Two Ravens Read Free Page B

bring a ship and its crew with me, even a little ship like Swan .”
    “That’s stealing,” Andres said. “It’s Papa’s ship.”
    Long-faced, and with his hands in his sleeves, Kristjan joined them. He was slight and dark, a changeling among the tall fair Hoskuldssons. He said, “You are stealing Hoskuld’s ship?”
    “Yes,” Jon said. “I’ll go. I hope I never see this place again, too. Or Papa.”
    “That’s well wished,” Ulf said.
    “It’s stealing,” Andres said. “It’s stealing.”
    “It was Hoskuld’s notion,” Bjarni said. “In part.”
    The door opened again at the other end of the hall and a step squealed. The men hushed their voices. Hiyke came toward them; she carried a basket on her hip. In their midst she stopped and looked from face to face.
    “What is this, now? You look like the bishops arguing over a filioque.”
    Bjarni said, “We are sailing tomorrow.”
    She put the basket down on the table and stepped up to him. “You mean that you are robbing us.” She spoke straight into his face. “That is vile, is it not?”
    “If you call it so,” he said. “I see no other way, aside from killing him.”
    “Bah.” She jerked away from him. Kristjan stood off to one side, alone. She said to him, “And you, good-for-nothing—you are going, too?”
    “I can do anything they can do,” Kristjan said.
    She walked away from them, going straight out of the hall. Ulf twitched back the napkin over the basket and a steamy fragrance rose from the bread stacked inside.
     
    JUST BEFORE DAWN, the firebell began to clang. Bjarni was sleeping in the loft of the barn. Barefoot, his shirt unlaced, he jumped down to the yard. The bell sounded in his ears.
    “The ship!” Ulf ran out of the sleeping booth, pulling on his shoes. “The ship is on fire!”
    Bjarni sprinted down toward the bay. The sky was white with sunlight. The longship lay on its gunwale on the beach above the tide line. The canvas awning was all afire. Flames towered up out of the hold. He knew Hiyke had set it, to keep them there.
    Jon was already there, and was throwing water onto the fire from a little bucket. Bjarni reached the ship. The canvas was burnt away; fire billowed through the whole long hull. The ship was packed with straw. It was the straw that burned. Bjarni gripped the oar rail. The wood was heating from the fire.
    “Help me! Jon—”
    He flung his weight against the rail. Jon and Ulf sprang to help him. They rocked the ship up off her side onto her flat keelboard and skated it down the gravel beach. Other men reached them from the farm. They drove Swan down to meet the low waves of the bay.
    “Swamp her,” Bjarni cried. Up to his knees in the water, he dragged Swan forward until he felt her floating. He pushed down with all his strength on the oar rail, and the ship rolled over.
    The fire drowned with a hiss. The men stood back from the hull, barely afloat in the bay’s soft waves. Swatches of charred straw fouled the water. They swam the overturned ship out into deeper water and turned her right- side up again.
    Bjarni waded toward the beach. In the shallows he passed by Ulf and Andres; he said, “Haul her in and see how badly she is hurt.” Without pausing he walked out of the water and climbed the slope toward the buildings.
    The sheep were clipping the grass around the black thunderstones. In tight bunches they hurried out of his way, their heads back. He went straight through the farmyard and into the hall.
    Hiyke was just stepping down from a stool she had put below the window; she had watched it all. He went across the room to her.
    “You did that,” he said. “You burned the ship.”
    “I would happily die,” she said, “if the funeral would keep you from leaving.” Her low voice trembled. “You are taking everything. It is not just—you will leave us with nothing—”
    As she argued she put out her hands, and he caught hold of her wrists. She twisted her arms to free herself. He held