We sail for days without seeing other boats. Local traders have stopped for the season. Long-distance traders are crossing the Baltic Sea southward, migrating like birds.
At night the women talk of setting up home on an island. It began with an offhand comment by Jofrid. But others joined in. Why not pick an island that no one else wants—a rocky crag? That way, no one will suspect women live there. No one will bother them.
They can take sand from the beach and kelp from the sea, and form layers—sand, kelp, sand, kelp—filling the largest indentations in the rocky top, until weather does its magic on the layers and turns it into fertile earth. They can grow what they need. The deepest indentations can be sealed somehow to hold rainwater. They’ll make ponds that way. There are hundreds of islands off Jutland, where the weather is so much milder than in Skáney. They’ll find the right one, and then they can live independently of the rest of the world. Women alone. Free. They fall into one another’s arms in joy. They can be as independent of the world as that child Bolli’s settlement is. And if they want, they can trade, but have someplace to retire all winter. They have choices now.
Their dreams jab me, for I cannot share them. I cannot even envy them.
One night, as we eat a wild boar that Unn killed for us, I listen to the animal’s skin. It is so thick, you hear it as it tears. It says something secret, about the hollow under one’s neck, the private folds behind one’s knees, the fact that we all die, sooner rather than later. It drives me crazy. I am fifteen, nearly sixteen. The skin of my life is tearing.
Rain comes. We’ve been at sea in rain before, of course. But this one goes quickly from a gentle patter to sleet. So we stop at the first settlement we see. It is on a hill, across a fjord, just around the west tip of Skáney.
We eat with the people, who welcome us heartily as the traders we present ourselves to be—traders who have already sold everything. That makes sense to them, for it’s the end of a work season for them, too. They’ve been fishers all summer. The bay is rich in cod, plaice, flounder, herring. But they’ve spent the past day packing their belongings into wagons. They are moving inland for winter, where the firewood and the game are plentiful. They are cheerful and hospitable.
Then the stories begin. They tell tales of the ghosts who haunt this place. I thought I knew all about them. But their ghosts are from the sea, and they can turn themselves into trolls, with a dreadful stench, or into seals that lead you astray at sea; you only realize what they are when you throw a spear and it bounces off them.
After stories we’re all more comfortable, more intimate. And now they warn us about the notorious women pirates, red-haired devils who kill without a second’s pause. They tell us that the kings of the Dan people, including all of Jutland, have banded together to send out ships of warriors to track them down and kill them. They think this is a good thing. They don’t talk about the women and children slaves that these pirate women have returned to their homes—they know nothing of this. And I suddenly realize no one knows the truth about us except the families of those women and children.
They talk about pirates in general—how the whole system they count on for survival will collapse if pirates are allowed to prevail. They tell of pirates who get enraged at ships that are empty, having already sold their goods, and torture the crew out of spite, even kill them. They hate pirates. And they hate these women pirates most fiercely of all—as though the fact that they are women makes it unnatural and therefore far worse.
We sit there in our male disguises and listen impassively. I am glad no one of our crew speaks up, no one gives in to the urge to set them straight about what the women pirates have done. After all, then they’d wonder how we knew.
We tell them we are sailing to Írland. They laugh, thinking it is a joke, thinking we are saying we are going to raid monasteries and burn farms, which would make us even greater terrors than the women pirates. But I explain that we are giving passage home to the three Irish women (an explanation their faces tell me I quickly have to revise), in exchange, of course, for considerable silver, since they are all three princesses (at which their faces tell me I have gone too far) or, rather, one is a princess; the others are servants.
Once I stop blathering and they realize we are serious, they are full of advice. They tell us to go up the west coast of Skáney till we reach the point where the forests are so thick, no light penetrates the trees. Then we are to cross the sea westward to Jutland and cut through a giant fjord at the north that will spill us out on the other side into the North Sea. They say this will shorten our journey by two days, maybe even three, depending on the winds.
I know about that fjord, of course. That’s where Gilli cut through seven years ago—the Limfjord, where I jumped overboard and lived for that spring and summer and part of autumn till Beorn whisked me away with Ástríd and my little egg Búri.
“But won’t the passage from Skáney to Jutland be long at that point? Won’t we be out of sight of land?”
“For a couple of days,” says a man. “But to long-distance traders like you, what does it matter?” The way he says it, the thrust of his chin, puts me on alert. He finds us suspect, though he can’t be onto us or they’d all be attacking.
“This ship is new to us,” I lie. “For safety’s sake, we want to keep within sight of land whenever possible.”
So they tell us to go north only half a day, and then we’ll see the largest island of the Dan people to the west. It’s called Selund, because it has so many seals, but good ones—not shape-shifters. We can go west there and follow the northern coastline of Selund until we see another island of reasonable size to our west and a little north. That’s Samsø. We are to go up the east coast of Samsø and cut through a passage that will let us out on the island’s west coast and within sight of the mainland of Jutland. From there we can go north to the fjord that cuts across Jutland and will allow us to come out on the North Sea. After that, they can’t help. Only one of them has ever traveled outside Skáney, and that one never went beyond Jutland.
I’ve been only half listening since the first mention of Samsø. I know a man who uses the channel in that island when he goes after pirate ships. I see his eyes. I toss and turn all night.
Before dawn, Ingun wakes us. “Shhhh. No talking. We have to leave quickly.”
We act without question. Within minutes we have everything we brought on land with us. We sneak onto our ship and Ingun tells us “North,” so we set sail northward.
Once we’re far from the settlement, Ingun tells her tale. She was relieving herself in the night, when she saw a man from the settlement jump off our boat and then get into another boat—a small one—and sail away south. “He was spying,” she says.
And, of course, in our personal chests now are the women’s clothing that families have given us—the clothing we wore on our excursions into Birka.
“Was he the tall one, missing a finger?” asks Jofrid.
The man who questioned why we wanted to stay within sight of land lacked a finger.
“Who could see his hand in the night?” answers Ingun. “But he was tall.”
“I bet he was the one who grabbed at my tunic.”
“What happened, Jofrid?”
“I was walking to our ship after the evening meal, to bring fresh water to Cadla and grasses to eat, when he appeared out of nowhere. I jabbed him in the ribs and he took off.”
“Why didn’t you say anything to us?”
“I didn’t think much about it. You know. He could have been a fuðflogi, hopeful that a ship of men would bring him love for a night. I felt sorry for him; it can’t be easy in these little settlements to find what you need.”
“Maybe he was trying to see if you were a woman. You’re the smallest of us—the easiest to target.”
“Ah,” says Unn. “He knocked my hat off. I thought it was clumsiness—but maybe he was checking my hair. Thank heavens mine is cut off.”
“And not red,” says Matilda, our redhead.
“All right,” I say. “Let’s assume he found us out. He went south. So I agree with Ingun, let’s continue north. We just have to be extra alert.”
We set up four lookout posts, one to each direction. Within the hour a fishing boat appears in a cove, but we simply head out farther from land and it stays there, possibly without even seeing us.
By midmorning we reach the point where we can see Selund to the west. We cross over and hug the north shore of the island. Within a few hours a fjord splits the land. The terrain is flat, so one can see long distances. There’s no evidence of a settlement. We enter into an enormous bay, a perfect harbor, and anchor.
“I’ve never been hunted before,” says Sibbe.
“That’s because you were a servant, not a slave,” says Unn.
“It’s an awful feeling,” says Matilda.
Ingun picks up an ax. “They’ll be looking for us by day. So let’s stock up with whatever we need so we can travel at night. What do you say?” She lifts the ax. “I’ll get firewood so we can warm ourselves at night.”
We fan out in pairs. Drifa and I hunt with bows and arrows. She’s as good as I am. We quickly roust a pair of greylag geese and take them both down. I’m carrying the brace when we hear something behind us on the water. In one swift movement, Drifa turns and shoots. Then she gasps. I look. She’s hit a swan!
In Eire it is unlucky to kill a swan or crane. Drifa was stolen from a country the Norse call Finlandi. I can see from her face that she also shares this belief. We feel cursed. The big bird struggles. It is wrong to leave it suffering. And the curse is already on us. I shoot a second arrow. The bird sinks.
“Fish will eat it,” I say. Drifa says nothing. I see a muscle in her cheek twitch.
We start back toward the ship when I see a stone statue of a woman seated on a throne. She wears a long shift, an apron, four bead necklaces, a neck ring, a strange hat that flattens out to the sides like wings, and a wide cloak. She’s flanked by a bird on each armrest. Above the back of her chair extend the heads of two dogs. Those must be Óðinn’s greedy wolves, Geri and Freki. I’m guessing the goddess is Frigg—for she has the right to sit on her husband’s throne.
Is this a good omen, to balance the bad? A boy bursts out from behind the statue and runs away as if for his life. There’s a settlement in that direction, for sure.
We race to our boat, whooping the alarm call we’ve agreed on. Everyone clatters onboard. I count, to be sure, as Sibbe pulls up the anchor—twelve! I look around. “Unn!” I shout. “Grima!”
A ship rounds the bend. They can’t help but see us.
Ragnhild and Thyra have our sail up already.
We go. We go without Unn and Grima. I feel insane.
That ship follows. It’s bigger than us. But the wind is with us, so we’re faster. The first shower of arrows comes.
“Lie flat,” I scream.
“But we have to steer,” says Jofrid from the helm.
“You and I will take turns. No one else will stand.” I run for the helm and push Jofrid flat as the second shower of arrows comes.
Jofrid pops up in front of me. “Don’t be stupid. I’ll watch the rear. When they pull back the bowstrings, we’ll both dive for the deck. Dive!”
This time some of the arrows are on fire. One passes through the sail, and instantly it’s aflame. Cadla the goat bleat-screams.
Everyone’s on their feet now, dunking buckets on ropes into the sea and splashing the sail. The flame is doused quickly.
The next rain of arrows falls short. We’re out of range now. We’re flying.