The Islands of the Blessed

“Northmen believe in facing things head-on,” said the Bard. He was comfortably wrapped in fleece over his usual white robe. The wind had burnished his face to a rosy glow.

They had left the hidden port two days before, after the betrothal ceremony. Egil’s cargo had been stored there with half of Egil’s crew to guard it. Egil’s ship and the rest of the men had gone south to deliver the grain.

Ydgith had established herself as queen of this tiny outpost, with Ymma and Ythla as her princesses. By the time Egil had gone south and Skakki north, she had managed to get her own hut, a supply of food, and new clothes for herself and her daughters. Her last words to Schlaup were, “Remember to get me freshwater pearls up north. I understand they’re common there.”

Thorgil continued to describe the miseries of sailing until Eric Pretty-Face bellowed, “BLOODY HEL! THAT’S THE THIRD TIME YOU’VE DESCRIBED FREEZING TO DEATH. SING ABOUT SOMETHING ELSE!” The shield maiden stalked off to sit by Schlaup in the middle of the ship.

“I like frost,” the giant said to cheer her up. “Fonn and Forath used to take me on picnics in the frost.”

“You miss them, don’t you?” Thorgil said.

Schlaup nodded. “When I marry…” He paused to marshal the words in his head, then continued, “I will take Ydgith to Jotunheim. To meet Mother.”

Jack choked back a laugh. He could imagine Mrs. Tanner’s reaction to her new mother-in-law, a nine-foot-tall mountain queen with bristly orange hair and fangs.

The shadow of the great bird Seafarer crossed the deck, made a lazy circle, and floated north again. The albatross had proven to be a most valuable crew member. He could see the coast when they couldn’t. He brought back information of islands, lonely villages, and inlets where they might spend the night without being discovered.

The Northmen’s knowledge of the coast was imperfect. Even Rune’s memory contained information only about the few places he had visited, and so Seafarer guided them most of the time. On the first day he directed them to a run of herring so dense, the ship was unable to move until the run passed. The Northmen dipped the fish out with nets, and Seafarer gorged himself until he was too heavy to fly.

That night they ate to their hearts’ content and fell asleep around a roaring fire. But the next it rained, and they shivered under oilskins until dawn.

Thorgil pointed out a few of the places she recognized. “Those are the old strongholds of the Picts,” she said, pointing at solitary round towers on the distant hills. “Rune thinks they’re deserted now.” It was a wild and forbidding coast, with many cracks opening up to the sea. The waves sent spray high into these channels, while between them cliffs jutted out like teeth.

“I have seen lights in those towers when all else was asleep,” the Bard said, shading his eyes against the afternoon sun. “I have heard the huushayuu call to arms where no army has marched for countless years.”

“What’s a huushayuu?” said Jack, repressing a shiver. The word had a breathy sound that recalled evil memories.

“The Pictish war trumpet,” the old man replied. Jack remembered darkness falling over a slave market long ago and men whose bodies seemed to writhe with vines. “The huushayuu was half as tall as a man, and its voice carried over vast distances. There was never only one of them. The Picts always had ten or twenty trumpeters, for the sound alone made an enemy’s heart melt within him. The Romans called it a ‘carnyx’.”

“Olaf had an old carnyx hanging on his wall,” Thorgil recalled. “It was shaped like a striking snake with a boar’s head. He refused to let anyone touch it because he’d found it in a tomb.”

The Bard gazed with dislike at the distant towers gliding by. “That was a Roman copy. A true huushayuu has the head of a Pictish beast. The jaw is hinged with a metal tongue inside.”

Seafarer returned with the report that a deserted bay lay just ahead, and Skakki gave the order to turn toward land. The Bard quickly canceled that order. “We should go north until the light fails,” he said. “If we don’t find a harbor, it is still better to lie out at sea than approach that shore.”

They left the round towers behind, and the cliffs became ever steeper and more jagged. Finally, just as the last band of red faded in the western sky, they came to a white sandy beach. It lay before a peaceful valley ringed by hills, and the Bard pronounced it fit for habitation.

Schlaup dragged the ship above the high tide mark all by himself. He was hopeless at many chores. He rowed too powerfully to work with others and couldn’t navigate across a mud puddle. But where strength was concerned, there was no matching him.

“What does a carnyx sound like?” Jack said later, when they had eaten and were stretched out under the stars. He was unwilling to use the Pictish word huushayuu.