Winterfire

Chapter Seven

Lucan

“What?” I gasped. As obsessed with the thought of Tyrfing as I was, I still didn’t want to talk about the sword with other people. I was sure they’d think I was crazy. “How do you know? I don’t even know.” I let go of the rudder and stared at Cormack.

“Gilbert and I were on this journey to guard Tyrfing. We have been following the sword since it left Dál Riata.”

“So your story is true?” I asked. “You came from Dál Riata?”

“That part of the story is true,” said Cormack. “My father was a fisherman; Gilbert and I spent hours upon hours at sea. We planned to be fishermen, too. When we were thirteen years old, a storm  - like the one we just had - caught us while we were fishing. We were blown off course and ended up on a strange beach. We dragged our father’s boat up onto the beach to wait out the storm. While we huddled together out of the wind, waiting for sunrise, another boat came ashore right beside ours. We had to jump out of the way, it beached so close.”

“Another fishing boat?” I asked.

“Sort of,” said Cormack. “It was a ship like the Fýri, only quite a bit smaller. We couldn’t make out much of it that night in the dark, but we did see it the next day. There were no oars. There was a sail, but what a sail! It was in tatters! I don’t know how it worked at all. The mast had been broken and patched. And the prow! You see how beautiful the Fýri is, with the intricate carvings. This ship’s prow had masterful carvings, too, but the image was…different. There was a giant eagle with outstretched wings, but one of the wings was broken clean off. And there was a crazy look in the bird’s eyes. Gilbert swore they moved, but I didn’t witness it myself.”

“Was the ship empty? Maybe it just ran aground because of the storm.”

“That’s what Gilbert and I thought, but then a man leaped over the gunwale and landed right beside us. He stumbled and cursed, and then practically fell down on the sand.”

“Was he drunk?”

“No. Strange, but definitely not drunk.”

Cormack went on to describe the conversation he and Gilbert had had with the man. “‘My name is Njord,’ he said, as if that would mean something to us. I guess we must have looked puzzled, because then he said, ‘I am of the Vanir.’ We still didn’t know what he was talking about. Gilbert and I looked at each other and shrugged. The man rolled his eyes and began speaking again. ‘I am the god of those who travel the seas. I am the wind in their sails. I am the fish in their nets. I am the crabs in their pots. I am the welcoming shore. I raise the storms. I calm the seas.’ He spoke as if he were reciting a boring, oft-quoted passage. ‘You never heard of me, but I have seldom been far from you. You are here, on this beach, because I put you here.’ After his speech, he looked around us. ‘Why haven’t you lit a fire?’ he asked. ‘I’m freezing!’ Then he touched his finger to the pathetic pile of wet driftwood Gilbert and I had been trying to light, and a fire burned immediately. In the firelight, I got a better look at him. He looked to be taller than my brother and I were at the time, but we were only fifteen years old, and I believe we—I—am taller now than he was. He was muscular, and though his face was smooth and unlined, he had long, gray-white hair in a braid down his back. He wore only a pair of breeches, no shirt or cape, and he didn’t seem to be freezing, despite what he’d said.”

Cormack paused in his story and gazed at the cliff wall drawing nearer and nearer. “I expect we’ll be upon the beach before noon tomorrow,” he said. “I have not spoken too soon.”

Then he resumed his story. “We spent the rest of that night by the fire, and I tell you, we never fed it and it never died down. Toward morning, Njord stood up and staggered about the beach. ‘I don’t have my land legs yet!’ he said, but in all the time I spent with him, he never regained his “land legs”. He was forever stumbling. I don’t believe he was ever meant to walk about on land. I believe he was, is—a creature of the waves. Gilbert and I followed behind him; more than once, we had to catch him to keep him from toppling over. We spent the next two days with him, fishing and talking and swimming—and you should see that man swim—but the gist of his story was this: we were to find the cursed sword, Tyrfing. You have seen Tyrfing in action both here on this ship and at the camp in Beal; you know the curse it real. You know I speak the truth.”