Six

The tale was not one we could get from our father, nor from our mother, but as the days of the snow moon turned, we stole the story, like the hooded crow does in the midden, in scraps.

Tor, our father’s brother, had left the village, had left Bloed when Eirik and I were barely born.

Something had happened, and here even though we pestered Sigrid and others besides, we could not learn the whole of the happening.

Yet we knew enough.

Our father had become chief, and had taken our mother as his, though Tor had wanted her for himself.

Yet, being the older brother, and having the right to choose, he took our mother.

There had been no children. That was what we kept hearing.

There had been no children.

And every night, Wulf, our father, would drink more and more flower beer, brewed from the dragon plant on the western isle, and had grown into himself.

During this time, we heard, our mother was looked after by Tor, who offered her comfort where there was none, and love, where it had died.

And then, at last, a miracle occurred, and our mother became heavy.

Nine months later, and the miracle was made twofold, as not one of us, but two of us slipped out of Mother’s belly and onto the rug by the fireside.

They said we held hands as we emerged into the world.

They said that Father cried.

They said that Mother wept.

They said that the priest swore, because he had prepared only a single totem. Expecting just one child, he had not made magic for more.

As I was the first out into the world, he wrapped me in the skin of a hare, and pushed a hare’s skull into my hand, and a hare’s small leg bone into my mouth.

“What of the boy?” Mother had asked.

The priest had shaken his head. “The gods did not see another,” he said.

“But he will be king one day!” Father cried.

“That may be,” the priest said. “But he will be so without a totem.”

“That cannot be!” Father shouted. “I have my raven! My father had his fox! Everyone must have a totem. Most of all a king!”

And then, we are told, that the priest thought for a long time. He nodded to himself.

He looked at the pair of us, wriggling on the wet rug, and spoke.

“Then you must give him a strong name, instead. Give him a name from the old stories. From the sagas. A name of strength. A name of eternity. A name with powerful meaning. You should call him Eirik: Forever Strong, The One King, and that will be enough to protect him. Not only in this life, but in other lives yet to come.”

*   *   *

It was only later, a little later, that the bad time began.

Tor declared that Eirik and I were his children. He claimed that he, not Wulf, had fathered them on our mother.

He demanded satisfaction; he demanded that we be given to him, and he did not care who he abused or whose honor he insulted to get his way.

*   *   *

Eventually, he was banished from the island, for a time of no less than three years.

He was taken out with the viking, as it left one leaf moon, taken to be abandoned at the farthest reach of the voyage.

He was never seen again.

Seven years passed and he was never seen again.

And then, this viking, there he was, found in the sunny lands of the middle earth, his skin tanned, his beard shorn, and he demanded his return to Bloed.

They refused at first, but honor bound them to obey, and so they brought our uncle home. Our uncle? Our father?