Prologue

Hedeby, A.D. 850

You could say he was a Viking wheeler dealer . . .

Everything he touched turned to gold, or leastways a considerable profit, and thank the gods for that, because Harek Sigurdsson was a brilliant Viking with an insatiable hunger for wealth and all its trappings.

It didn’t matter that he had vast holdings in the Norselands, an estate in Northumbria, several hirds of warriors who served under him when called to battle by one grab-­land king or another (Harek was a much-­sought battle strategist), amber fields in the Baltics, trading stalls in the marketplaces of Hedeby, Kaupang, and the Coppergate section of Jorvik, a fleet of twelve longships and two knarrs, and numerous chests filled with coins, jewels, and rare spices. It was never enough! Not to mention three wives and six concubines . . . or was it seven?

Not that he wanted or needed any more wives or concubines. Like many Viking men (hah! men of all lands, truth to tell), he was betimes guided by a body rudder known for its lackwittedness when it fancied a woman. The Wise Ones had the right of it when they proclaimed: A cock has no brain. Well, at the ripe old age of twenty and nine, he had finally taken a sip from Odin’s famed well of knowledge. In future, when he came upon a comely woman, he would bed her, not wed her, then send her on her merry way with a pat on the rump and a pouch of gold coins. Cheaper that way and lots less trouble!

Harek had just completed a meeting with Toriq Haraldsson, his agent here in Hedeby. Toriq had once been a hersir overseeing Harek’s Norse housecarls. Unfortunately, the fierce swordsman had lost an arm in battle. Harek had no qualms about hiring the handicapped man as his business representative. Loyalty and honesty were more important in that role than fighting skills. Besides, Toriq had once saved Harek’s life in battle at a time when Harek had been young and not yet so adept in fighting. A berserk Dane had been about to lop off Harek’s very head. Suffice it to say, the wergild for a highborn man’s head was enormous.

As they walked side by side on the raised plank walkways that crisscrossed the busy market center, men and women alike glanced their way, not just because of their impressive Norse height and finely sculpted features. Their attire—­fur-­lined cloaks, gold brooches fastening shoulder mantles, soft leather half boots—­could support a tradesman’s family for years.

Unaware or uncaring of the attention, Toriq scowled and grumbled under his breath. Toriq was not happy with Harek today.

“Spit it out, man. What troubles you?”

“This latest venture of yours . . . it ill-­suits a man of your stature,” Toriq said, but then he had to step aside to accommodate a crowd that had gathered to watch a craftsman blowing blue glass into a pitcher. Other artisans were hammering gold and silver into fine jewelry. In fact, Harek noticed an etched armband he might purchase later. In other stalls, workers could be seen carving wood and ivory, or firing clay pots in kilns behind the trading tables.

Hedeby was an exciting city, always something going on. To Harek, the bustle of commerce, the sounds of money being made, were like music to the ears. There wasn’t anything that couldn’t be purchased here, from the prized walrus rope that was cut in a single spiral strip from shoulder to tail, to—­well—­to his latest venture.

“Slave trading, that is what rubs you the wrong way?” Harek asked, now that he and his agent could walk side by side once again.

“Yea, and it should rub you the same, boy.” Toriq always referred to Harek in that way, even though Harek had long since been blooded in battle and it had been thirteen years since Toriq had saved his bloody head. Toriq himself had not yet seen forty winters.

“ ’Tis just another way of amassing a fortune.” Harek shrugged, not taking offense. After all, Toriq was a free man, welcome to voice his opinion. Still, it did not hurt to remind him of certain facts. He glanced pointedly at the massive gold ring that adorned Toriq’s middle finger, a writhing dragon design with ruby eyes, worth a small fortune. “My ventures helped make you a wealthy man, Toriq.”

“That they have, and most appreciative I am.”

“And your eight children, as well?” Harek mentioned, trying to lighten the mood. “How else would you dower all those daughters?”

Toriq was always complaining about how expensive it was to support females, much as he loved his six daughters and his lone wife, Elsa. “All boys need is a sword and occasional change of braies and boots, but girls want gunnas and hair beads and slippers and brooches for every occasion and all the household fripperies that are a seeming necessity” was Toriq’s usual refrain.

Not today, though. He just shook his head sadly at Harek.

“I am always looking for new ways to earn still more gold. Slave trading is no different than trading in amber or moneylending, both of which have been our mainstay. I’m only surprised I haven’t tried it afore.”

“There is a vast difference, Harek.”

“How so? In every country, there are thralls. You have thralls yourself.”

“Nay. I have indentured servants. Due to their own circumstances, some folks are forced to sell themselves, but only for a time. Then they are free.”

“You are splitting hairs, my man. Vikings are known to free thralls if they are well-­pleased. Some even wed their thralls or take them as concubines. Slavery is a fact of life. Why should I not profit from it?”

Toriq threw his arm out in frustration . . . and almost knocked over a plump maiden. After apologizing profusely, he turned to Harek once again. “You have riches enough to buy a small kingdom. Why can you not be satisfied with what you have?”

Harek was approaching frustration himself now, and he bristled. Criticism, even from a friend, could go too far. “A man cannot have an excess of gold. All the sagas say ’tis best to save for rainy days.”

“Pfff! It could rain for forty days and forty nights, like it did for that Noah character the Chris­tians babble on about, and you would still stay afloat. On the other hand, you would probably fill your Ark—­rather, longship—­with gold, and it would sink from its very weight. Then where would you be? Sunk by your own greed.”

Realizing the inadvertent humor in his remark, Toriq laughed and squeezed Harek’s forearm. “Peace, my friend. You gave me back my life when I thought I no longer had worth as a man. You know I will do whate’er you ask.”

“Even if it leaves a bad taste in your mouth?”

“Even then.”

They had almost arrived at the harbor when a horn blared, announcing the arrival of yet another sea vessel. Hopefully, it would be Silver Serpent, Harek’s largest longship, which was expected any day from the eastern lands. With its human cargo.

Anyone entering or exiting Hedeby, located at the junction of several major trade routes, had to do so by foot or horse or cart through one of three gateway tunnels built into the massive semicircular ramparts of the fortified city. Once they passed through into the bright light onto the wharves, Harek surveyed the seventy or so ships and boats, with flags of many colors denoting family or business or royal allegiance, that were tied at anchor or beached farther on for repairs.

The new arrival was indeed Harek’s slave trader. To his dismay and Toriq’s horror, they could practically smell the “cargo” afore the passengers even alighted.

And what a motley bunch they were! More than fifty men, women, and children of various nationalities, from ebony to white skin, wobbled on shaky sea legs over the wide gangplank onto the dock. There should have been a hundred. Harek bristled with anger, wondering what had happened to the others. Even a dimwit could see that this was a disaster that meant money lost. Even the most tightfisted farmer knew that you did not starve a pig before market.

As a whole, the starveling group, wearing raggedy garments, was filthy, some covered with dried vomit and other body emissions. Scabs, bruises, and lice were in clear evidence. Their eyes as they passed by Harek and Toriq were dead, except for a few in shackles who held his stare with murderous intent.

“The reeking ship will have to be scrubbed down with lye afore used again for any purpose,” Toriq noted, as if Harek had not already come to the same conclusion.

“I want these thralls bathed, fed, and clothed. A healer will have to be called to treat some, I warrant,” Harek told Toriq.

“It will be a sennight or more before any of them are fit for the auction block.”

“And time wasted means less profit,” Harek repeated one of his favorite proverbs.

“Precisely.”

“Meanwhile, I have a thing or two to say to the captain of this floating cesspit.”

“Where shall I take them?” Toriq studied the individuals, some of whom were shivering despite the summer heat. Obviously, they could not be housed in the slave quarters where goods and persons were stored before auction, not in this condition. If naught else, there would be fear of contagion. Odin only knew what diseases bred on these sorry bits of humanity.

“I have no idea where to house them. To Muspell, for all I care, at this point.”

Toriq tapped his chin thoughtfully, then said, “I will take them to the storage building behind the amber trading stall. It is mostly empty now. Elsa will know what to do about delousing these ­people and fattening them for market, though she will not thank me for the task.” That was as close as Toriq went to taunting him with I-­told-­you-­so’s.

“Buy her a new gold neck torque with my regards,” Harek advised.

“You do not know women if you think that will suffice,” Toriq told him.

“Do whate’er you must then.”

It was, in fact, three sennights afore Harek returned to Hedeby from a brief trip home to his Norse estate where he’d been summoned to handle a crisis involving a neighboring chieftain with a land dispute. The lackbrain Viking would think again afore trying to steal property from Harek in his absence, especially in his present mood.

His first wife, Dagne, resided there, and what a shrew she’d turned out to be! Now that the first bloom of youth had passed Dagne at twenty and five, Harek could scarce bring himself to give her a conjugal duty swive. ’Twas hard to find her woman place in all that fat, Dagne now being as wide as she was tall. But did she appreciate his husbandly attentions? Nay! She was too busy complaining:

“There is not enough wood for the hearth fires.”

It is summer. You do not need to keep all the hearth fires burning.

“The cook is too mouthy and disrespectful.”

Probably because you invade her domain too much.

“One of the privies needs cleaning.”

Then clean it.

“Why can’t we have a beekeeper in residence?”

Because you would tup him, as you did the blacksmith, the shipwright, the horse breeder, and the monk.

“The rushes in the great hall are flea ridden.”

Um, I can tell you where we keep the rakes, my dear.

“Your mustache is too bristly.”

Then stay away from my damn mustache.

“I heard that Queen Elfrida has a new silver fox-­lined cloak. Why can’t I have one, too?”

Because three dozen foxes would have to die to cover your bulk.

“There is a black bear in the north wood needs killing.”

I can think of something else that needs killing.

“I might be increasing again.”

And yet I have not been home for nigh on ten months. How do you explain that, my halfbrained wife?

There was a good reason why Norsemen went a-­Viking so much.

In the end, Harek left his Norse estate, with good riddance, vowing to himself not to return for a good while. And renewing his vow never to wed again.

To his relief, Toriq had already handled the thrall situation in his absence. Not only cleaning and feeding them, but selling them at the slave mart the day before. “Four thousand mancuses of gold for fifty slaves! That is wonderful!” Harek exclaimed, doing a quick mental calculation. “Even with expenses—­initial purchase price to the slavers, sixty seamen’s wages for one month, food and clothing for the thralls during the voyage, medical care where needed, the auctioneer’s commission, and a goodly bonus for you—­there has to be a clear profit of at least twenty-­five hundred mancuses.”

Toriq nodded. “A few of the skilled slaves—­a carpenter, a farrier, a wheelwright, a weaver, and a beekeeper—­brought a goodly amount by themselves.”

Good thing Dagne, with her sudden yen for a beekeeper, did not hear of the beekeeper.

“And, of course, the younger, more attractive women raked in considerable coin. I saved one especially nubile Irish wench from the bidding block. For your bedplay, if you choose. Otherwise, my Elsa says she must go.” He waggled his eyebrows at Harek.

He slapped Toriq on the shoulder in a comradely fashion. “A job well done, my friend! Already I can see the possibilities for the future. Longships sent to different ports to gather new cargo. The Rus lands, Byzantium, Norsemandy, Jorvik, Iceland. With more selective purchases and better treatment, I guarantee there will be even better returns on investment.”

“Cargo? Cargo?” Toriq sputtered. “You are speaking of human beings, Harek. Many of whom are stolen from their homes.”

“You still object?” Harek was surprised. “I thought . . . I mean, you did such a good job. I thought you now accepted the wisdom of slave trading as a side business.”

Toriq shook his head vigorously. “I mean no insult, Harek, but you will have to find another man to handle this business. I did it this once, but no more.”

“No offense taken,” Harek said, but, in truth, he was offended. Perhaps that was why he was so dissatisfied with the Irishwoman in his bed furs that night. Beautiful, she was, but Toriq had failed to mention that she could not stop weeping for her young son who had been sold to a Frankish vintner and a husband who had been left behind on a poor Irish farm. Never mind that it had been the husband who’d sold her and his youngest son into thralldom. Harek wished he could sell Dagne so easily.

Disgusted, Harek made his way to the sleeping quarters on his largest knarr anchored at the docks. There, instead of celebrating a new, successful business venture, he succumbed to a long bout of sullen mead drinking, which led to alehead madness. Leastways, it had to be madness, for the drukkinn apparition that appeared to him out of the darkness was not of this world.

A misty, white shape emerged. Ghost-­like.

“Harek Sigurdsson!” a male voice yelled out of the mist, so loud that Harek jerked into a sitting position on the pallet in the alcove of his enclosed space and almost rolled off to the floor. He blinked and tried to see the hazy blur standing in the open doorway leading to the longship’s deck. The only light came from the full moon outside.

He stood, and at first he was disoriented. Who wouldn’t be with a head the size of a wagon wheel, with what felt like a battle-­axe imbedded in his skull?

A man . . . He could swear it was a man he saw standing there, and yet at the same time, there was no one there. Just a swirling fog.

“Who goes there?” he yelled out, thinking it must be one of the crew stationed on board overnight.

Silence.

Now he was starting to be annoyed. “Present yourself, man, or suffer the consequences.”

No one answered. Good thing, because he realized he had no weapon in hand. Should he grab a knife? What kind of weapon did one use with a ghost? Would a blade even suffice?

He shook his head to clear it, to no avail. He was still under the influence of ale. Or something.

He could see clearer now, and it was a tall, dark-­haired man wearing a long gown in the Arab style who beckoned him outside. The gown in itself was not so unusual but the broadsword he held easily in one hand was, especially since it was his own pattern-­welded blade. Then, there were the huge white wings spread out from his back.

What? Wings? Huh? It couldn’t be possible. He closed his eyes and looked again. Definitely wings.

Was it even a man? Or some kind of bird?

He had heard of shivering men suffering from wild dreams of writhing snakes or even fire-­breathing dragons, but usually it was men trying to wean themselves away from years of the addictive brews or opium. Harek rarely drank to excess and never had an interest in the poppy seed.

But Harek had a more important issue at the moment. His bladder was so full he would be pissing from his ears if he didn’t soon relieve himself. Making his way through the now empty doorway, he staggered over to the rail. Undoing the laces on his braies, he released himself and let loose a long stream of urine. When he was done—­shaking his cock clean, then tucking it back into his braies—­he breathed a sigh of relief, then belched. Which was a mistake. His breath was enough to gag a maggot.

Which cleared his head enough to let him know he still had company. The man-­bird stood there, scowling at him with contempt. The wings were folded so that he could scarce tell they were there.

“Who . . . what are you?”

“Michael. The Archangel.”

Harek knew about angels. In his travels, he had encountered many a follower of the Chris­tian religion, and a pathetic religion it was, too. Only one God? Pfff! “I am Norse.”

“I know who you are, Viking.”

He did not say “Viking” in a complimentary manner. And, really, Harek needed to get to his bed and sleep off this alehead madness. Best he get this nightmare over with as soon as possible. “And you are here . . . why?”

“God is not pleased with you, Harek. You are a dreadful sinner, as are your brothers, as are many of your fellow Norsemen. ’Tis time to end it all.”

“End it? Like, death?”

“You say it.”

“All of us?” he scoffed.

“Eventually.”

“We all must pass to the Other World eventually.”

“That is not what I meant. Life as you know it will end shortly for you and your brothers; in fact, it has already for some of you. And the Viking race as a whole will dwindle away gradually over the centuries until there is no country that will claim you.”

Huh? “That requires an explanation. Are you threatening me and my family?” Was this apparition implying that some of his brothers were already dead? Harek tried to recall the last time he had made contact with or heard from any of his family and realized it had been months. Inching backward from the looming figure, he hoped to reach a nearby oar, which he could use as a makeshift weapon. But he felt dizzy and wobbly on his feet. “I need to sit down.”

“What you need, fool, is to pray.”

What a ridiculous conversation! He could not wait to wake up and tell his friends about this strange dream. It would be fodder for the skalds who ever needed new ideas for their sagas. “Pray? For my life?” he scoffed.

“No. For your everlasting soul. Your death is predetermined.”

Enough! This madness had gone on long enough! “Speak plainly,” Harek demanded.

“Thou art a dreadful sinner, Harek. Dreadful! Your greed is eating you alive, and you do not even know it.”

He must have appeared confused. Bloody hell, of course he was confused. “What have I done that is so bad?”

The man-­thing—­an archangel, he had called himself—­shook his head as if Harek were a hopeless case. “Your most recent activity is so despicable. How can you even ask?”

“Oh! The slave trading! That is what this is about.” Harek was disgusted up to his very gullet with all the sanctimonious condemnation of his business dealings. First Toriq. Now some angel with flea-­bitten wings trying to lord over him.

“I do not have fleas.”

That was just wonderful. The creature could read minds.

“And I am not a creature.”

Harek inhaled deeply for patience and almost fell over. He reached the rail for support. “In truth, what is so wrong with thralldom? Your own biblical leaders—­Abraham, David, Moses—­had slaves.” On occasion, Harek’s father had hired monk scholars to tutor his sons, and, being a merchant, Harek had often traveled to Chris­tian lands where the inhabitants considered it their mission in life to convert those “heathen Vikings.” He knew more than most Chris­tians about their book of rules and sagas.

“You dare to compare yourself to such great men!” The angel pointed a forefinger at Harek, and Harek felt a jolt of sharp pain shoot through him.

“I only meant—­”

“Silence! For your sins, you will die, taking your mortal form with you. For the grace of God, you are being given a second chance to redeem yourself.”

That caught Harek’s attention, but he was an astute businessman. He knew no great prize came without a price. A second chance was going to cost him, sure as . . . well, sin. “And what must I do to redeem myself?”

“You will become a vangel—­a vampire angel—­one of the troops being formed to fight Satan’s evil Lucipires, demon vampires.”

Harek had no idea what a vam-­pyre was. Sounded like something to do with fire. But angels . . . that, he did understand. “I am a Viking. I hardly think I am the material for saintly angelhood.”

“You will not be that kind of angel.”

“For how long would I be required to fight these . . . um, demons?” He was still not convinced this wasn’t just a bad dream.

“As long as it takes. Seven hundred years at first. Longer, if you fail to follow the rules.”

“Whoa! Seven hundred years?”

“Or longer.”

“And there are rules?” What am I . . . a youthling who needs to be told when he can do this or that? We shall see about that.

“No great prize comes without a price?” Michael told him, repeating his own thoughts back at him. Again. “Do you agree?”

“Do I have a choice?”

“There is always a choice.”

What did he have to lose? Besides, he was an intelligent man. He would find a way to reverse the decision later, if he so chose. Harek nodded, and before he had a chance to change his mind, the archangel pressed the tip of the broadsword against Harek’s chest, causing him to lean backward, farther and farther, until he fell over the rail into the water.

It should have been no problem. He was a leather-­lunged swimmer when need be, but his body was suddenly riddled with excruciating pain. His jaw felt as if it were being cracked, then forced back together with an iron vise. In fact, it felt as if he had long, fang-­like incisors now. And his back! His shoulder blades seemed to burst open. The place where wings should go, he presumed, but no; a quick pass of his fingers over those spots revealed that the skin had healed into raised knots. All this happened in the matter of seconds as he sank deeper and deeper into the murky depths. Choking on the briny water. Fighting to swim upward against a force determined to hold him down. His ears began to ring, and a sense of lethargy overcame him. Drowning. He no longer fought his fate.

Even so, Harek had time and brains enough left to realize that he’d forgotten to ask one important question:

What exactly was a vangel?