Daughter of the Wind Read Online Free Page A

which comely woman was round with child because of his prowess behind the ale hall. Hego could drink more fermented beverage than any man, winning every kappdrykkfa —drinking contest—during which horns of ale or rare mead were drunk without restraint. While the young man was a drinker of legend, to his shame he had no great reputation as a storyteller.
    Hego listened hard, and he heard no more footsteps.
    And then he did, once more, and the creak of leather. Heavy billy goat leather, or even ox leather, the sort men used for armor.
    But this wasn’t possible. Most of Spjothof’s fighting men had sailed off again, and even old Hrof, a legendary, gray-haired fighter fond of wandering around in full-leather armor, would not be walking around in the mountain passes at night.
    Hego was slow, in both mind and body. He knew this, hated himself for it, and sought to think faster at every opportunity. If some young men could grow more fleet of foot through practice running from the well to the shipyard, then Hego could learn to think more quickly.
    It would take practice.
    Not that Hego was utterly without skill. Children brought him their first knives, the short blades fathers gave their sons so they could learn the art of carving, a prized craft in the village. A good edge was highly honored in the village. Old men whittled mustached sea lords from the leg bones of deer, and children made their own, crude figures out of driftwood. It was an industry Spjothof was renowned for, carving elk antlers into spoons, cow bones into combs. Travelers docked here every summer to collect the fine reindeer-bone thread-spindles and whalebone sword pommels.
    Now there was something wrong. The mare shook her mane, and scuffed the earth with one hoof. Some intruding presence was disturbing the livestock, there could be no question.
    Hego sometimes walked out to the stone-lined water source just to listen to the wind make a whole, round song as it blew over the round opening in the earth. Now he lowered the bucket carefully. It did not have to descend far, the earth so full of water that Njord the helmsman had bet Hego the well would overflow before Raven and its companion ships came home.
    Another step.
    Creeping, but distinct, and the chink of expensive metal armor.
    Hego heard them clearly now, many men, far off across the snowmelt-sodden pasture. He counted them, as every Spjotman had been taught, numbering his unseen foe. Leather belts and booted feet, far off. And whispering voices. He could almost make out the words.
    Hego walked out into the field grass and made a clicking sound with his tongue, the sort of quiet noise the hawk owl makes to its young. It was the traditional signal Spjotfolk gave to one other in the dark.
    There was no response.
    Hego smiled, despite his unease. This was when he would win his glory, fighting off an army of dwarves, the squat, earth-dwelling creatures who populated every song but never approached human dwellings. Now he would have a story. Head-Splitter and I strode out under the stars , he would say—
    He stopped.
    He heard the whirring sound, and a mutter of human speech, guessed who this enemy was as Head-Splitter—a breath-keen weapon that had never touched a scalp—roused, like a living thing.
    These were not dwarves.
    These were Danes!
    Danes were legendary in Spjothof as wealthy and well armored, but fastidious in battle, preferring sling stones and arrows to hand-to-hand combat. A Danish voice whispered again, and another stone hummed through the air.
    As yet another stone hissed past, and another, Hego readied his warning cry. Perhaps he would sing out, The Danes have crept out of the mountain , or, even better, I’m killing Danes at the edge of the sheep meadow !
    He would say something grand, words villagers would repeat in ale halls up and down the coast, long after his bones were green earth.
    But before Hego could make a single sound, a stone sang off the side of