When the Gods Laugh

by Kate Machon

The horse whinnied as my men led him into the shallows. He was my best mount—glossy coated and thick muscled. I would miss him, but the gods demanded the best. Any other horse wouldn’t have been a sacrifice.

Ulf made it quick. His blade sliced both jugulars—Storm Bringer half-reared, staggered, legs buckled. Dead in a heartbeat. His nose dipped beneath the water as blood pumped from his neck to spread through the shallows, turning the breakers frothy pink.

My shadow stretched long across the scene as the sun died at my back. The sky darkened and my men dispersed, returning to our base camp above the debris of the high tide mark. Night closed in, claiming the beach and obscuring the hump of the horse’s body.

I might trust in the strength of my sword arm and the men who fought at my side, but only fools failed to seek the favor of the gods. A mistake I wouldn’t make. Not when so much of my past was tied up in tomorrow’s fight.

Ulf came to me, face painted with a dark spray of blood. “We could be halfway across Wessex with Ivar’s invading army by now, getting rich and drinking Saxon ale.” He wiped his seax on a scrap of cloth before sheathing the knife. “But no, here we are, stuck on this gods-cursed Northumbrian coastline.”

I snorted. “You always say Saxon ale tastes like piss.”

His teeth flashed a grin. “True. Though who cares after the first pailful?” He glanced across at the other men. “They’re getting restless. You’d better be right about this raid, Sigurd. Even your revenge has to pay.”

I scowled and flexed fingers around the hilt of my sword, calluses settling into the familiar grip. “There’s a church. There’ll be gold.”

Ulf caught my mood and took a step back. “As you say, Lord.”

Except he wasn’t wrong. I was a war leader, a gold giver whose reputation had grown with every season. It was why men followed me. They would fight where I told them as long as I won. Tomorrow would be different, and perhaps some of them would leave me because of it. But I’d already waited too long for this day.

Ulf turned towards the camp. “I’ll stop these rassragrs drinking themselves into a stupor. You get some sleep, Lord.”

His curses sent men into the darkness to guard our exposed flank, while the luckier ones wrapped themselves in cloaks and blankets and took to their sandy beds. I doubted our prey knew we were so close, but care was what kept us alive.

I remained apart. There would be no rest for me this night. Sleep would only roll back the years and bring the dream: a cold morning on a sandy beach, the clash of swords and the sting of fear in my throat, the tight grip of my sister’s hand. And the moment our hands were ripped apart. The tide had been dyed red that day too. With my mother’s blood.

I twitched. My thoughts had spiralled and the dream almost claimed me. While I’d been caught in the memory, a moon had risen, silvering the crests of the waves. Above the water something skimmed. A gull caught late? From the dunes a bird called.

I shivered. Were they an omen?

My sacrifice would draw the gods’ attention. Yet they cared nothing for the small lives of men. What they loved was a strong warrior and a bloody fight. In that I would not disappoint.

I settled onto the shingle, sword across my knees, cloak wrapped close against the creeping cold. From beneath my tunic I drew out the pouch holding my father’s hammer amulet. He had been killed on a raid before he had learnt of my mother’s death. Retribution was mine alone. And the waiting was almost over. Tomorrow I would wear the amulet as the Norns wove my fate.

I clenched the pouch tight as the hiss and roll of waves over stones vibrated through me. The night played out in the slow rotation of the stars while I stoked the fury that burned in my belly.

False dawn. A smudge of light breaking the sky from the sea. A curl of mist.

It was time.

I kicked the men to wakefulness. Mutters filled the half-light as they waded up to their knees in water, stowing gear on the longboat. I pulled on my coat of mail with its leather lining stinking of sweat, fastened my sword and seax at my waist, and vaulted into the boat. Water nudged her prow and the strakes shivered as the stone anchor dropped into the bottom. My men ran her off the shingle bar, leapt aboard as she reached deeper water, and took their places at the rowing benches.

At least Ran had been listening last night. The goddess had accepted our sacrifice for a calm sea and called her Sjovoettir to heel. The water was a steady rush against the hull as we skimmed the polished surface. Droplets flicked from the oar tips, golden as honey mead.

This I loved. The vibration of the boat beneath my feet, the rush of the wind against my face, the briny splash of spray. But today it brought no comfort. I would only find solace in the bite of a sword.

The leather pouch was in my hand again; the press of metal hard against fingers. I tipped the heavy gold amulet, engraved and enamelled, into my palm, then fastened it around my neck. No doubt the Saxons had stolen my mother’s matching amulet from her body. They would pay for that in blood—Odin’s lesson. Only thirty men filled the boat. But we were Danes.

“Pull, you bastards,” Ulf shouted and the boat surged beneath us.

Speed and surprise would be our allies.

Light glinted on water as the sun showed its edge above the horizon, turning the mist and sea red-gold. The outline of a familiar headland appeared off our larboard side.

I glanced at Ulf and anticipation growled between us. Today we would sacrifice to a different god. One hand touched the amulet at my throat, the other rested on the pommel of my sword. Thor, give my arm strength, for today we would kill. Today our reputation would spread in the jaws of Fenrir. And I would have my revenge.

I made my way astern, climbing between the rowers, over stacks of sand-polished helmets and painted shields. Hrothgard had guided us to this headland, but for the final approach I took the steering oar. It quivered in my hand, pulled by unseen currents, and I nudged it landwards.

The mouth of the river opened before us, snarled with sandbanks and the exposed ribs of wrecked boats. Withies marked the courses through—some safe, some false—set to stop the unwelcome; set to stop us. The people here thought they were safe against sea attacks, and that had made them lazy. The day I’d spent amid the stinking mud and biting flies of the reedbeds, watching the fishermen run the deep channels, had shown me the way through.

The boat rushed towards the golden crescent of sand. The beach where my childhood had shattered, and for a moment the memory gripped me. Mother, sword in hand, locked in the shield wall to protect her children. Fear and pride had twined in my guts as I’d watched her fight the Saxon bastards who’d attacked our settlement while Father and his men were away. The shield wall had been pushed back and back until the surf swirled around their ankles.

My sister gripped my hand—her seax raised to defend us. Hair tangled around narrowed sea-green eyes and bared teeth. She was as fierce and beautiful as the goddess Freyja.

“Get them in the boat,” a gasp from Mother.

No. I couldn’t leave her. Couldn’t bear the thought of her death. But someone gripped me from behind, pulled me deeper into the water and away from her. My sister stumbled after me, floundered, went down. Our hands tore apart. The shield wall buckled.

I was flung into the boat among wet ropes and bilge water. Oars dug, pulling us away from Mother and my sister. I shouted, scrambled to the stern, fingers gripping the gunwale as the beach and bodies shrank in our wake.

That day I had been a child. Now I returned as a warrior, and eagerness keened in my blood. The keel crunched against sand and we splashed into the shallows. Among the upturned fishing boats littering the beach, an early fisherman gave a cry and was silenced. We moved across the shingle like Einherjar, summoned from the battlefield by Odin’s handmaidens to enter Valhalla.

The first obstacle would be easy. A few rotting huts which straggled among the dunes, giving shelter to those that were meant to keep watch and light the signal fire at any sign of danger.

Not today.

A door opened to a yawning woman carrying a child. She froze, one hand flying to her throat. Hrothgard’s sword hissed and I spat a curse, barked a “No”. I didn’t fight women and children. Not after what happened in my childhood. At times men had mocked that as weakness, and had come to regret it.

Ulf ghosted past me, face painted with old and new blood, seax dripping red. He raised it to his lips and waved the woman away. She backed into the hut and a bar thudded into place.

Ulf shook his head. “One day, Sigurd, a woman’s going to put a knife in your back.”

I grinned. “They’d have to get past your mighty sword first.”

He cupped the bulge in his trousers and chuckled. “Aye, there’s always that.”

The men I’d sent to the headland to deal with the signal fire re-joined us.

“The firewood’s scattered, Lord,” Sven said. “Thrown into the sea. No one will be lighting it.”

I nodded. “Let’s move.”

We took the pathway I’d run a hundred times as a child, threading our way through the sand dunes. Then, half crouched, traced a fold in the land, through rough undergrowth to within a bowshot of our goal.

We paused to let ragged breathing steady, scanning the enclosure’s palisade walls. It was larger than when I’d lived here, before the thieving, bacraut Saxons had stolen back our toehold in this land, but not much had changed since my recent scouting trip. The palisade was dark and rotting. No helmets or spears showed above its ragged top. The seaward guards were no doubt dozing, safe in the belief that the watchfires would warn of danger.

I glanced at Sven. “You can climb the palisade? Let us in?”

A grin wriggled the tattoos on his face. “Easy as pissing on a corpse, Lord.”

I grunted. “Don’t be seen.” The final run to the enclosure would be in the open.

Sven half rose, but movement had him dropping to the ground. The gate opened and four horses emerged. The first was a massive chestnut stallion, coat gleaming golden in the early sunlight, its rider’s crimson cloak stirring across its haunches in a sudden breeze.

Odin’s balls. That had to be the lord of this shithole. So much for catching him in bed.

Behind the chestnut came a smaller horse carrying two slight figures. Children. And behind them a pair of nondescript bays, though their riders were warriors from the weapons they carried. How close would their path take them to our hiding place? Close enough for sharp eyes to notice us.

“What now?” Ulf asked.

I scanned my men. “Ready a bow. When they see us, we run—get between them and the walls. And you,” I pointed at the bowman, “bring down the horses.”

He nodded, and I silently cursed that we hadn’t more bows. We’d planned an assault amid the confines of the settlement where swords would carve flesh. Not a place for bows. But the gods liked to scatter our plans.

We pressed close to the ground, breathing dust. My muscles tightened and sweat prickled beneath armor as the sweet heat of battle lust stirred. Every stride the horsemen took from the settlement was one in our favor. They started up the rise in the ground whose height would expose us. One of the warriors looked our way, his body tensed, and his mouth moved in an unheard shout.

“Now!”

We were up and running. Shields bouncing against our backs, swords jolting legs. The riders spun the horses back towards the settlement, pushing them into a gallop. It would be close. My bowman paused, took aim, and loosed towards the tight bunched group. The arrow skittered in the horses’ wake.

A second arrow followed, its flight a streak of motion past my shoulder. This time a horse went down. Curse the Norns—not the chestnut stallion. That galloped on for a few paces before the rider sawed it to a halt, shouted back to his men then rode onwards for the gate.

“Watch our backs,” I panted to Hrothgard, pointing to the warriors who flanked the downed horse. He and the bowman peeled away as we continued the race to the walls.

The thud of the horse’s hooves and the snort of its breath were loud in our ears as we converged on the gates. The stallion was through them first, and they swung inwards. We rushed the gap, spilling the guards and making short work with our swords. More men staggered from buildings; half-dressed Saxon rassragrs pulling on helmets and drawing weapons as they realized wolves were loose in the fold.

“Shield wall,” I shouted.

Ulf was at my shoulder, touching his shield to mine, Sven on the other side forming a line of overlapping wood spiked through with blades. We advanced, hammering weapons against shield rims, shouting disdain, slicing fear into the Saxons before they’d even met our swords.

We clashed. Spilled blood. Pushed on.

My heart a drumbeat in my ears. Fear a clenched fist in my stomach.

Don’t let the bastards think. Don’t let them group. Chaos is king here. The stench of their shit-terror stung my nostrils. We abandoned the shield wall to better fight. Butchers’ work.

A spear lunged at me. I knocked it aside. Stepped inside the arc of its reach. Shoved my sword in the wielder’s face. He went down with a gurgle. No time to rest. Press forward. Take an axe on my shield. Push back. Thrust. Another spray of blood and I moved on again.

Their leader was in sight. On foot now, an unbloodied sword hung from his hand as he watched the rout from behind his men. He saw me coming: a warrior, heavy with muscles and arm rings, with a gore dripping weapon.

He fled.

I followed, armor scraping as I ran, blood pounding in my ears, breath a rasp within my helmet. I’d corner the argr rat. But he was cunning. He reached the center of the settlement where a second palisade surrounded a hall. The gates slammed shut as I skidded to a halt in a spray of loose stone and dust.

“Cowardly Saxon whoreson.” I ripped my helmet from my head and spat towards the enclosure.

Ulf came to a panting stop beside me. “We don’t have the men or time for a siege …”

An arrow flickered from behind the palisade, narrowly missing his head, and we scrambled out of range.

Odin’s balls. Revenge had been so close. I seized an abandoned spear. Threw. It bounced off the palisade. I cursed the gods, the Saxons, my men. Yet Ulf was right. There was nothing I could do. The moans of dying men and the weeping of women and children filled the air. The sound of our victory, like bitter herbs on my tongue.

My most loyal men gathered at my shoulders, but the rest dispersed, heading for the church and looting the buildings. There’d be bigger prizes within the second enclosure, but the price to gain them would be too high.

“It’s a good haul,” Ulf said, nodding towards the growing piles of treasure. “Gold, silver, slaves if we want them. We’ve hurt the bastards.”

Not enough.

“Lord.” Hrothgard pushed his way to my side, and dangling from under his arms were a boy and a girl. “From the horse. That bastard’s brats.” He jerked his head towards the palisade.

Unease stalked across my skin. Had fate thrown these children in my path? Were they a test from the gods? I had never harmed a child, yet here they were when I needed bait for their father.

Ulf put his hand on my shoulder. “The boy will grow, Sigurd. Become just another Saxon bastard for us to fight.”

He knew me too well. The weight of my men’s eyes were heavy on my back. There could be no weakness.

Two ravens strutted and cawed on a nearby hut’s roof. Huginn and Muninn, Odin’s eyes in this world. I touched the amulet at my throat. Revenge. Its flickering fire had been a part of me since that day on the beach. I mustn’t fail.

Sheathing my sword, I drew my seax and took the boy, pressing the blade to his throat. “You want your son to live, Saxon,” I shouted in their tongue. “Come out from behind those walls and fight me.”

Heads bobbed above the palisade but the horseman didn’t show himself. “I can breed more sons,” a voice shouted, but it faltered.

“Perhaps I’ll just put out his eyes. Will you watch that?”

Urine poured down the boy’s legs, splattering my boots. I grunted. Maiming children wasn’t work for a warrior, though the gods liked to make us dance. Whatever I might threaten, I would make his death clean. A chance for Valhalla.

There was silence from the enclosure. The bacraut wouldn’t come out, even for his son.

I took the seax from the boy’s throat, squeezed his shoulder. “There’s nothing to fear. Just warrior talk.” I would make it quick. My teeth clenched as fingers tightened around the seax’s hilt, preparing for the thrust under his ribs and into his heart.

“Sigurd?” The other child, a girl, crouched at Hrothgard’s feet, spoke my name.

I frowned, staying the thrust. The girl’s face tilted up to mine. The world jolted. Sea green eyes and a promise of beauty to rival Freyja’s.

Her hand opened and heavy, enamelled gold flashed in her palm. “Before she died, my mother gave me this. She said you would come, one day.” The girl held out the amulet. Thor’s hammer—a twin to my own. “She said to give you this. My grandmother’s.”

Ringing filled my ears. A raven cackled and the seax slipped from my hand. The Saxons had captured my sister. Their leader had taken her to his bed. Fury clawed in my chest as I pushed the boy aside and took a step towards the palisade.

Beside me, Ulf threw back his head and barked laughter. Swinging towards him, I groped for my sword hilt.

He raised his hands, mouth still stretched in a grin. “The gods love to jest, Sigurd.”

“I’m not laughing,” I growled, but my sword remained sheathed. Instead, my lips pulled back in a wolf’s snarl. “Take everything to the boat then fire this place.” With luck, the coward would burn behind his wall.

Ulf nodded and shouted orders. The men divided up the plunder, carrying away metal plates and cups, coins and tools, armor stripped from the soldiers. Anything of value. Two carried a heavy silver cross from the church. Ulf was right; we had hurt them. The boat would lie low in the water on our journey home. Yet the failure bit.

I crouched by the girl with my sister’s face, and the familiarity of it tugged at the pain of loss. “What else did your mother say?”

She held my gaze and smiled. “She said Odin would protect us and guide us to our real family.”

Family? For so long I’d had nothing beyond the brotherhood of the battlefield. But now? I laughed and looked towards the strutting ravens. Perhaps there was another way to hurt this bacraut.

I rose, turned to the palisade, a hand resting on each child’s shoulder. “See your son, you Saxon shit,” I shouted. “Your daughter. I’m taking them with me—raising them as Odin-loving Danes. And one day, you’ll meet your son on the battlefield and it will be his sword in your gut.”

Maybe the gods were laughing, but I had my revenge. And more.

About the author

Kathrine Machon lives on the island of Jersey and spends her spare time scribbling stories both historical and fantastical. She has had a number of short stories published and hopes one day to have her name on the front cover of a novel. You can learn more about her on Twitter @KateMachon.

About the artwork

The illustration is Overseas Guests by Nicholas Roerich, painting, 1901. In the collection of the Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow, Russia. In the public domain.