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FIVE - Into the Wulfs Den

Magnus meets the captain and learns the truth.

I am sure that Ovden's treatment of my shoulder injury hurt like hell at the time but all I can remember now, looking back, is the crazed surrealism of the events after I saw the captain of the raiders for the first time. I do vaguely recall him ordering me to be stripped and dunked in the cold surf to bring my temperature down, and because I probably stank, to clean me as well. I do remember though that after I was stripped I caught a glimpse of my manhood which was covered in blood.

When I finally recovered my senses later and realised that the blood had belonged to Esja I felt incredibly stupid, but at the time I thought that I had somehow been mortally wounded and screamed out loud to the men that my cock was falling off and that someone needed to help me to stop it doing so. If this memory doesn't give you a good picture of my feverish state of mind at that point then I am at a loss to suggest what will suffice. I know that I wrestled like a demon with the two unfortunate men picked to be my carers, who I found out later were Kofri and Kiarr, the latter having returned from the village moments before I had met the captain, and I was convinced that I was going to be drowned in the surf and left to float on the waves as a bloated corpse to be picked at by the sea predators like nothing better than a piece of meat.

The last day had been so completely turbulent that I had little left that was stable to cling to and the world which had up to so recently been ordered and structured seemed to have been turned on its head, leaving me totally adrift. My father, friends and everyone I knew were dead according to Kofri and as far as I knew my young love and the women folk, including my mother and two sisters, were also lying face down beside them. The worst thing was that I was as powerless as a new-born cub to do anything about it or even consider vengeance, so weakened was I by the fever burn which ravaged my limbs.

After roughly cleaning me in the freezing ocean waters, my carers dragged me aboard the vessel and pinned me to one of the thwarts so that Ovden could go at his work. The old man produced a glinting needle and thread and then sewed up the gash as tidily as if he was mending sails. He then applied some stinking kind of poultice which was a rank yellow colour to my wound and bound it tightly in fresh linen, sealing it from the fresh cool air.

I vaguely remember then being dragged to the back of the vessel and being propped up against one of its sides, naked, soaking and shivering violently. Someone must have then took pity on my wretched form because I soon found that two pelts of thick fur, the likes of which I had never seen before, had been draped over my shoulders. I wrapped myself up in them; lay down on the rough planks which formed the deck of the ship and closed my eyes to one of the most fitful and nightmare plagued sleeps I have ever known.

Dreams of my mother being taken against her will flitted across my mind. Horrifying images of my sisters crying out for their father who they had seen cut down before their eyes as he tried to plead with the armed demons which had stormed from the forest like vengeful spirits.

Visions of Esja as she was dragged by her hair, semi-conscious, through the glade path where we had stood and kissed minutes earlier.

Fleeting glances of her screaming sister who fought with all the energy she could muster to break the grip the burly raider had on her.

Snapshots of my love making with Esja in the grass as the whole of our world collapsed around us.

Yes, with all that going on in my feverish mind, it's fair to say that I didn't get much sleep that night.

---

I woke to the sound of creaking wooden planks beneath my head and was instantly delirious. In front of my face I could see two pairs of stout boots rimmed with fur braced against a large wooden plate which lay in front them. I could hear the sounds of grunting men at hard physical work and the rhythmic sound of a beating drum as it called out a regular timing. The smell of ancient wood, sweat and the salty smell of the sea was everywhere. I must have lay still for some time just taking it all in because the sensations provided such a heady concoction for my pounding and overtaxed mind. Eventually I forced myself to sit upright and got my first glimpse of a raiding longship under the power of oars pulled by men of the sea. The image is still with me to this day.

All around me were the raiders who had attacked my village but gone was the heavy armour, helmets, shields and weapons to be replaced with loose clothing, tunics and breaches which would allow them more freedom of movement. The grim and battle hardened faces of the tigers that surround me belonged to warrior who were as home on the wave as they were on land and each one drew long pulls on the large oars they gripped in their strong paws. I sat in awe for some time, mutely watching how they worked their oars perfectly in time with their colleagues, intent on the job at hand and paying no attention to anything else, including me.

"Breaker!" someone shouted from the front of the vessel and as one unit the men held their oars fast in the water, bracing against them with their powerful chests, arms rested over the wood like a mother cradling a new born child.

Seconds later the ship lurched dramatically upwards and then after a short few seconds of rising it fell away again, pitching the bow towards the water once more. The moment the vessel started its downward movement the men around me placed their oars in the water again and began to row in time as if nothing had happened to break their rhythm. The same procedure happened another five times in close succession and after the third my stomach started to lurch. Once we had recovered from the fifth, whatever food I had left in me decided it was time to leave and I barely managed to drag my head over the rim of the ship and dry wretch into the dark black water below me.

"It looks like the Gethir has sea sickness" a voice chuckled from behind me as I clutched at the rim and emptied my stomach into the vastness below me.

"Maybe" another replied. "But it could just be the fever"

After a loud grunt another voice joined in the conversation. "We should just throw him overboard and be done with it. If he suffers from the sickness then he will be no use on an oar".

"Shut your mouth Efi" a voice I did recognise scolded. Kofri was clearly nearby and pulling an oar himself by the sound of his strained voice. "It's the Jarl's decision what happens to the lad, not yours"

"Close your hole Kofri, I wasn't speaking to you" the one called Efi spat back. His voice was almost sinuous, nothing like the gruff sound of Kofri and I immediately didn't trust it. His voice reminded me of a serpent's back then and nothing has changed my opinion of it to this day. "I am just saying out loud what we all know to be true. We need a good oarsman to replace Drengr, not a sickly child that can't even pick an oar up. Even Drengr would have..."

"For the last time Efi, get over it. Drengr is dead for fucks sake. He is already with the gods and busy banging some busty wench. He will have forgotten all about us by now!" Kofri bit back. "All you have talked about for the last day is Drengr!"

"And I will continue to do so; he was a good friend..."

"He was a sick bastard that enjoyed watching people suffer, that's what he was Efi and you know it" another voice that I think belonged to Kiarr responded immediately. "And don't try and paint him like a hero of any kind either, he was a cunning and devious shit and I don't miss him at all"

A few murmurs of resentment followed that comment and I think that Kiarr realised that he had overstepped the mark because he quickly added "but he was a good oarsman though and sharp with a blade."

Clearly not that sharp, I thought to myself silently, especially when he had my axe buried in his skull.

After another minute or so of dry wretching until my stomach ached I realised that I wasn't going to be sick at all so I pulled myself back into the vessel and slumped down against the side again. As an afterthought I wiped my forehand across my face to clean away as much of the thick saliva as possible. "Drink?" I asked the nearest raider.

"See Efi" the raider laughed as he heard my request, not breaking stride with his oar at all. "The lad wants something to drink; maybe there is hope for him yet!" He threw me a wine skin that sat on the bench beside him and it landed in my lap with a wet slap. "Drink your fill lad, there is plenty of it and you look like you could do with it more than I do!"

The men around him joined in his laughter and it doubled when I managed to spill the wine all over my maw and chest fur as I fumbled to try and keep the skin to my lips with weak fingers. I eventually managed to get the tube in my mouth and downed the whole skin in one long set of chugs. The strong wine burnt as it went down but warmed me up nicely and before I had even managed to drain the last drop my mind had started to become fuzzy with its influence.

"He wants drink when he wakes up, quaffs like a raider and is handy with an axe this lad!" Kofri exclaimed. "I like him already!"

A few more the men around me chuckled at that comment but they soon left me alone and I curled back up again on the rough planks to return to my own personal misery and helplessness. The strong wine that still burnt the back of my throat having done nothing for my thirst but, as I had hoped, helping at least a little to make the demons of my mind leave me alone.

---

Three days later, I finally woke up and realised that the ships wooden hull had stopped creaking and that the boots that I had become so used to seeing during my occasional bout of semi consciousness were gone. I sat up painfully, my body still weak but growing stronger, to find the old man Ovden sitting on the thwart opposite me, his arms folded across his chest and his piercing eyes locked on my own. The gods know how long he sat there waiting for me, for as much I knew at that point he had been sat there for many hours, but he did not seem to be surprised when I finally roused. Ovden let me recover my senses for a while before speaking quietly. "Good afternoon Magnus".

I covered my eyes to shade them from the suns blinding rays. "Drink?" I asked him, the word having become a standard request every time I woke up by this point.

"No drink. You have had quite enough and any more will waste you. Get up and put these clothes on" he nodded towards a small pile sat on the thwart next to him.

"I don't want to, go away" I replied childishly.

In response to my petulance he simply remained quiet and glared at me until the atmosphere became so intense that I finally relented with a huff like a scolded child. I got to my feet unsteadily and sat on the thwart near the clothes, dropped the furs which had been my only clothing for the last few days to the deck and pulled the trousers and tunic on as he had instructed. He handed me a thick leather belt which I used to secure the breeches in position and then produced a sturdy pair of boots which I hurriedly stamped my feet into. None of the clothing was mine and so I was very impressed that it all fitted me well. When I asked about that fact he simply dismissed my question and instead picked at the garments like my mother used to when I occasionally outgrew my clothing and had a new set made. It made me uncomfortable and I batted his paws away on more than one occasion.

"Where are we?" I asked once I had dressed and had had a chance to look around my immediate surroundings. The ship had been pulled ashore on a beach which was much smaller than the one near my village. Thick vegetation and sinister looking trees wrapped tightly around the limited sand and I could see only one exit into the undergrowth. It looked almost like a tunnel into the forest, such was the denseness of the foliage around it, and darkness sat in the mouth of it like a beast opening its jaws.

"You will find out soon enough lad, now get up and follow me".

Not wanting to give him a reason to glare at me again I did as I was told and followed the old man as he stepped down the gangplank and across the tiny beech in the direction of the plant tunnel. As he entered I flinched, half expecting him to scream as he was swallowed alive. But, to my relief he soon returned to the light when he realised I was no longer following and grabbed me by my tunic, yanking me in after him.

It turned out that the plant tunnel was only a dozen or so yards long and was nowhere near as frightening as I had imagined it to be. As we exited the other side I was surprised to find that a relatively large space had been cut out by the felling of carefully selected trees and in the space, which measured no more than fifty yards in each direction, small huts and shelters had been constructed using the remains of the tree trunks and large leaves which I had no name for. The small clearing was open to the sky and as such was well lit. However the heavy layers of trees all around blocked the visibility in all directions, preventing anyone looking in or out. At the far side of the clearing, almost perfectly opposite the entrance, the craggy features of a cave entrance punched through the forest which was doing its best to overcome the dark stone. Creepers and climbers clung to the rock surface in such massive quantities that you could only just make out the stone underneath.

Milling around the clearing, the crew busied themselves with their own tasks and entertainment. Some gathered around a large tree stump which was being used as a makeshift gaming table to roll dice on, the players shouting at each other loudly and laughing at each other's misfortunes. Others sat in their own shelters, white eyes piecing through the gloom as they polished armour or honed blades that glinted in the sunlight. Two particularly large bare-chested individuals were busy hacking down another tree, passing an axe between themselves and taking it in turns to gulp from four wine skins they had scattered on the floor nearby. Images of Olaf suddenly fleeted through my mind and I found myself hoping for one of them to miss the target and lop of their own leg. The thought brought a wicked smile to my lips which I tried to conceal as best as possible.

"Come with me" Ovden stated once he had allowed me enough time to drink my fill of the sight.

I stepped off after him and was painfully aware of every single pair of eyes watching me as I did so. Even the gamers and axe men had stopped what they were doing to eyeball me. What followed was a very threatening few moments as I threaded myself through the small camp in my guide's footsteps whilst I attempted to match every single glare with a defiant one of my own.

Ovden led me in the direction of the cave entrance which, when I got close enough, I realised was clearly lit from the inside by torches. As I entered behind him I had to duck so as not to split my head on the rocks. Inside, the cave entrance continued for some time, descending slightly into the earth with each step. The torches became much farther spaced as we descended and I did strike my head from a few jutting rocks which had escaped my attention, much to the amusement of my guide who seemed to dodge them with an unnatural ability to see in the dark.

Eventually we reached a junction in the tunnel and to my left and right, two large sturdy wooden doors had been built into the rock walls, blocking further progress. One large blazing torch was affixed to the wall besides each of them providing adequate light and warmth to clearly see my way around. Ovden branched to the left door and tapped three times, his rasps barely making a noise on the thick wood it was made of. "My lord, Magnus has woken up and I have brought him as you requested".

There was no reply from behind the door and Ovden stamped his foot on the rocky floor impatiently as he waited. Maybe thirty seconds later he was about to knock again out of impatience when it opened slowly, revealing the dire looking face of another tiger who I recognised as Hrolf, the warrior I had knocked senseless whilst protecting Esja and her sister. He looked from Ovden to me and then back to Ovden again and I noticed that he was hunched over a little due to the close sides of the tunnel. "The Jarl wants the cub to enter alone" Hrolf stated flatly and Ovden seemed taken aback a little at his words but soon rallied. "Very well" he replied. "Straight through the door and carry on, you can't get lost"

Hrolf did his best to stand to one side in the cramped confines but I still barely managed to squeeze past his hulking form. As I did so he growled at me and I almost laughed in his face, a move which, had I made in my weakened state, would most likely have been a terminal.

I continued down the confines of the tunnel and was painfully aware of the door being pulled to behind me as I did so. A few more paces brought me to the entrance which Ovden had promised and as I braced my right paw against the side of the wall I took a moment to steady myself. It felt almost like I had entered the lair of a vicious predator that lurked in wait and I had to gather my courage to continue. I am sure if I had been a full health I would have stepped into the reasonably sized cavern beyond with more confidence but at the time even the walk had winded me badly and I struggled to get the air into my lungs in preparation. Finding the conviction to enter was proving difficult but in the end I was spared the decision as the commanding voice of the captain broke the silence.

"Come in lad, let me see you"

I did as he commanded, unable to even consider disobeying him and was met with a sight which struck a chord in me that didn't even know existed. The first thing I laid my eyes on was the vast pile of silver, gold and jewellery which lay against the far wall, glowingly dully in the light of a large fire burning to my left. My heart instantly soared at the wealth in that hoard and immediately longed to dig my paws in it and let the coins drop through my fingers like water. Dotted around the stone room, pieces of expensive furniture stood against the stone walls, most covered in vases, gold urns, goblets and statuettes of immense quality and workmanship. Contained in this room alone there was more wealth than I would have seen in a lifetime and the temptation to touch all of it in wonder ate at my soul. "Good, you like gold and silver, that is a start at least" the voice purred, clearly happy with itself.

I stepped further into the room and placed a paw on the back of a large high backed chair to steady myself, as much from the bewilderment of the hoard as the weakness in my limbs. "Sit Magnus" the voice commanded again and I complied, more than a little relieved to rest my body.

"Are you hungry?"

I nodded slowly and then remembered my manners. "Yes, I am"

"For food this time I assume, not women or vengeance?"

"We will see" I replied testily and the voice laughed at my comment.

"Good answer lad, well spoken. A drink then perhaps?"

I could hear a few clinks of metal on metal and then the glugging sound of liquid pouring. The sound reminded my brain that I was thirsty and I nodded subconsciously. "Please".

I tried not to flinch as the captain appeared from the relative darkness of an antechamber, his large form looking sorely out of place in his chamber. He carried two full golden goblets and a half empty green bottle, its contents slushing with every step. The captain was dressed in a simple green tunic, brown breeches and thick leather boots. On his bared arms, over a dozen warrior bands wrapped around his muscles, each made from glistening precious metal. His fingers were adorned with delicate rings, each set with a different type of stone and each worth more gold on its own than my family had even owned. He crossed the room like a ghost, hardly making a sound and passed me one of the goblets and as he sat down on the chair opposite me he placed the half empty bottle on the table between us.

In the firelight and free from my delirium I could see that my initial assessment of the captain was incorrect. Whilst his markings and fur colouring were scarily similar to my own there were features that didn't match up exactly. My nose was a different colour and I was not, and never would be, his size. He was also well spoken and I am sure that I sounded like a gutter runner to him. Also, his countenance was one of high breeding and aristocracy, as far from my own as could be conceived. He seemed to notice that I was sizing him up as he took a deep draft of his own goblet and rested his heavy forearms on the chair.

"You stare lad, why?" he asked.

"I thought you looked a lot like me when I first saw you but now I am not so sure"

The captain pondered my words before replying.

"Surely you mean that you look me, as I am older"

"I don't see how. Short of you turning up at my village and killing everything, I have never had the misfortune to meet you"

"Ah, I was wondering how long the impeccable manners you displayed that night would take to return. Faster than I imagined it appears".

I remained quiet for a moment. Contrary to what Kofri had said about his leader, the captain seemed to be quite reasonable.

"Are you wondering how our markings are similar Magnus?" he asked after a few moments, breaking my thoughts.

"No, it's clearly a co-incidence. It happens. I once knew two men who had similar markings in my village, there were not related but people said they could have been. Well, that was until you killed them".

The captain's lips barely moved but I could tell he very nearly smiled. He leant forward and pulled the table that lay before us closer to him and spread a roll of parchment out flat that he had taken from the rack underneath it. It was a map. "I have been a raider now for more than twenty years boy" he said to the room in general, apparently caring little if I chose to listen. "And in that time I have been to many parts of the known world and, as you can see, gathered much treasure and wealth in doing so" he nodded in the direction of the pile which had so taken my imagination minutes earlier. "I have also had more than my fair share of women, some of whom even agreed". He then placed the bottle on one corner of the map, his goblet on another and held down the last two corners with his paws. "Are you going to drink that wine or shall I?" he asked suddenly, changing tack so quickly it caught me out.

"Yes" I announced and downed a lot of it in one gulp. The burn was so immediate that took my breath away and I coughed uncontrollably as it felt like someone had just poured liquid fire down my throat.

The captain laughed at my plight. "Alborian red Magnus, the strongest thing I have ever known and by gods does it get addictive. However, it also gives you terrible hangovers and can change a man's mood quickly. Amazing stuff and bloody expensive. You can't even steal the stuff; I think it's about the only thing I own that I actually have to pay for". He continued chuckling to himself for a minute or two, caught in his own mirth, before he finally continued. "So, you have never met me before have you Magnus?"

"No"

"And yet you share my markings. You also clearly have a temper, a wild streak, a problem with authority and a penchant for women, drink and plunder".

I stared at the gold pile in the corner as he mentioned it. It was still calling to me.

"What was your father like?"

I ripped my head from the sight of the gleaming treasure to stare back at the captain. When it became apparent that he had not meant anything by the comment and was genuinely interested, I mellowed once again.

"Strict, stern, unloving and he didn't laugh at all. He was also a taskmaster and pushed me harder than he pushed the others. He hated it when I was insolent and answered back. But other than that, he did his best by me".

"Did you love him?"

"Of course, he was my father"

The captain sat back in his chair as he considered his next words. "There are different kinds of love Magnus. Physical love as in between you and your young starling the other night, the love that you have your parents, the love you have for your friends and the love you have because you respect someone. Do you understand me?"

"I think so..." I replied, barely keeping up now the wine had stopped burning my lungs and had started to toast my brain instead.

"So then, did you love your father as a man that was worth respect or did you love your father as a man who provided for your family and put food on the table every mealtime?"

As I listened to his words I realised that I had never thought about my father like he suggested before. The answer was obvious and I said so. "I suppose I loved him as a man who provided for the family, not as a man to respect. Even though he was the headman in the village, I very rarely listened to him".

"I thought as much lad" the captain said, his gaze moving to the fire which burnt well in the fire pit next to us. For a moment he looked distant but then came back to the conversation.

"The men that you have seen, my crew if you will, love me because they respect my ability to lead. The expect me to provide direction and riches, women for their needs and to keep their bellies full of fine meat and wine" he told me flatly. "They love me because they respect me, and I in turn have a duty to all of them to do my best by them. It is my responsibility to fulfil their needs and reward them well. Do you understand me?"

"I do. Well, at least I think I do"

"Never mind Magnus, you will soon enough" he said.

I let the point sit for a while and took another few sips of the liquid wildfire in my goblet. In truth, I was surprised it hadn't burnt though the metal of the cup and melted through my hand. "So you think that I didn't love my father as well as I should have?" I asked, the faint niggling of regret beginning to creep into my mind as I did so. For some reason, despite the fact I knew it was the captains fault my father was dead, I couldn't find it in me to hate him for it. Instead I just felt a sense of loss.

"No, I didn't say that. How you loved the man you called your father was your choice. But, I don't think you knew your father at all".

"Maybe I didn't. He was always cold with me. I tried to bond with him though; it's just he was never like that with me even though he doted on my sisters. My mother saw it and often quarrelled with him over his attitude."

"That's not what I said Magnus. I said that maybe you didn't know your father at all".

"What do you mean?" I asked, confused.

"The man who raises you is not necessarily your father lad. Even though he provides for you and is a father in every other way possible".

"I don't understand. Are you trying to say that my father wasn't the man who sired me?"

The captain locked his eyes to mine, totally transfixing me with his presence. It was all I could do just to breathe. "Are you so shocked lad? How have you not seen it already? You didn't act like him, none of his traits were yours, you felt no kinship with the man and he never tried to bond with you at all"

As I pondered his words whilst taking sips of the fine wine, whose potency I had now started to get adjusted to, I studied the captain's features in more detail. He let me do so, simply starting back at me as if willing me to make a connection. Suddenly, in a moment of stark clarity, what was left of my world fell down around me and realisation hit me like a hammer blow to the stomach.

His markings, his attitude to life, the fact that he spared me and killed everyone else and had weathered my comments which would have demeaned him in front of his men without running me through with his own blade. My apparent and unknown lust for treasure, women, adventure and my disobedient nature. All of it. It all pointed to one answer which was so ground shaking that I didn't believe it myself at first until I repeated the facts to myself silently.

"No!" I spat, spraying the wine all over the map in front of me and a generous amount over my father as well. "No!"

"Ovden made me aware of you at first. He was watching you fight Hrolf and Beinir, saw the connection immediately and ran to find me. I didn't believe him at first but I knew he was right the moment that I set eyes on you wielding the axe from a distance. Our thoughts were confirmed when you knelt defiant in front of me the same night. The crew saw it just as well as I did. You are my son Magnus. Your attitude, determination and battle fury are the same as mine. The facts are too compelling to be disputed"

"I don't believe it!" I growled at him, slamming down my goblet on the table violently and jumping to my feet. "How is that even possible?"

My father leaned back in his chair and beckoned me to sit down again. "Like I said to you earlier, I have been a raider for over twenty year's lad. Do you think that three days ago was the first time I met your mother? If you do, then you would be very much mistaken. Sit down, pull up the goblet again and let me tell you a story that is eighteen years old..."