I saw another group, this time a huddle of servants and one of the carrying-seats we knew well from the Great City. I realised, suddenly, that the knees were out of my breeks, my tunic salt-streaked and stained.
The carrying chair halted and a figure got out, rearranging the folds of his white robes. He was bald save for tufts of grey hair sticking from the sides of his head and clean-shaven but for a wispy lick of beard. That and his flap of ears made him look like a goat, but the officer saluted him smartly enough.
I had ordered Finn and others into what battle-gear we had, so that they made some appearance, grim being better than ragged. I slid into mail, greasy against almost-bare skin and borrowed a pair of better breeks from Amund, who then had mine, which were shorter in the leg on him. He stood behind the others on deck to hide his shame.
So I stepped ashore, flanked by mailed men, trying to look like a jarl while the bright sun beat down and the waves slapped. Goat Face stepped forward, glanced around and gave a slight nod.
I nodded back and he rattled off in Greek. I knew the tongue, though could not write it then, but he spoke so fast that I had to hold up a hand, to slow him down. That stunned him a little, for it seemed an imperious gesture, though I had meant no such thing. Even as he blinked, I realised that he had been asking which one was the leader here, never imagining it could be the most boyish of them all. By cutting him off in midflow, I had announced myself and with some force.
‘Speak slowly, please. I am Orm Ruriksson, trader out of the Great City, and this is my ship, Volchok.’
He raised an eyebrow, cleared his throat and said – slowly – that he was Constantine, the Kephale of Larnaca, which title I knew meant something like a governor.
The officer removed his helmet, revealing a moon-face and sweat-plastered thinning hair, to present himself, with a nod of the head, as Nikos Tagardis. He was kentarchos here, a chief of several hundred men – though if they were all like the ones sweating and shifting behind him, it wasn’t much of a command.
They were, it turned out, delighted and relieved to have us, for it seemed that the last time they had been visited by Varangi there had been more trouble about it. Constantine remounted his carrying chair and led a little procession of us away from the sea and into the town.
Behind, I could hear the noise change as the people surged forward and the Oathsworn clattered off the boat, Finn already booming out his few words of Greek. I hoped Radoslav and Brother John did as I had requested and sold only enough cargo to pay what we would owe.
The town was a deceit from the shore, since most of it lurked, sleepy and hidden, in a hollow between the scrub-covered hills and the sea. But it had a huddle of white houses and crooked alleys, a score of wells and several Christ temples, at least one of which had been a temple to a goddess of the Greeks before that. It even had a theatre, though I did not know what that was then.
There was also an area I knew was called a forum, which seemed to be a big square surrounded by columns, like a row of trees. It had a big, white building on one side of it, which turned out to be a bath-house.
We marched up to it and went in – the rich Greeks liked to trade in a bath-house and I came to enjoy it more than I did then. Inside, wine was served and my ‘guards’ scowled outside, given only watered ale. Then we spoke of this and that – and previous visitors.
‘It was five years ago now,’ said Tagardis, telling of the last visit of my ‘countrymen’. ‘They raided along the coast, but always managed to escape before I arrived with my troops.’
An escape for you, I thought as I smiled and nodded, for if they had decided to stand and fight, you would not be looking so plump and pleased now.
‘In the end,’ he said, looking at me levelly, ‘they got themselves so drunk on pilfered wine that they ran aground and could not easily escape. Those we did not kill languish in our prison to this day.’
Hitting me on the side of the head would have been a more subtle threat. I lost my smile at that and the Kephale cleared his throat as he saw my face.
‘Of course,’ he smoothed, ‘Trader … Ruriksson, is it? Yes. Ruriksson. Yes. He has much more peaceful and profitable reasons for visiting our island, I am certain. What cargo do you carry?’
He was pleased with the