The Chapter of Alda
Walking along the shore she tasted snow on her tongue, a thick layer coated the ground high enough to almost come to the top of her sheepskin boots. Looking out at the black pebbled beach that spread out beneath a rocky ledge she stood in thought. In the summer she would swim in those waters.
Her father's boat sat moored to a stake, its prow carved after the manner of a hawk looking out at the sea. Rising and falling with the tide.
Her breath plumed into the dusk air joining the grey and endless skies that loomed beyond the stony pillars that sat capped with white snow at the end of the inlet.
What lay beyond that horizon?
Her father often told her of the great journeys of the Skjorn, tales of men who had ventured east exploring or raiding.
Tales of strange lands and strange things.
Perhaps someday she would see those other shores.
A cold wind bit her face.
She remembered how the men had laughed at this.
"A woman belongs by a hearth. Not off in some foreign land."
"A woman's place is at home my sweet girl"
Her mother had said.
When she asked about the shield maidens, about the great captain's wives like Dagny the Fare, who led her dead husband's men on the voyage to Ichihakin and brought glory to their houses' names, she was always met simply with more laughter.
"You are no shield maiden, girl."
Her bucket of milk sloshed, swinging on the handle she grasped with two hands.
She turned toward the stone longhouse further up the hill. Smoke curled from the chimney, and light flickered through the small windows set high into the wall.
Her mother would be worried if she stayed out too long. After all, Mother had said there would be a storm soon and it seemed like one was coming; the snow was picking up and coming down now in a powdery sheet.
She began trekking up the hill, her shawl straining against its iron broach as the wind began to turn.
Burdened with the milk she had to go the long way round to avoid the sharp rise that the house sat upon, easily climbed by unladen hands.
It was not a long trek, but the snow slowed her pace.
The thin wrap of cloth around her hands provided little shelter from the cold.
Her fingers were numb.
She leaned against the door that sat at the corner of the house whose long side faced the sea behind her.
It creaked open under her weight, the warmth of the house washing over her.
Orange light lapped at the walls to her right, where her father sat sharpening an axe.
A fireplace made of stone and plastered over with white daube sat next to him, above which hung the family treasures, an old sword and an elaborate drinking horn: gifts to her great grandfather Odnier the White-wisped from Skjinjorn Magnus Stonebreaker, for his deeds at the battle of the nine bridges.
Her great-grandfather had built this longhouse over the course of 10 years with his bare hands, or so the story went.
Directly in front of her stretching into dimly lit shadows was the second section of the house that met at the corner of the other at the far end of which a tallow candle burned pungently.
