Viking Read Free

witch is dead, you’ll be able to concentrate on wedding Bretta and producing children.
    “We will await your return, Thorne. May Odin the All Father see you safely to your destination, and Thor the thunder god give you strength to defeat the witch.”

Chapter Two
     
    Isle of Man, Summer, 851 AD
    Cold gray waves washed the western shore. The land was silent and deserted. No peasants roamed the shoreline. No smoke plumed above the wooded hillsides.
    Peasants native to the isle knew better than to build too close to the sea lest a savage Viking horde swoop down upon them in their sleep and slay them. They were wise enough to build well away from the sea to give them time to close the log gates of the palisades surrounding their villages and string their bows in times of peril.
    No sound broke the silence on this summer morning except the lapping of the waves against theshore and the shrill crying of gulls as the rising sun broke through the morning mist.
    At his post on a hilltop overlooking the sea, a young peasant boy wrapped in a heavy woolen cloak stretched and yawned and got stiffly to his feet. His job was to watch for any strange craft approaching their shore and warn the villagers in time to arm themselves. He had seen nothing since taking over from another boy the night before and was bored with scanning an empty sea. He reached into his greasy leather wallet for his breakfast of coarse black bread and cheese, but before he could take a bite, something far out in the swirling mist caught his eye. He blinked, then stared fixedly at a dark shape riding low in the water. Then he saw another, and another. Five altogether. Suddenly the sun caught the edges of sails and glinted from flashing oar blades.
    Now he could see the fierce dragon heads rising above the graceful hulls. Flashes of light reflected off polished helmets, spear points and sword blades. Along each gunwale hung a line of brightly painted wooden shields, one overlapping the next, two shields to each oar hole. Each dragon ship was propelled swiftly by sixteen pairs of oars, seventeen feet long. From a yardarm slung across the forty-foot pole mast hung a single red-and-white striped square sail.
    The young watchman stood frozen with fear as the five narrow, shallow draft ships scraped the shore below him. Thirty tall, bearded and moustachedgolden-haired raiders leaped ashore from each ship. One hundred and fifty in all. They wore mail shirts of interlaced steel rings that reached almost to their knees, over which were slung handsome fur-trimmed cloaks, fastened at the throat by jeweled gold or silver brooches. Their leather shoes were laced and crisscrossed around their bare legs, and conical steel helmets protected their heads.
    Each man carried an assortment of weapons: a long, two-edged sword, battleaxe, spear, short knife and round wooden shield with a metal boss in the center. As the Vikings disgorged from their dragon ships, the lad finally found the courage to move his frozen limbs. But by then it was too late. He had already been seen from below. Two fierce Vikings charged up the hill and seized him before he could carry a warning to the village.
    “We have the boy, Thorne,” Ulm said as he dragged the struggling boy to the beached ships where Thorne was directing his men. “What shall we do with him?”
    Thorne gave the lad a cursory glance, noting that he was young and offered no threat to them except for the warning he would have carried. “I will speak with him.”
    Ulm held the boy by the shoulders while Thorne fired off questions. “How far to the village, boy?”
    The lad stared at Thorne, surprised to hear the savage Viking speaking to him in Gaelic. When he remained mute, Ulm gave him an ungentle shake. “Answer the question, boy!”
    The lad gulped and tried to speak, but terror froze his throat.
    “I won’t harm you, just answer truthfully,” Thorne said. “How far to the village?”
    “N-not far. A league, no more.”
    “Does