Wings of the Storm by Giles Kristian

Author:Giles Kristian
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781473510425
Publisher: Transworld

CHAPTER EIGHT

THEY FOUND JARL Guthrum and his men still camped at the foot of the hill to the east of the kings’ mounds, his axe banner fluttering in the warm breeze. Storvek had assured Sigurd and Hrani both that King Eysteinn was still nowhere to be seen, having yet to return from whatever fighting he was up to his neck in, which was good news as it meant there would be no other war band getting mixed up in things.

It turned out that having arrived at Ubsola Olaf and the others had recognized Guthrum’s banner and kept watch from a safe distance while Asgot had gone to the temple to speak with its priests. Two of them being dead, it had been the boy-godi who explained what had happened and how the two would-be sacrificial offerings and a fierce woman warrior had escaped, stealing the sacred spear as they went.

‘When Storvek rode into the place telling anyone who would listen that they could see the spear returned for the right price, we knew all we had to do was put a blade to the lad’s throat to find out what he knew, then use him as the bait on the hook,’ Olaf explained.

Now Jarl Hrani’s boar head banner was revelling in the wind as his Norsemen climbed the ting mound and formed a great shieldwall upon it to deny Guthrum the high ground. They had come round from the north of Ubsola and come at speed too so that Jarl Guthrum was caught completely by surprise, his own men not expecting to be faced with a fight of any kind, much less with a force outnumbering them two to one.

‘I can see you’ve made yourself known around here, lad,’ Bram said to Sigurd, grinning at the sight of the temple, or King Eysteinn’s hall if that was what the Svearmen called it, for it was still standing but half of it was black and charred and you could smell the burnt timbers on the same breeze that made Guthrum’s and Hrani’s banners dance.

‘Not my doing, Bram,’ Sigurd said, looking at Valgerd. ‘She is the bravest of us all for she thinks nothing of burning down a temple even if it belongs to a king or the gods themselves.’

Bram grinned at Valgerd who denied none of it. They were standing in the pre-dawn gloom at the top of the hill, waiting for Guthrum’s men to notice them, which they just had by the look and sound of it. Down in the camp amongst the shelters and the cook fires men were shouting and pointing and others were running towards Guthrum’s own tent in which he was still sleeping.

‘I wonder if the statues burnt,’ Floki said.

‘They didn’t,’ Valgerd answered.

‘How do you know?’ Floki asked.

The shieldmaiden smiled. ‘Because if that Frey statue had caught fire it would be burning still, what with the size of his cock.’

That raised a few laughs as Sigurd watched Jarl Guthrum emerge from his tent, shrugging himself into

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