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INTRODUCTION

" Pick up your quill again fool. We have a lot of ground to cover and I have only just started. Shut your mouth and don't even think of complaining or I will take my gold elsewhere. I have more riches than I could use in dozen lifetimes and I will pay you what you asked and then some for you services if you complete them to my satisfaction. Do you own a house and plot of land of your own? No, I don't suppose you do. But get on with your task and you may well find yourself in luck. I nearly choked when your lord told me your rates. Obscene is the word I used but I suppose I will have to foot them. I can't write and even if I could my rough and scarred paws are all but useless for holding such a childlike implement as a bird's feather. Best leave such a woman's task to those men who think that scribbling on pressed trees it the way forward. They can have it and I want none of it."

I crossed over the room slowly, my back aching and legs barely responding to my will. Hrolf, my manservant and bodyguard helped me down into the comfy chair he had requested be brought along to the appointment with the scribe. The lad was a good valet, keen as mustard and a dab hand with a blade. Not as adept as I had been when I was his age, or younger for that matter, but he knew his way around the sword dance well enough to put most of the pathetic muggers and bandits who roamed the streets nowadays in the gutter for good.

Gritting my remaining teeth against the pain of my aging bones I leaned forward and tapped the edge of the scribe's desk with my scabbards tip. "I suppose that the last few hours of my ramblings have been unstructured but my mind feels a bit clearer now that I have had a few tankards of piss poor ale at the local tavern. So I think it is about time that I should start at the beginning. Before the life of a raider, captain and Jarl. Before the raping and the pillaging and even before I had first seen a long ship or a woman's fanny." I took a second to catch my breath which was getting harder and harder to do. A point I am sure that was not wasted on the young man sat opposite. "A long time ago, when I wasn't even as old as you, I hacked out a semi existence in a world where the only thing you could expect was what you made with your own hands. Aye lad, even before I was your age I was burying my axe in logs as thick as you spindly chest and building up my body with every single chop".

I leaned back and made myself as comfortable as possible, taking the tankard of ale from Hrolf when he passed it to me with a grunt of approval. After I downed as much as I could without the fear of spilling it over my tunic and beard like a drunken beggar, I tapped the edge of the weasly scribes desk with the end of my scabbard again, making him jump a little with fear. "How much ink and paper do you have?" I asked him sternly.

"Enough for the task at hand your lordship" the young tiger replied whilst tiding his desk in an effort to avoid my gaze.

"Good" I exclaimed and hoisted the tankard. "And as long as Hrolf keeps fetching ale, it this piss water can even be called that, then we have all we need"

The scribe nodded in reply. He was clearly looking forward to the thought of being in a room with me for long periods of time and I can't say that I blame him. Who wouldn't want to listen to the tale of the greatest raider that ever lived? When I had approached the scribes master and asked him to be the only person to document my life the man had nearly bit my hands off.

"Well, lord Magnus, where should I begin?" the young scribe asked as he dipped the quill into the ink pot carefully.

"I already told you boy, we are going to start where all good raiding sagas should start."

"And where is that?" he asked petulantly.

"The beginning..."

ONE - Infatuation

Magnus learns that women are cruel, axework aches the arms and that he hates gardening.

The sun was high in the sky and nearing its mid-day cycle when I finally finished turning over the sod in my family's respectable garden. It was a chore that I had been putting off for over three days until my father gave me a rap around the back of the head when he had returned from a hunting trip and berated me for being a lazy child. In truth, it was more the thought that my father was disappointed in me than the requirement to turn the garden that spurred me into getting on with the job in the end. You see, my father was the village hetman and the other families looked up to him to provide guidance. As such he could little afford a lazy child and so pushed me relentlessly to set the example for the rest of the youths of my age, regardless of how much I tried to wriggle out of it. Whereas my sisters both spent a great deal of time with my mother and other village females learning how to cook and do other wifely duties, my lot was one of constant gardening and tree felling interjected with the occasional hunting or fishing trip to teach me survival skills for the future so that I could provide for my family in the years to come. How I hated the gardening and loathed the exhausting and back breaking axe work.

The hunting trips, however, were the best experiences of my young life. The thrill of the stalk and the kill activated every one of my young predatory instincts to the highest possible level every time I was invited to take part. I loved the surrealism of the forest in the dawn as the mist crept like a shallow blanket over the crisp green grass and I was fascinated by the way that the smallest noise echoed from the thick trees, masking the direction of its origin. I was always happiest when I hunted.

"Have you finished yet Magnus?" my father asked as he watched me from where he sat, shaded from the sun by the porch of our home. A luxury I was keenly aware he had not shared with me as I cooked in my fur under the burning rays.

"Yes sir" I replied as I looked at him, conscious to keep any hint of resentment from my voice. My father was renowned to have a vicious temper when roused and had struck me a hard blow on more than one occasion. Unfortunately, I had also blood inherited the trait, and usually responded to these disciplinary actions by finding the closest person who had slighted me in the past to take my frustration out on them. My father had stopped hitting me when he learned it had taken two of the other village fathers to restrain me after the last time. Silently I think he was impressed but couldn't show it but hen again he could have just been bloody furious. My father was a difficult man to read.

"Good, it's about time; I can't believe it took you three hours to turn this small patch of soil. I thought you might have put a bit more effort into the task" he stated and got out of his chair, placing his writing box carefully on the floor as he did so. "We need more firewood for the night".

I nodded; there was no point in arguing or asking for some rest as he wouldn't even have considered that I might need any. "Yes father" I said as I picked up the garden fork and hoe and slung both the tools over my shoulder. "May I drink before I leave for the glen?"

He stared at me for a lengthy amount of time, his heavy brow furrowing. "You may" he finally stated flatly.

On my way to the water barrel which stood outside the house I replaced the two gardening tools to their positions against the front fence and picked up the heavy single bladed wood splitting axe that I would need for the next task. "Is there anything else you want me to do after I bring back the wood?" I asked whilst gulping down palm-full's of the luke warm water.

He shook his head and I was glad for the gesture because it meant that I could take my time and possibly go fishing or hunting before I brought the firewood back. I might even be able to take a sneaky mid afternoon nap in the forest all alone. "Just make sure that you bring back the wood well before supper or your mother and sisters will struggle with the cooking, other than that, the afternoon is yours to do with as you wish".

"Thank you" I responded, perhaps a little too enthusiastically.

"And stay away from Esja or I will beat you senseless"

At the mention of her name, my heart skipped a little beat. I hadn't been thinking of dropping in on her at all and now my father had unwittingly sparked my interest and achieved the total opposite result to what he had clearly intended. "I won't go anywhere near her" I lied.

"See that you don't"

As I left my home I also collected my short bow and quiver of arrows from the out shed in case I needed them whilst hunting. I knew that my father would be watching my movements until I was out of view and so instead of heading directly to Esja' s home I walked in the direction of the glade until I reached the outskirts of the wood. When I had disappeared into the forest and was confident that it would mask my actions, I double backed on myself, tracing the line of the wood for the few hundred yards inland that would bring me to her home. It was a trick that I had used on many an occasion and was particularly useful at night where you could take less care. However, during the daylight I would have been a complete idiot to have not taken my time and make sure I wasn't seen. As I moved through the undergrowth, ghostly silent and monitoring my every footfall, it occurred to me that I was indeed hunting in a roundabout kind of way. Esja' s father hated me with a passion I had never seen in a man, accusing me every time I lay eyes on him of attempting to seduce his eldest daughter. I didn't even know back then what that word meant but in retrospect it was probably the wrong one to use and I think 'stalk' might have been more appropriate description of my intentions.

As I approached the small homestead I noticed that her father was outside in his own garden, tending to some turnips which looked fit for little other than a stew. He had no son and so undertook all of the manual chores himself, despite his aging body. I have to say that I respected the man for getting on with the chores instead of shunning them but it was clear as spring water that he was unable to make a thorough job of it anymore. I must have watched him for a full quarter of an hour before he finally relented to the mid-day heat and sought refuge inside his house, probably to take one of his regular mid-day naps.

I moved in the moment he had walked out of sight. Covering the twenty or so yards to the house in a low crouch I lay flat against the wooden planks against the southern wall and shimmied up to the closest window. After listening intently for a few moments to make sure that the coast was clear I tapped on it. "Esja, it's me, are you there?"

No one replied immediately but after a few seconds of silence a small voice whispered back. "Go away; if he catches you here he will probably try to kill you...again"

"Not bloody likely" I replied and stood up a little to look through the window. Esja was sat on her bed looking through the window at my face with the faint trace of a smile on her lips. She had clearly been in the middle of some chores around the house but had stopped dead when she had heard my voice. She was dressed in her simple green short dress that she wore whenever she was working around the house and expected to get dirty doing so.

"I swear, one of these days you are going to get caught and then either killed or banished Magnus. I wish sometimes you could just develop some common sense and leave me alone". Her words were meant to sting but I could tell by the look on her face that she didn't mean any of it.

"I am on my way to cut and collect some firewood from the glade" I lifted my axe blade to the window to show her. "If you want to come along, I will cut some for you as well".

She cocked her head to one side and studied me for some time as if trying to gain some kind of inkling to my plans. "And..."

"And nothing!" I responded just a little louder than I would have liked and she scowled at me in disgust, lifting a finger to her lips. Her father was somewhere inside the house and the last thing I needed was for him to hear me talking to his daughter. "I promise. All I will be doing is chopping and collecting some firewood and I could do with the extra pair of hands to carry it back"

"Fine" she replied. "I will meet you at the break in the woods in ten minutes. I have some chores to finish off here and my father will most likely have fallen asleep in his chair by then so won't even know I am gone"

"Sounds like a plan. See you in ten minutes"

---

One universal constant that I have learnt over the years is that when a woman gives you a time scale it is almost always an estimation and never accurate. Thus, I found myself sitting patiently on the stump of a long ago felled tree nearly thirty minutes later, still awaiting the arrival of my female partner in crime. Eventually, after what did seem an age, I caught a glimpse of a familiar red dress as she stepped through the forest undergrowth in my direction.

As she moved Esja clumsily batted aside some of the overhanging branches and vines which obscured her path and at one point had to lift up her skirt to step over a patch of mud providing me with a more than generous glimpse of her wondrous thighs. I don't mind telling you that the briefest glimpse of female flesh at that age was like a lighted match to a barrel of whale oil and I had to fight to compose my feelings to avoid making an arse of myself when she caught up with me. I must have watched her move through the forest for a full minute before I finally thought it would be prudent to announce my location with a loud whistle. Up to that point Esja had been so focused on not tripping up that my sudden call nearly made her jump out of her fur with fright. "What were you hiding for!" she growled as she approached me and now that she was close enough for me to assist I realised that she was carrying a small satchel on her back which was made from a simple green cloth tied together at each corner. "You could have made yourself a little more obvious. I thought I had lost my bearings!"

I chuckled in response which in hindsight is never the best course of action when confronted with a frustrated woman. "My apologies m 'lady" I replied and bowed mockingly. "Next time I will light a signal fire for you".

If I only knew then how much I would regret those words in the years to come.

Esja snorted in disgust as she stamped past and successfully made it to the much clearer forest path behind me which led to the glade nearly a mile away to the east. "Well don't just stand there and be a smug fool all your life. You owe me some firewood remember?"

I picked up the felling axe which I had placed safely against the tree stump and secured the bow over my shoulder as well. "Coming your highness" I exclaimed, at that point feeling clearly suicidal.

Esja simply glowered at me in disgust. "Carry on like that and you can kiss goodbye to the lunch I packed before leaving to join you. There is enough for two if you can shut your mouth and swing an axe at the same time" she berated me.

Point well-made I thought to myself and as I stepped off after her I mused that even though the afternoon had started with another chore set by my taskmaster father, the prospect of a free lunch and a possible chance to get to know Esja a little more privately in a sun dappled glade was music to my ears.

All in all, it had to be said, the day was shaping up quite nicely.

---

I delivered the overhead blow as accurately as possible to the large quart of oak which sat upright on the splitting stump and cursed under my breath as the impact jarred my forearms. I knew as soon as I had launched the strike that it had been far too heavy. The axe head successfully split the wooden quart in half, sending both parts spiralling to the ground a few feet away in opposite directions, but also buried itself a good few inches into the stump, much to my onlookers amusement.

"Too much strength, too little skill, you need to use your head as much as you use your muscles, boy" Esja proclaimed whilst trying as much as possible to impersonate my father's voice as she delivered his favourite line. Esja was my oldest friend and knew far too well how much those few words grated on my nerves. The fact she still used them anyway spoke volumes of how much she wanted to rile me, no doubt in an attempt to claw one back from my sarcasm a few minutes earlier. The plan worked.

"Easy to say when you are sat on your arse eating berries" I growled as I rocked the axe free of its trap with a few sharp tugs. On arrival at the glade I had hoped that the overhead canopy would diffuse some of the sunlight but a few hot and determined rays had managed to find their way through regardless. One of the beams had also happened to fall right over the splitting stump, looking for all extents and purposes as if the gods themselves were intentionally mocking my hopes.

The strain of chopping wood blocks, combined with the repressive humidity, soon brought beads of sweat to my forehead and shoulders. My arms had started to ache from the axe work and I well knew that using a sharp blade to cut firewood when tired was a tragic accident waiting to happen. Two years ago I had watched in shock as one of my friends, Olaf, had almost severed his left leg below the knee with an axe wielded by his own tired hands. The seemingly endless blood which poured from his wound had been horrifying to witness and even though the old woman of the village, who was our residential Godi, had done everything in her power to save him, Olaf had still perished of wound rot over two weeks after the accident. In truth I knew that Olaf was dead long before he eventually passed as he stank terribly in his final days of pus and decayed flesh. Those few agonising weeks and the final sight of his rot-ravaged form have never left my mind and I still take extra care when gathering firewood even now lest I follow his example. I think Esja must have also guessed that I was getting tired because she shifted slightly on her perch and beckoned me to sit down. "Come and take a rest for a few minutes, your sweating a lot and you will do yourself a mischief if you carry on like that."

After burying the axe head in the stump by just enough to hold it in place, I removed my light tunic and used it to dab down at the small rivers of sweat which were dripping down my face, chest and back. Esja had not been expecting me to get half undressed in front of her and I was very conscious that she spent more than a polite amount of time inspecting my supple young body. "You get more toned every time I get the chance to see you" she almost purred.

"A side effect of the constant manual labour my father seems to enjoy dumping on me" I replied as I sat down, consciously leaving only a barely respectable amount of distance between us. "To be honest, I don't even feel the burn the day after like I used to anymore. I suppose that must mean that my muscles are learning take abuse as well as my mind"

She chuckled at my words and flicked back her head, releasing her long auburn hair to dance around her slender frame like leaves on a spring breeze. As it shifted, her hair dazzled beautifully in the sunlight and the site of her bared neck reaching out longingly to me was almost irresistible. I had to fight with every inch of control I had to steel myself against leaning forward to bury my head into the base of her throat and nibble teasingly at soft flesh and fur. She had unbuttoned the top three buttons of her loose shirt giving me a teasingly small view of the top of her developing breasts. Esja kicked her long legs playfully out in front of her as she soaked in the warmth of the day and nothing had ever looked to me as beautiful and naturally perfect as she did in those few moments of carefree glee.

She must have caught me looking because she lowered her head again and stared into my eyes. "Behave" she teased. "You know full well what my father thinks about you, and besides, I am far from ready to be mated".

I tried my best to fake surprise but totally failed. I have never been any good at dissembling my thoughts and many a person has told me that I wear them on face as obvious as my scars. "Neither am I. And even if I was ready I wouldn't pick you" I lied with a smile.

"Good" Esja giggled whilst handing me a small group of cherries she had taken from the cloth sack. "Because you wouldn't have a chance with me anyway you wastrel!"

We must have talked about little and nothing for the next few hours because the time seemed to simply slip away from me. Every now and again Esja would nod in the direction of the splitting stump and I would grudgingly return to creating firewood for both of our families. By the time I had completely halved all of the quarts lying nearby my paws were starting to ache and I knew that blisters were not far away. The sun was now just visible over the treetops clearly indicating that it was mid-afternoon and time for us both to be getting back to the village with the afternoons work. Even though the thought of returning back to another meagre meal and mind numbingly boring night was less than appealing, I had promised my father that I would return well before cooking time to make sure we had enough wood for the fires. I had no doubt that I would be ear bashed for being already later than he expected but I was more than willing to endure the anger after spending the pleasant afternoon in the sole presence of a possible future mate.

I gathered up the firewood roughly and used my shirt as a makeshift sack to in an attempt to make the burden of carrying it back to the village less strenuous. As I slung the pack over my shoulder and hoisted the axe in my left paw I felt a gentle touch on my lower spine and turned slowly to see that Esja had placed her right paw against it invitingly. "Thank you for a lovely afternoon" she purred her eyes heavy as she looked at me. "And thank you for the firewood. My father finds it hard to keep the pile stocked up these days and the fuel you just cut will go a long way to help me feed him".

"You're welcome" I replied. "And if you want, every time I cut some more wood I will work some extra for you. Not enough for it too look obvious to your father but enough to make your life a little easier"

Esja nodded slowly. "I would appreciate that very much Magnus" she said. "And if there is anything that I can do for you to reward your efforts, feel free to ask"

One of the many traits that have carried me through my long years of close run fights and near death experiences is a urge to always bite at chances that other men, who often wind up dead might I add, shy away from. Call the trait whatever you want whether it is rashness, courage, stupidity or even in some cases a suicidal tendency. To me though, the thought of letting an opportunity slip through my paws is totally alien and, just like in the years to come, I saw my chance and pounced on it.

"You can give me a kiss" I replied.

Esja never broke contact with my gaze and it was obvious that she was wanted the touch as much as I did. The words she had used were loaded with meaning and I hadn't missed them. "I think that is acceptable" she smiled, reaching her other paw around my stomach and turning me to face her. "Just the one though, I don't want you to think that you have earned anything more"

I dropped the sack and let the axe fall from my outstretched hand a safe distance away. In a brief moment of longing I pulled her into my arms, drew her close to me and wrapped my left paw around her lower back, lifting her slightly from the ground. Despite being of a similar age and having grown up together in the village since we were birthed, the differences between the females and males of our species were now starting to appear. I was a good foot taller than her and widening at the shoulders every time I worked an axe and therefore hand to bend slightly to reach her beckoning, moist lips.

As our muzzles connected, for the second time that day my heart skipped a beat. She lifted her paws up to cup my chin and gently rolled her rough tongue around mine in teasing patterns, murmuring as she did so. Unlike my fumbled efforts it was clear that Esja was not a novice and had already had some practice, a point that I would later wish I had been given the time to investigate. Over the years I have heard many bards and poets from across the known world deliver performances about the power of the first kiss or the foolishness of young love but I can honestly say that at that point, the only thing I felt was longing. A deep and urgent longing to lift her from her feet, carry her to a soft bed of grass not too far away and investigate every single inch of her supple body in the most intimate way imaginable.

Almost subconsciously, and I say subconsciously because I knew what was happening but found myself unwilling to stop it, my paws slid up her back and round to her front, teasing their way up her taught flat stomach and under her loose blouse. Her eyes widened at the touch of my rough paws on her soft stomach fur and she pulled back away from me with a gasp. "No touching you naughty boy!" she giggled as she flattened out her blouse, erasing any trace of my presence. "You have years of chopping firewood in front of you yet before you deserve anything other than kisses!"

I'm not ashamed to say that at the sound of her words my young heart, which had up to that point be singing and beating as fast as it ever had, lurched and went cold. The girl that I wanted more than anything else in the world at that moment had pulled away and spurred my advances with little care to the hurt that would cause my young pride. Worse, she seemed to treat it all as a game, allowing me only the tiniest of morsels whilst she dangled herself like a piece of succulent meat in front of my hungry eyes. "We will see..." I growled back as I snatched up my fallen tools, weapons and firewood.

"Oh don't hate me" Esja teased, almost dancing around me as I stamped off down the forest path in the direction of the village. "All the best things come with time".

I tried to ignore her but like most women I have ever met since; she seemed to revel in the needling her sharp words had on my soul. Is there anything crueller that women who know you want her and is dead set on making every step on the ladder to reach her as painful for you as possible? Not for the last time I marvelled at the incompatibility of the female and male mind-sets and severely doubted the foresight of whichever god was responsible for the monumental cockup.

Content for now to simply tease and play the inescapable temptress, Esja straightened her hair and linked her left arm with mine; totally ignoring the fact there was a sharp axe hanging between the two of us as we walked.

Using the forest path to head back to the break in the forest took only a few minutes but every step of those few hundred yards felt like a personal hell. I could smell the musky fragrance that surrounded her like a cloak, a heady combination of her natural female odour blending with the tart aroma from the blackberries that she had eaten earlier that day. I could feel her body as her flesh brushed against my arm and hear her soft voice as she prattled on about nonsensical things to pass the time and maintain the suspense of the moment. Every young urge in my body drove me to simply throw her to the ground and claim her there and then, willing or not, but the rational part of my mind which I am secretly pleased to say occasionally rears its head at pivotal moments managed to somehow keep those bestial feelings in check.

"Are you listening to me?" Esja snapped testily. She had clearly been continuing on with her monologue and due to my own self-pity I had missed a critical part to which she had expected an answer. I knew immediately that it would cost me dearly.

"Errr, yes?" I replied half-heartedly.

She tutted and span me round to face her with a surprising amount of strength. "You realise that all the hard work you put in today will get you nowhere if you don't pay attention?" she stated flatly. "I won't choose a mate that refuses to listen to me"

I didn't reply. I couldn't. But for this time at least I had a genuine reason. Just visible over the top of the tree canopy I had spotted a funnel of midnight black smoke that reached to the clouds.

It was coming from the direction of my village.