The Land of the Silver Apples Read online

  It was one of Father’s usual remarks, but Jack refused to let it bother him. The air was too clear, too bright, too alive.

  A noisy crowd of men and boys waited outside the chief’s house. They all carried birch rods, and some of the boys chased each other in mock sword fights. Colin, the blacksmith’s son, challenged Jack. They set off across the yard, slashing and cursing. “Vile barbarian, I’ll have your head!” cried Colin.

  “Sooner will it decorate my doorpost!” swore Jack. Colin was heavier than him, but Jack had learned a great deal about fighting from the Northmen. He soon had Colin on the run, shrieking, “No fair! No fair!” until a blast from the chiefs hunting horn brought them to a halt.

  The chief stood in his doorway with the Bard, who carried his blackened ash wood staff. Only Jack knew what power lay in it and where it had come from. His own smaller staff, won with great effort in Jotunheim, was stored at the Bard’s house. Jack could practice with it there without listening to Father tell him about demons waiting to drag evil wizards down to Hell.

  The boy felt a sudden rush of joy at the rightness of the gathering. It was good to be in the middle of a crowd with the sun shining and the air fresh off the sea.

  The Bard held up his hand for silence. “The long night is past, and the sun has turned from walking in the south,” he proclaimed in a ringing voice. “It comes toward us, bringing summer, but the journey will be long and hard. The sleep of winter still lies over the land. We must wake the orchards to new life.”

  The old man nodded to the chief, who spread his arms wide and cried, “You heard him! Let’s go wake up some apple trees!” Everyone cheered and spread into the chiefs orchard, slashing the trunks with birch rods.

  “Waes hael! Waes hael!” the men and boys cried in Saxon. “Good health! Good health!” The Bard followed behind, his cheeks rosy with cold and his long beard and robes as white as the snow. After each tree was struck, he placed a morsel of bread soaked with cider in the branches, for the robins that would sing the apples back to life.

  The villagers moved from farm to farm, blowing on wooden flutes and bawling songs at the tops of their voices. In between, they stopped to drink cider until most of the men were drunk. The last place they visited was Giles Crookleg’s house because it was the farthest out of town. “Waes hael!” bellowed the villagers. Mother came out to greet them.

  “Waes hael!” yelled the blacksmith, slashing none too accurately at the tree shading the barn. He sang in a loud, blustering voice,

  Apple tree, apple tree,

  Bear good fruit!

  Or down with your top

  And up with your root!

  “It’s not wise to threaten powers you don’t understand,” the Bard remarked, placing cider-soaked bread in the branches. The blacksmith belched thunderously and staggered off. “I’m glad this is the last of it,” the old man said to Jack. “You’d think I’d be used to drunks, living with Northmen so long, but they still irritate me. And speaking of irritation, we have yet to discuss what happened during the need-fire ceremony.”

  Uh-oh, thought Jack. He had hoped to escape punishment.

  “Yes, I see you understand what I’m talking about. You knew as well as Giles that Lucy had that necklace.”

  “I did try to stop her, sir, but Father—”

  “You’re thirteen years old,” the Bard said sternly. “In the Northman lands you’d be considered an adult.”

  “Father doesn’t think so.”

  “Well, I do. You’ve fought by the side of Olaf One-Brow. You’ve been to the hall of the Mountain Queen, seen Norns, and drunk from Mimir’s Well. You vanquished Frith Half-Troll, something even I was unable to do. How much more growing up do you need?”

  Jack wanted to say, A lot, but he knew that wasn’t what the Bard wanted to hear. He was caught between two men, both of whom he’d always obeyed. Now the Bard was asking him to make a choice.

  “I’m teaching you lore men would give their entire wealth-hoard to learn,” the Bard went on. “There are few like me in the world. Each year there are fewer, and I have chosen you as my successor. This is a high destiny.”

  Jack felt ashamed for letting the old man down. The Bard had believed in him and had given him so much.

  “There’s more,” said the Bard, gazing at the bright snow-fields and blue sky beyond. “Something happened during the need-fire ceremony, and the wheel of the year was turned in a new direction. I can feel it in the bones of the earth. Change is coming. Enormous change.”

  “The Northmen won’t be back, will they?” Jack hoped he didn’t sound as appalled as he felt inside.

  “Nothing so trivial as that,” said the old man. “I’m speaking of something that will topple gods and spread its influence throughout the nine worlds for centuries to come.”

  Jack stared goggle-eyed at him. All this from Lucy wearing a necklace at the wrong time?

  “I really must train that slack-jawed expression out of you—completely undermines your authority,” said the Bard.

  “But, sir, who could topple a god?” asked Jack. He knew, of course, that his own God was the enemy of Odin and Thor, and a good thing, too! Who needed bullies who told their worshippers to burn down villages? Less comfortably, Jack realized that Christians were opposed to his mother’s beliefs in the powers that ruled the fields and beasts. And some of them even denounced bards.

  It was all mixed up in Jack’s mind. He was a good Christian—or tried to be—but he had been at the foot of Yggdrassil and had seen how everything belonged on it. What was wrong with the Christians having one branch and the Northmen another?

  “I spoke too rashly. No one actually topples gods,” the Bard said softly. “They are simply forgotten and fall asleep.”

  “That’s what happened during the need-fire ceremony?”

  “Not exactly.” The Bard drew a pattern in the snow with the tip of his staff. It might have been a sunburst except that each ray had branches like a budding tree. It was the symbol on the rune of protection. “At the right time a very minor event—a hawk taking one chick and not another, a seed sprouting where it should not have grown—can have consequences that even the Wise cannot see. When Lucy failed the ceremony and Pega took her place, a profound shift happened in the life force. What this means has something to do with you three, but I don’t understand it yet. All I ask is that you take your duties seriously.”

  “I won’t fail you, sir,” Jack said fervently.

  “I hope that’s true.”

  The old man frowned at the blacksmith, who had collapsed in the snow. Father knelt beside him in a fit of drunken remorse. “I should have been a monk,” Giles Crookleg moaned, rocking back and forth on his knees. “No farmwork, no worries. I would have been happy as a monk.”

  “There, there,” said the blacksmith sympathetically.

  “Throw a sheepskin over those idiots before they freeze to death,” said the Bard. He strode off, his white robe merging with the white snow so quickly, it seemed he’d vanished.

  Chapter Four

  THE SLAVE GIRL

  Mother and Jack had been cooking all day. He’d cleaned the fire pit outside, filled it with coals, and covered them with stones and wet straw. On top he’d placed a clay pot containing two plucked geese. With a covering of more straw and more coals, the geese had been stewing for a long time.

  Father tied branches of holly around the door. As a Christian, he didn’t believe in the old religion, but it didn’t hurt to hang holly and repel unwanted gods, elves, demons, and other beasties that came out during the Great Yule. Some of the villagers also hung mistletoe, but Father said that was dangerous. Mistletoe was sacred to Freya, the goddess of love.

  “I’m bored?” said Lucy, poking at the fire pit with a stick.

  “Do some work. Wash those turnips,” Mother said.

  Lucy made a halfhearted effort, but she left so much dirt, Jack had to wash them again. “Tell me a story,” she wheedled Father, tugging at his sleeve
.

  “Later, princess,” he promised. “I’ve got to get holly around the smoke holes. You never know what might come down a smoke hole this time of year.”

  “I’ll do it,” offered Jack. It hurt Father to climb a ladder, and even though he liked offering up his suffering to God, there were times when he was relieved to hand a chore to Jack.

  “Ah, well. You might as well make yourself useful.” Father sat down and put Lucy on his lap.

  You’re welcome, thought Jack. Once, it would have upset him to be treated so, but now he had a better understanding of his father. Giles Crookleg was not really a cruel man. He was merely a sad and disappointed one. His childhood had been harsh, and he saw no reason why Jack’s should be any better. No one looked after his family better, Jack thought loyally.

  The boy climbed up to the smoke hole at one end of the roof. He could look along the spine of the ceiling to the hole on the other end. A mouse squeaked indignantly and burrowed into the thatch. Jack attached the holly and climbed down.

  Below, Mother was baking her special Yule bannocks in the ashes of the hearth. They were made of her best oatmeal, softened with honey and delicious goose fat. The edges were pinched out into points like the rays of the sun, and in the middle of each bannock was a hole. This was a charm to keep away trolls, who were common this time of year. Only the Bard and Jack had actually seen trolls, far away across the sea, but Mother said it didn’t hurt to be careful.

  By the time the sun dipped toward the western hills, the family was ready for the Great Yule feast. Father loaded Bluebell with baskets of roast goose, bannocks, and turnips. Lucy skipped ahead and Jack followed behind with a load of cider bags. Their shadows stretched long and blue across the fields of snow. The smoke of a dozen cooking fires blew across the road and made Jack’s stomach rumble. He’d hardly eaten anything all day to keep room for the treats in store.

  And he wasn’t disappointed. The chief’s hall was filled with trestle tables covered with food. There were rabbit pies and partridge pies and pigeon tarts and larks-in-a-blanket. There was smoked haddock and brined pork. Several kinds of cheese were displayed with barley cakes slathered in lard. For dessert they had baskets of slightly withered, but still good, apples. Families brought whatever they could afford, and those who had nothing, like the tanner’s widow and her children, were welcome to take whatever they liked.

  Every household had brought its special kind of cake: birlins made of barley-meal and mixed with caraway seeds, meldars coated with salt and snoddles that tasted of the ashes in which they were baked. But Mother’s bannocks were rated the best because of the honey.

  The most impressive dish was provided by the chief—a sheep’s head split open so you could pick out bits of brain or tongue. It was served on a large wooden trencher with slices of mutton all around. At the outer edge was a festive border of boiled eggs, turnips, and onions, and a sheep’s trotter at each corner for decoration. All together it was a wonderful display!

  The villagers feasted until their faces were shiny with grease. One by one the smaller children fell asleep and were carried to an adjoining house. Pega stood guard over them and tended the small hearth fire there. Jack was glad to see she had not been forgotten. The chief’s wife had given her a new dress. It was a hand-me-down, of course, but of decent wool and not too stained.

  Early on, Pega had been allowed to take a trencher of food for herself. She hunched over and ate rapidly, as though she feared someone would take it from her. Jack felt again the pang he’d experienced at the Little Yule ceremony. What must it be like to be a slave forever? He’d been one a few short months and found it terrible.

  Nor was Pega the only slave in the village. The blacksmith had two large and silent men to keep his fires going. All day they chopped wood, and at night they slept in a barn with the cattle. They had been sold by their father in Bebba’s Town to the north, because they were of limited intelligence.

  What did they think about? Jack wondered as he watched them feed in a darkened corner of the hall. They didn’t talk, not even to each other. Perhaps they couldn’t talk. What must it be like, to be sold by your own father? Jack thought.

  When everyone had tucked away a last morsel of food, Brother Aiden told them the story of Baby Jesus. It was an exciting tale of angels and shepherds and of animals that warmed the infant god with their breath. Jack tried to imagine the great star that had drawn the kings of the East. What a sight it must have been!

  Then the monk led them in singing “Angels We Have Heard on High” in Latin. None of the villagers spoke Latin, however. They could only hum along, but they made up for it later with waes hael songs. The blacksmith bellowed “The Holly and the Ivy” in his deep voice while his handsome daughters danced around the tables with their suitors.

  The Bard sat in the shadows and listened. He hadn’t brought his harp. The Little Yule and waes hael ceremonies belonged to him, but the Great Yule had been graciously offered to Brother Aiden. Jack was surprised by the friendship between the two men. Monks generally denounced the old ways, but Brother Aiden was different.

  When he’d staggered into the village after the destruction of the Holy Isle, he’d gone mad with grief. At the time, everyone believed the Bard was mad too, but the old man’s spirit was actually traveling in the shape of a bird. When the Bard’s spirit returned, he took in the monk. “It’s the least I can do after the trouble I caused,” he explained.

  Jack didn’t feel as generous because Brother Aiden’s care fell on him. It was his job to make sure the monk ate and exercised. He had to walk the man up and down the beach, all the while listening to his moans. Well, it was tragic, what had happened to Brother Aiden’s companions, but no Northman would have complained so much about fate.

  Every night the Bard played the harp and Jack sang while Brother Aiden sat by the hearth with a glazed look in his eyes. “Music is the very air of healing,” the old man explained. “Aiden may not seem to be listening, but he is. His spirit is trapped in the burning library of the Holy Isle. With our help, it will escape.” Gradually, the little monk’s nightmares left him, and he was able to care for himself. The villagers built him a little beehive-shaped hut to live in.

  Brother Aiden was touchingly grateful to the Bard and never once said a word about wicked pagans.

  The Great Yule feast began to wind down. Wives packed up the remaining food and roused husbands from comfortable stupors. The blacksmith was carried home by his slaves, and more than one farmer was forcibly pushed out the door. Eventually, the hall emptied.

  “Shall we go?” Mother said. She’d already wrapped Lucy in a woolen cloak.

  “Not yet,” said Father. “I have business to attend to. We’ll wait until the Bard leaves.”

  Jack saw the Bard come alert—not that the old man was ever anything else.

  “It may take a long time,” Father explained. “I wouldn’t want to keep you from your bed.”

  “That’s quite all right,” said the Bard.

  “It will be boring.”

  “I’m seldom bored,” the old man said genially.

  Father frowned but turned brusquely to the chief. “It’s about Pega.”

  “Has she done something wrong?” the chief said. He leaned back on his bench and stretched out his legs.

  “No, no. It’s something else. Tell me, is she healthy?”

  What a strange question, thought Jack.

  “As healthy as any child. She catches colds and so forth.”

  “Is she a good worker?”

  “Ah!” The chief suddenly woke up. “An absolutely wonderful worker! For the size of her, she’s amazing.”

  “Giles, what are you up to?” said the Bard. Now Lucy had awakened and eagerly pressed herself against Father’s side.

  “This is farm business,” Father said.

  “You have boys coming every day to help you,” said the Bard. “What more do you need?”

  “I plan to buy a few cows for butter and chee
se.”

  It was the first Jack had heard of the plan. Father had all the work he could handle, even with the help of the village boys. That was an arrangement the Bard had worked out to free Jack for his apprenticeship. Father owned chickens, pigeons, geese, and thirty sheep, as well as the beehives and herb garden that were Mother’s domain. During the summer he planted oats, beans, and turnips as well. How could he possibly take on cows?

  “Pega’s a valuable slave,” said the chief.

  “She’s stunted and ugly. I’m surprised she doesn’t turn the milk sour,” Father said.

  “On the contrary. She turns milk into fine yellow cheese,” said the chief.

  They were bargaining as though Pega were a sheep! Jack was so outraged, he couldn’t trust himself to speak. He looked up and saw the Bard watching him intently.

  “She looks weak. If I were a cow, I’d kick her out of the barn,” said Giles Crookleg.

  “She stares them down as well as any sheepdog,” the chief replied.

  “Giles,” Mother said. “We have no room for cows.”

  So Mother didn’t know about the scheme either, thought Jack.

  “Be still,” said Father. “I’ll give you five silver pennies for the wench.”

  “Five!” cried the chief. “The skill in Pega’s hands is worth at least fifty.”

  “For a sickly runt? I think not!”

  “Observe her face, Giles. She has the scars of cowpox. She is safe from the great pox. I’ll call her from the other house so you can see.”

  “Father,” said Jack hesitantly.

  “Be still. Dairymaids are well known for lung-sickness. Because of our friendship, however, I’ll give you ten pennies,” said Giles Crookleg.

  “Father, buying slaves is evil,” Jack said. A hush fell over the hall. All eyes turned to him.

  “Excuse me?” said Father in a cold voice.

  “He said, ‘buying slaves is evil,’” Mother repeated.

  Giles Crookleg rose to his feet. “How dare you oppose me!”