The Islands of the Blessed

“I’m not criticizing you.” The Bard stopped and wiped sweat from his brow. “Whew! It’s as hot as a dragon’s belly in here. I wouldn’t be surprised if we had a thunderstorm tonight.” Which meant, Jack knew, that they would have a thunderstorm tonight. The Bard was never wrong about such things.

“The Tanners will be far better off in Bebba’s Town,” the old man went on, “where their troublemaking won’t be so noticeable. There are many places they can find work. Really, lad, you’ve done them a favor.”

“So… how will they get to Bebba’s Town?” the boy asked, guessing he wouldn’t like the answer.

“On Skakki’s ship, of course. Will you look at that road! Straight as an arrow and hardly a rock out of place. The Romans were amazing builders. Unfortunately, they didn’t have a speck of sympathy for nature. A road had to go from here to there by the shortest way possible, and if a tree was in the way, they cut it down. If there was a hillock, they leveled it. That’s why the Romans aren’t here anymore. Nature doesn’t take kindly to being pushed around.”

They continued walking, with the Bard stepping sure-footedly on the slippery moss with hardly any help from his staff. The air changed as they neared the inlet, becoming cooler and mixed with the smell of seaweed. In the distance Jack heard surf. “Perhaps there won’t be room for the Tanners,” he said hopefully.

“I sailed on this ship with Olaf,” the old man said. “He could ferry a herd of horses with it—well, to be accurate, he could steal a herd of horses with it. Our cargo isn’t large, and we’ll only have you, me, Thorgil, and Seafarer for passengers. There’s plenty of room for the Tanners.”

Wonderful, thought Jack. Ymma, Ythla, and Thorgil crammed in together like a box full of spiders. Not to mention Sven the Vengeful, Eric Pretty-Face, and that new fellow, Schlaup. Thorgil said Schlaup could lift an ox over his head with one hand.

Northmen loved picking fights better than swilling ale, and they were extremely fond of ale. Jack remembered how Olaf had kept order with blows and threats, and wondered whether Skakki was tough enough. “Isn’t Brother Aiden going?” the boy asked. By now they had reached the path that led from the road to the sea.

“Aiden would die rather than set foot on a Northman ship,” said the Bard. “He saw his friends murdered by some of the very people we’re going to travel with.”

Jack, too, had seen Northmen run berserk, and the memory still haunted his dreams.

A tongue of land formed a shallow bay and made an ideal place to anchor. It was well hidden from view, and on either side was a beach of clean white sand. The Bard found a rock to sit on. “Swallows have reported seeing Skakki’s ship a week to the south. You can stop furrowing your brow, Jack. He’s trading amber and sea ivory this time, not slaves.”

“This time,” Jack said bitterly.

“I’ve told the villagers we’re taking an Irish merchant vessel and have been vague about where it’s to be anchored,” the old man said. “You understand that we can’t let them catch sight of the crew. You and Thorgil will have to do all the loading.”

“What about the Tanners?” said Jack.

“I’d rather they didn’t know who we’re sailing with until it’s too late.”

They sat for a while, watching the waves break beyond the tongue of land. Green sandpipers scurried along the beach, running for safety when the water foamed in. A flock of black-and-white eider ducks sailed overhead.

Brother Aiden had told Jack that eider ducks had once befriended St. Cuthbert. They had attended his sermons, and the mother eiders trusted him so much, they had let him pick up their chicks. When St. Cuthbert became abbot of the Holy Isle, he forbade anyone to hunt the birds. But a wicked monastery servant had killed one and thrown the evidence into the sea. The very next day the sea had coughed up bones and feathers onto the chapel doorstep. For even the sea, Brother Aiden said, knew better than to lie to a saint.

Jack had heard many stories about St. Cuthbert and animals. Otters kept him warm when he meditated, sea eagles dropped fish when he was hungry. Once, the saint scolded a pair of ravens for stealing thatch, and they brought him a lump of fat to oil his boots with, by way of apology. It was Christian magic and, as far as Jack could see, not that different from the Bard’s magic.

The old man said the life force flowed in streams deep in the earth. If you understood its workings, you could call it forth—or rather it chose to listen to your call. This was where the power to do magic came from. Jack didn’t understand much of this explanation, but he knew the power was difficult to control. And sometimes things happened that weren’t supposed to happen.

“I could see the paths in the hazel wood last night,” Jack said aloud.

“That’s excellent,” said the Bard.

“But I don’t know how I did it.”