Saga - Final Chapter, Part 2
For content, rating, disclaimers and A/Ns, see the chapter’s part 1.
Bronagh appeared astounded at meeting Eoin again, and more so when she learned that he was now a loising, a free-standing wood-carver, and that he nevertheless did not plan to return to Ireland but would be traveling across the seas to seek new shores. She herself had not had an easy life since being sold for the first time, back when Eoin first traveled north with Einnis and Ketil. Most of the time she’d been a thrall on a small and poor farm to the east, where the master drank too much and mismanaged his property, and she had suffered many hardships and indignities.
“They expected every woman to work as hard as any strong man,” she said quietly. “And those who could not work that hard were frequently beaten. The younger ones were raped, too. Now the master has given up on getting much more out of me. He’s putting me up for sale on the off chance that it might bring him any small amount of silver. If not, I think it’s likely he’ll kill me before he returns home. He can’t afford to feed me now I’m not pulling my weight.”
Her voice remained steady and did not in any way betray the fear and despair she had to be hiding, but Eoin was horrified. “I am happy to have found you in time! I will have Einnis Elmarson buy you, and liberate you at once. I hope you will come with me - with us - across the seas.”
Eoin told her of his and Einnis’s plans to search out the new land to the north, and to build a farm there. “We will need women to help us there, that’s certain. Someone to tend the cows, prepare the food, spin and weave. But all the hard labor we’ll certainly manage ourselves.”
He paused for a moment, considering. “Would you be interested in that? We will do our best to create a good life for all, and you’d share our hall with us, such as it is. Our only condition is that whatever happens behind those walls, and whatever you chance to see and hear there, stays behind those same walls.” A faint blush crept into his cheeks.
Bronagh studied him closely, evidently mulling over the possible meaning of his expression and his enigmatic words. She lowered her eyes. “You tell me you are not returning to the monastery, but do you still turn to God and trust in his grace, in all things great and small?” she eventually asked.
“Yes,” Eoin said plainly. “I have followed step by step where the Lord has led me, and have always done what he has shown me to be right. I will continue to do so. And surely it was the good Lord’s will that we should meet today, so I could repay you for your kindness and care in the past!”
Bronagh smiled, her lips trembling slightly. She clasped her hands together to keep them from shaking. “Then you have my word, brother Eoin, that I will follow you and Einnis Elmarson across the seas, on the condition that you mentioned.”
She hesitated, then pointed to a hunched woman sitting nearby. “Aoife is Irish too,” she whispered. “She was brought here a week ago, with the last long-ship that came back across the seas. She’s been used by many men, I’m afraid, and now she doesn’t speak to anyone but me, and she shakes and screams once she sees a man approaching. They are having a hard time finding a buyer for her, the way she is. I think - I think, if you were to buy her too, she would make me a good helper in a lonely farm where no men would crowd her.”
Eoin stared at the young woman. Her face was pale and distraught, her wild eyes surrounded by dark circles like bruises, her reddish hair disheveled. She was very thin, and constantly fidgeted with a snip of her ragged shawl. Her dirty dress was little more than a slip. All of a sudden he was reminded of how Muirenn had looked on that far-off day when the two of them first arrived in Kaupang, humble thralls to be sold like cattle at market.
He nodded at Bronagh without further deliberation, his voice heavy with emotion as he spoke. “We will not leave without her.”
Einnis came down to the market to close the purchase of the two women. Bronagh looked him straight in the eye and thanked him, holding onto the frail younger woman’s arm and supporting her with a firm grip, her quiet dignity already returning now that circumstances had so unexpectedly taken a turn for the better.
Einnis answered her gravely. “Well met, Bronagh. Once you helped me, probably much more than you were aware of, and I am glad to be able to return the favor. You have little reason to trust the Norse, I know, but as we cross the seas together I hope I may at least give you reason to change your mind about me. I already know that I can trust you.”
That same evening Bronagh and Aoife had been installed on a bench together in Gunnar’s small house. Muirenn was delighted to meet Bronagh again, full of concern for the two women’s plight, and glad enough to be getting help with the household as she found many chores difficult now, because of her bulk. Bronagh took over most of the work around the house, and Muirenn instead would sit before the hearth fire with Aoife, talking quietly and calmly of Ireland and of their lives there, their drop spindles rising and falling in even motion as both women spun wool from the seemingly never-ending supply from Torgeirr’s many sheep.
At Christ Mass time Muirenn gave birth to her second child. The birth was easier than her first one, and she had several skilled women to help her, Bronagh among them. All went well, and Gunnar proudly named his first son Grim after his own father, though Muirenn also named the boy Lochlan on the day when Eoin baptized him in a brief and secret ceremony.
During the quiet winter months Eoin spent time carving two high seat poles for the home that would be built in Iceland, God willing. One pole showed Tor, scowling in rage, his right hand lifting the hammer on high, lightning bolts flaring across the pole’s length. The god’s left hand biddingly held the forces of chaos at bay where they crawled and swarmed near the base of the pole; twisted, monstrous and writhing shapes biting each others’ tails in the depths. The other pole showed the lord Christ, his face mild and peaceful, one hand lifted in benediction and the other holding a cross in place over his heart, from which rays of light welled forth in every direction. The forces of evil writhed below; all horns and hooves and forked tails, they cringed and covered before the Lord’s light.
It was the largest work Eoin had ever attempted, and by far the best he had ever finished. Gunnar helped him with the most difficult parts, and many customers stopped by to admire and praise the work.
As spring approached, the work to get everything ready intensified. Everything that they would need to build their farm was made ready, and everyone who was to travel with them, be they thralls, crew members or free men and women, now prepared themselves for departure.
Then on a bright morning in late spring the quest for a new land and a new life began.
Sigrid, Torgeirr and Sverri had come down to Kaupang to see Einnis off, and Muirenn and Gunnar joined them on the wharf. Sverri’s light boy’s voice called out wishes of good luck and fair winds as the heavily laden ship was pushed away from land, and slowly rowed out of the harbor. A brisk spring breeze filled the solid knarr’s sail. On the wharf the men’s cloaks billowed, and the wind tugged playfully at the women’s coifs and shawls.
Their private goodbyes had been spoken the evening before, and none of them had slept much that night, for they all knew that they might never meet again. The Norns would have their way, and there were many dangers in the wide world and the deep seas. Men and women could only live each day well and hope for the best.
To Einnis and Eoin their kin and their loved ones soon looked as mere specks in the distance, and then they were gone from view.
The Gander sailed on, keeping close to shore as they rounded the southern part of the land and traveled northwards, and then one day they were out on the open sea, no land in sight, trusting to the tales they had heard and the vague directions they’d been given, the skill of their crew - and not least to fate and the will and grace of God.
The keel ploughed the deep dark waters steadily as they journeyed on through gales and quieter weather, through sun and cold rain for many long days and nights, huddled together in the cramped spaces onboard, all eyes searching for new land on the horizon, all hearts clinging to hope.
---
The Gander was heaving a little in the steady waves as a cold spring breeze filled its sail and pulled it along the strange, foreign coast. Above them seagulls and terns dipped and rose on the wind, eying the ship curiously and shrilling out cries of welcome and of warning.
They’d had land in sight for over a day, and were sailing in a westerly direction along the ragged foreign shores, high barren-looking slopes and snow-capped mountains clearly visible in the distance.
Einnis and Eoin stood shoulder by shoulder by the gunwale, studying the land intently, as did every other person onboard. The relief and joy at having actually reached their destination and at seeing that the land wasn’t just a figment of some adventurer’s imagination were plain to read on every face. The elated mood had even communicated itself to the animals clumped together in the middle of the ship. They had long been subdued, frightened, barely moving or making a sound, but now they were stomping and shaking their heads, sniffing the winds and making pleading, eager noises. Both humans and animals longed to feel solid ground and firm earth once more under their feet.
“I think there are people here already,” Einnis suddenly exclaimed, pointing. “Look over there, I think that’s smoke rising into the air. And over there too!”
Eoin squinted towards the far-away serrated lines of smoke climbing towards the skies and being dispersed by the gusts of wind. “I don’t think either of those are man-made, Einnis,” he said after a while. “I think it’s probably proof of those warm water springs that we heard tell of, hot water bubbling up from the insides of the earth to heat lakes and ponds and make them steam and sometimes even boil… I think those tales were true. They sounded very convincing. Perhaps it’s God’s way of making up for the land otherwise being so cold here.”
Einnis stared in the direction of the smoke, but the distance was too great, and it was impossible to say for sure whether the source of the billowing grey puffs might be steaming lake water.
Eoin grinned, nudging Einnis’s side. “Imagine going with me to one of those lakes! We’ll swim together in the lovely warm water and find a secluded, shallow pool where we can enjoy ourselves, take our time, stay limber in the heat, hidden from view by the steam…. Won’t that be something?” He quirked an eyebrow suggestively in Einnis’s direction and licked his lips.
Einnis pursed his own lips disapprovingly in response, but his glance was melting with desire and longing. “We’ve been too long on this ship,” he muttered. “I can’t wait to go exploring with you once we get ashore - to be all alone with you again.”
“What exactly is it you plan to explore?” Eoin laughed, though with the same hunger in his eyes.
Einnis grunted. “All I can say to you, Irishman, is this: The steam rising once we're there will certainly be man-made!”
They stood for a moment, close together, watching the waves breaking against the land and the flocks of gulls and sea-birds circling and dipping over the surf.
“Your teller of tales was certainly right,” Einnis said, serious once more, looking across the sea and the rocky shoreline to the slopes and hills beyond. “It does look to be a very lonely and mostly barren land. Not a single tree to be seen anywhere. We’ll have a hard time of it here.”
Eoin surreptitiously placed his hand over Einnis’s on the gunwale, their cloaked backs forming a wall against every prying eye, though in truth all eyes were directed shorewards. “We don’t need trees and woods,” he said, his blue eyes more eloquent than his few spoken words. “We carry the woods with us in our hearts and memories. The green and fragrant woods of summer, with lily-pads floating in the shimmering lakes, and does hiding in the shade of the trees. The woods in winter, their tall snow-covered spruces, the cold fresh smell of pine needles and resin, the wind’s whisper through the heavy branches, capercaillies alighting in a sudden flurry of wings. All that will stay with us wherever we are, as long as we’re together.”
Their eyes met and held before they quietly turned to study the land once more, their hands still interlocked.
“Well, I think it’s time for us to go ashore,” Einnis said, his voice strained and gruff. “What say you, should we give the high seat poles to the sea here, or do you want to wait?”
Eoin hesitated for a moment, looking up and down the lonely shore as far as his eyes could see. “Let us wait for a little while yet,” he said. “I will sense when the time is right.”
And so it wasn’t till several hours later that the two of them heaved the magnificently carved high seat poles over the ship’s side and watched them hit the choppy waves with a splash. By then their ship had rounded a promontory and had entered what seemed to be a large bay, its waters somewhat calmer than those of the open seas. Here the grassy slopes inland seemed to show the first faint hints of spring green. Their course was set, and they were steering towards shore. This night many of them would be sleeping on dry land for the first time since their journey began. Excited talk and an occasional shout of glee or gratitude rose from the ship and were carried landwards by the wind.
The two men quietly watched their high seat poles disappearing in the distance. Lashed tightly and firmly together with strong ropes, buoyant among the waves, carried by currents and pushed by wind, guided by God and fate, the poles were left to find their own way to shore.
Einnis and Eoin had agreed that on the site where the poles reached land they’d erect their new farm in this strange and distant, yet hopeful land of promises and new beginnings. Wherever the poles were carried from the heaving seas and lifted onto solid ground would be the center of their shared little universe, the firm base of their future, the haven where their two hearts finally had a place to call home - together.
- The End -
Notes and explanations;
Farmann - the nickname means Seafaring merchant, tradesman. In the Norse saga of kings this actually was the nickname of one of the minor kings, a half-brother of Eirik Bloodaxe, one of those brothers Eirik gained his own nickname killing.
Loising - thrall who has been liberated
Aoife and Bronagh - the names mean “radiant, joyful” and “sad, sorrowful” respectively. Hopefully they both will go from the latter to the former while living with Einnis and Eoin on Iceland!
Bronagh appeared in the first few chapters of Saga. She took care of Eoin and Muirenn on the Viking ship that carried them (and Einnis and Torgeirr) from Ireland.
Lochlan - The native home of the invaders in Ireland during the Viking raids was Lochlan "land of the lochs." Lochlan became a popular name and was generally given to boys with fair or red hair, ie. boys with viking ancestors. Muirenn thus is quite the trendsetter in naming her second son, though of course in his home country the boy would be known as Grim Gunnarson.
Knarr - One of the types of open sailing ships used by the Vikings. The knarrs had a relatively round hull with fewer pairs of oars than the longships, and the oars were placed towards each end, leaving the space midships for cargo. Knarrs were designed for maneuverability, large loading capacity and good sailing abilities offshore. They were the vikings’ merchant ships as opposed to their sleek and slender longships, the ships of war.
High Seat Poles - the wooden beams that would hold the roof up on either side of the "high seat" or place of honor in a hall, ie. the beams by the bench space where the lord or master of a farm or manor would sit and which indicated status and clan leadership. The poles in question were often richly decorated, unique to each manor or hov and were imbued with power and magic related to the fortune of the clan. Several Icelandic sagas (including Kormak’s Saga, Islendinga Saga and Öyrbyggja Saga) tell how settlers who’d emigrated from Norway in the days that Iceland first was populated threw their old homestead's poles overboard from their ship and then built their new farm and their new life in Iceland on the place where the poles drifted ashore, and which therefore had to be an auspicious place.
Thermal springs and pools - natural hot pools and geysers are among the characteristics of volcanic Iceland. The most famous such pool is the “blue lagoon”, heated with the run-off water of a geothermal power plant, and which is near-obligatory for any visitor to the country: http://www.jeffsweather.com/archives/blue%20lagoon%20iceland.jpg
