Текст книги "The Road to Jerusalem"

Автор книги: Ян Гийу

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Chapter 2

King Sverker's son Johan died as he deserved. King Sverker had of course followed the advice he had been given by Father Henri, to see to it that the Danish jarl took his wife back to Halland at once. But both King Sven Grate and his jarl scornfully rejected the subsequent part of Father Henri's plan, to arrange a marriage between the royal but roguish son and the other violated Danish woman, so that war could thus be avoided with a blood bond.

   The fault lay perhaps not so much in Father Henri's plan as in the fact that King Sven Grate wanted war. The more proposals for mediation came from King Sverker, the more King Sven Grate wanted war. He thought, possibly correctly, that the king of the Goths was exhibiting weakness when he offered first one thing and then another to avoid going into battle.

   As a last resort, King Sverker had prevailed upon the Pope's Cardinal Nicolaus Breakspear to pay a visit to Sven Grate on his way to Rome and speak of reason and peace.

   The cardinal failed at this task, just as he had recently failed to ordain an archbishop over a unified Götaland and Svealand.

   The papal commission to name an archbishop had failed because the Swedes and Goths were unable to agree on the location of the archbishop's cathedral, and thus where the archbishop should have his see. The cardinal's peace-making assignment failed for the simple reason that the Danish king was convinced of his coming victory. His newly conquered realms would then be subject to Archbishop Eskil in Lund, so Sven Grate could see no Christian reason for refraining from war.

   King Sverker had made no preparations for the defense of the realm, since he was too wrapped up in mourning his queen, Ulvhild, and preparing for a wedding with yet another twicewidowed woman, Rikissa. Perhaps he also thought that all the intercessions he had secured for himself at the cloister would save both him and the country.

   His oafish son Johan harbored no such belief in salvation by intercession. And if the Danes should emerge from the coming battle victorious, for his part all hope would be lost. So he, and not his father the king, called a tingat the royal manor in Vreta to decide how to plan the defense against the Danes.

   He had no idea how hated he was as an outcast. If his father had not been both old and weak of flesh, he would have condemned his son to death for committing two heinous deeds as well as perjury. Everyone understood that except possibly Johan himself. No man of honor wanted to prolong the war and risk losing his life for the sake of an outcast—the worst sort of violator of women.

   On the other hand, many men came to the tingat Vreta filled with anticipation, but for entirely different reasons than those Johan imagined.

   They had come to kill him. And they did. His own retainers didn't lift a finger to protect him. Johan's corpse was chopped into pieces of the proper size and flung to the swine in the back yards of Skara so that no royal funeral could take place.

In the year of Grace 1154 winter came early, and when the ice had settled in, King Sven Grate led his army up from Skåne and into the Finn Woods in Småland. The army burned and pillaged wherever they went, of course, but the advance was slowed by all the snow that year. Horses and oxen had a hard time making headway.

   In addition, the peasants in Värend took defensive measures. They had decided at their tingthat if they had to die, it was better to die like men in accordance with their forefathers' ancient beliefs. Dying like a servant or thrall without offering resistance was to die in vain. Besides, nothing was certain when it came to war except for one thing: He who did not fight, or who stood alone against a foreign army, would surely die if the army passed his way. Everything else was in the hands of the gods.

   And King Sven Grate truly had a difficult time of it. The residents of Värend defended themselves one stretch of land at a time, from behind logjams, which they dragged onto the forest roads. It took a great deal of force and time to deal with these barricades, and victory was elusive. If the momentum seemed in their favor in the evening when the battle had to be broken off for supper, prayer, and sleep, by morning the defenders of the barricade would be gone. By then they would have regrouped in a village a bit farther on, with new people who had their own homes to defend, and then it would start all over again.

   At night the soldiers in the Danish army deserted in large groups and began walking home. Those who were professional fighters knew that too much of the winter had already passed. Even though they might finally manage to get through these damned peasant defenders, they would end up mired in the spring mud on the plains of Western Götaland. Besides, the peasants of Värend had a nasty way of defending themselves. At night they would sneak up in small groups, overtake the guards, and then stab as many horses and oxen in the belly as they could before reinforcements arrived. Then they would flee into the dark forest.

   A horse that has been stabbed in the belly dies quite rapidly. Oxen are a bit more resilient, but even oxen die if a pitchfork or lance point has penetrated their underbelly. Naturally, the Danish army ended up with plenty of beef to roast, but it was cold comfort, since they were forced to consume their only hope of victory.

   When at last Sven Grate had to accept the fact that the war could not be won, at least not this year, he decided that the army should be divided for the retreat. He would proceed home through Skåne to the islands of Denmark. His jarl would take the other half of the remaining army home with him to Halland and his own manor. Sven Grate also had messengers sent home to announce that when they returned, the war would be over.

   But in Värend there was plenty to avenge. And the story was long told of the woman Blenda, who sent out messages to the other women, and together they met the jarl and his men near the Nissa River with bread and salt pork. Quite a lot of salt pork, as it turned out. They provided an extraordinary feast, and oddly enough, there was plenty of ale to go with the salt pork.

   The jarl and his men finally staggered off to a barn to sleep while the soldiers, just as drunk as the noblemen, had to make do as best they could underneath ox and sheep hides out in the snow. It was then that Blenda and the other women made their preparations. They tarred big torches and summoned their men, who were hiding in the forest.

   When silence had fallen over the army's encampment and only snoring could be heard, they carefully barred the door of the barn and then set fire to all four corners simultaneously. Then they attacked the sleeping soldiers.

   The next morning, with joyous laughter, they drowned the last of the captives beneath the ice on the Nissa River, where they had chopped two big holes so that they could drag the prisoners down under the ice as if on a long fishing line.

   King Sverker had won the war with the Danes without lifting a finger or sending out a single man.

   No doubt he believed that this was due both to his prayers of intercession and to God's providence. Yet he was man enough to have Blenda and her kinsmen brought before him. And he proclaimed that the women of Värend, who had shown themselves so manly in the defense of the country, should henceforth inherit just as men did. And as an eternal emblem of war they would wear a red sash with an embroidered cross of gold, an insignia that would be granted to them alone.

   If King Sverker had lived longer, his decrees would surely have had greater legal effect than they did. But King Sverker's days were numbered. He would soon be murdered.

No fortress can be built to be impregnable. If strong enough motivation exists, any man's home can be pillaged and burned. But the question then is whether it is worth the price. How many besiegers had been shot to death with arrows, how many had been crushed by stones, how many had lost their will and health during the siege?

   Herr Magnus knew all this, and he was greatly troubled as the construction progressed. Because what he couldn't know, what no one at that time could know, was what would happen after the death of old King Sverker. And that time was fast approaching.

   Anything was possible. Sverker's eldest son Karl might win the king's power, and then nothing in particular would change. If nothing else, Sigrid had seen to improving her husband's relationship to King Sverker by donating Varnhem almost as if in his name.

   But it was difficult to know much about what was happening up in Svealand, and which of the Swedes was now preparing for the battle to become king. Perhaps it was some Western Goth? Perhaps someone in their own lineage or in a friendly clan or in a hostile clan. As they waited for the decision to be made, there was nothing to do but keep building.

   Arnäs was located at the tip of a peninsula that jutted out into Lake Vänern, and so had a natural water defense on three sides. Next to the old longhouse a stone tower was now being erected that was as tall as seven men. The walls around the tower were still not finished, but the area was mainly protected by palisades of tightly packed, pointed oak logs. Here there was still plenty to do.

   Magnus stood for a long time up in the tower on his property, trying out shots with a longbow, aiming at a bale of hay on the other side of the two wall moats. It was truly remarkable how far an arrow from a longbow could reach if he fired down from an elevated position. And after very little practice he was learning to calculate the angle so that he hit the target almost perfectly, at most an arm's length to one side or the other. Even in its present unfinished state, Arnäs would be difficult to take, at least for a group of soldiers returning from some war or other who might need provisions on the way home. And eventually it would become even more fortified, although everything had its season, and Sigrid mostly wanted something different from Magnus.

   He was well aware that she often got her way when they disagreed. By now he was even aware of how she behaved to make it look as if she weren't actually driving him before her, but rather was obediently following the will of her husband and lord—as she had done with the matter of the high seat of his Norwegian forefathers.

   In the old longhouse the high seat and the walls around the end of the hall had been decorated with oak carvings from Norway, in which the dragon ship plowed through the sea, and a great serpent whose name he had forgotten encircled the entire scene. The runic inscription was ancient and difficult to decipher.

   Sigrid had first proposed that they burn all these old ungodly images now that they were building afresh. The walls should be covered instead with the tapestries of the new era, in which Christian men defended the Holy City of Jerusalem, where churches were erected and heathens baptized.

   Magnus had had a hard time agreeing to the idea of burning all his forefathers' skillfully made carvings. Such things were no longer created nowadays; in any case their like could not be found anywhere in Western Götaland. But he'd also had difficulty arguing with her words about ungodliness and heathen art. In that sense she was right. And yet the forefathers who had carved those writhing dragons and runes had known no other way of carving; now the lovely work of their hands was all that remained of them.

   At the same time as they were quarreling about the dragon patterns and the runes, they were also addressing the question of who knew how to build walls. Should the stonemasons' talents be used first for the outer defenses, or should they build the gable of the new longhouse first?

   In the old longhouse, the fireplace had stretched the whole length of the building, down the middle of the floor, so that the heat was distributed more or less evenly. In the far end of the longhouse were kept the thralls and the animals, while the master of the estate and his people and their guests lived in the part where the high seat was placed. During hard winters, heat was best conserved in this manner.

   But now Sigrid had come up with new ideas, which of course she had learned from the monks down in Varnhem. Magnus still remembered his amazement and his skepticism when she drew it all in the sand before him. Everything was new, nothing was as before.

   Her longhouse was divided into two halves, with a big door in the middle that led into an anteroom, and from there you entered either the master's half or the half with the thralls and animals. In addition, the half with the thralls and animals was divided into two floors. The upper floor served as a barn for fodder, and the lower floor as stall for the livestock. In this half of the house there was no fireplace; on the contrary, fire was something that would be forbidden on pain of severe punishment.

   In the other half of the longhouse, which would be their own, with a high seat as before, the far gable would be built entirely of stone. In front of it large, flat slabs would be mortared to a fireplace almost as wide as the house, and above the fireplace a huge chimney to conduct the smoke would be built into the stone.

   He'd offered many objections, and she had answers to all of them. The lack of fire along the floor was not a problem; the stone walls at the end would hold the heat inside the building, keeping it warm even through the night. No, the old vents were not necessary, as the smoke would go straight up the stone chimney above the hearth. And there was no need to worry about winds blowing through the stacked logs, as the cracks would be sealed with flax and tar.

   As to his concern that the thralls and animals would have no fire in their part of the house, she patiently explained that by dividing their living quarters into two floors, the heat from the animals would remain downstairs, while upstairs the thralls (and the men) could make comfortable beds of hay.

   But then, in response to one of his questions, Sigrid happened to invoke the Norwegian stave churches, which certainly had no lack of dragon patterns, and she seemed to reconsider. On closer reflection she thought she could yield on the matter of the ancestral high seats and their less than Christian ornamentation. And then, quite exhilarated and relieved, Magnus agreed at once that first they had to finish the masonry work on the new longhouse. Since now he had indeed achieved what he wanted.

   Of course he had seen through her, and he understood how she managed to push through her will on almost every matter. Sometimes he felt a brief wave of anger flow through his limbs and head at the thought that his wife was acting as though she and not he was the master of Arnäs.

   But now, as he unstrung his longbow and shouted at one of the thralls down in the moat to gather up the arrows and return them to their place in the armory, what he saw was not merely a beautiful sight. It was a very convincing sight.

   Below him in the stronghold area, the new longhouse stood with its tarred walls gleaming and its turf roof a luxuriant green. They had converted all the thatched roofs on the buildings to turf roofs with grass, even though reeds could be easily harvested nearby. This was not only for the sake of warmth, but also because a single flaming arrow could transform thatched roofs into huge torches.

   At the other end of the courtyard in the stronghold area, under protection of the high section of wall that had been completed, stood a long livestock house. Below him in the tower were stored grain and weapons. Even in its present state, he would now be able to organize the defense of Arnäs in half a day.

   If he looked inland, a whole village was cropping up on the other side of the moat. There stood the tannery, stinking along the lakefront beyond the other buildings where ox-hides and skins of marten and ermine were prepared, which brought in so many silver coins in Lödöse. Up toward the fortress the other buildings stood in two rows, livestock stalls and thrall dwellings, stonecutter workshops and smithies, food storehouses, cookhouses, cooperages, and flax-houses. Now there were twice as many thralls and animals as there were only a few years ago.

   The latter turn of events was like a miracle and just as hard to understand. He had learned from his father, who had learned from his forefathers as far back as anyone could remember, exactly how many thralls and animals a field could support in relation to its size, so that the estate owner would not be eaten out of house and home.

   Now there was a whole swarm down there, twice as many as he should have had by his own reckoning, and yet Arnäs had grown richer and bigger with each month that passed. The forest that had once come right up to the northern moat had now been cut as far away as ten shots with the longbow, which was as far as the eye could clearly see. The forest had become timber, which had been used to construct all the new buildings down there. New fields and pastures now covered the land that had once been forest.

   And no matter how many silver coins he had spent on things that could not be made at Arnäs, or those that could only be purchased for silver, such as salt or the services of the woodcarver from Bjälbo who was working on the gates, the quantity of his silver coins still kept growing, as if the coins were able to propagate like animals and thralls inside their oaken chests in the vaults and chambers of the tower.

   When King Sverker had started minting coins down in Lödöse two winters ago, he was the only king who had endorsed coinage as legal tender since farther back than anyone could remember, ever since the heathen time. Most tradesmen had been skeptical of the newfangled money and preferred to stay with the old ways, bartering for salt and iron, hides, butter, and furs measured in bushels.

   But Sigrid had urged Magnus to adopt the new method right from the start, and to be the first to accept silver for everything. She had argued that in this way he would be helping King Sverker establish a difficult new custom that others were reluctant to accept, and thus the king would remain favorably disposed toward Arnäs.

   So at first he had received ten times as much silver for an item as he could get now that everyone else had begun to follow the new ways. By being the first, Magnus had doubled his fortune in a few short years.

   When he realized this for the first time, what power now resided in his money cached in the tower—without understanding why—he had felt an urge to chastise her, let her feel the rod, make her know her place as wife. But his anger had quickly abated. Instead, when he saw a whole district teeming with all the life that had been created around Arnäs, he turned to God with a prayer of thanksgiving that God had granted him the wisest wife in the entire land of the Goths. Sigrid was a gift from God, that much was certain and true. And when he was alone under the roof of heaven where only God could hear his thoughts, Magnus acknowledged this without bitterness. After all, it was just he and God—yes, and Sigrid herself, of course—who knew. No man knew of this. They all thought that the flourishing region around Arnäs and the two villages that belonged to Arnäs down toward Forshem were his work and none other's. They all believed that he was a great man, a man to reckon with, a man who knew how to create wealth.

   Presumably, although he wasn't sure, Sigrid too believed that he was floating along on that conceited delusion. He resolved never to let her see that he understood quite well that she was behind it all.

   And besides, he consoled himself, he and Sigrid were as one, since whatsoever God has joined together, no man can put asun der. Everything that thrived around Arnäs was the result of their common efforts, in the same way that their sons Eskil and Arn were half himself and half Sigrid.

   When viewed this way, which was after all the only Christian way to look at it, he was indeed a great man, through God's providence. And in what other way except through God's providence could it have happened?

Winter was the time of feasts in Western Götaland. But this winter, especially, when King Sverker's days were waning, there was an unusual number of feasts. Sleighs crisscrossed the countryside, and it was not only for the sake of the roast meat and ale. It was a cold time of uncertainty for some people, and a hot time for hammering out plans at the forge of intrigue for others.

   Erik Jedvardsson had announced that he intended to visit Arnäs just before midwinter, and the reason he gave, other than the prospect of getting to know each other better since Sigrid and his wife Kristina were kin, was that there was much for them to discuss. Besides, they might be able to have done with the dispute about Varnhem.

   Only one part of the message—that there was much to discuss—bothered Magnus. Everyone knew that Erik Jedvardsson was a man with high-flying plans for his own benefit. In the worst case he had his eye on the king's throne. And that meant in turn that he now sought to establish who was his enemy and who would be his friend in this struggle.

   Magnus wrestled inwardly and at length with this question. He knew what he wanted to do with his own life. That was to build Arnäs into a strong and rich estate and leave a good in heritance to Eskil and perhaps something to Arn. But anyone who allowed himself to be drawn into the struggle for the king's crown might gain much, but just as easily could lose everything. So far the choice was not difficult for Magnus, since his means of achievement in his life had been staked out all the way until his death, which would come at an advanced age, he hoped. He would continue to build, continue his trading, and continue to break new ground. That was his sure path to profit and a good life.

   On the other hand, what made the matter truly worrisome was the fact that whoever did not aid the victor in the struggle for the crown could expect trouble when the victor next came to visit and asked why he had received no support until it was no longer needed. Magnus knew enough about Erik Jedvardsson to realize that he was sure to enter the fray, and he was also known to be a man who was loath to forgive his enemies. No matter how Magnus positioned himself, he risked losing.

   Secretly Magnus did not consider himself to be a man of war. Certainly he could handle a sword and shield, lance and bow; what else had he done as a young man but learn such skills? His retainers numbered a dozen men, distant kinsmen and mostly young, who had no hope of inheritance but who knew no other work than that involving weapons. Lazy ne'er-do-wells mostly, Magnus thought. Nevertheless, he would be able to provide a dozen retainers. And if necessary he could arm eight dozen of his peasants in the two villages near Forshem. This wasn't a warrior force that could tip the balance in a struggle for the crown. Crucial to his future would be which side he had taken in the struggle, for or against the victor. And whether half of his clan, who lived as he did in Western Götaland, backed Erik Jedvardsson or not would probably depend on what position the other half of his kinsmen took, the ones from Bjälbo in Eastern Götaland.

   Magnus had sent for his younger brother Birger, who although he was not the eldest or most prominent, still acted as spokesman for the Bjälbo family in many difficult matters. Birger was regarded as both shrewd and forthright in negotiations. Many had predicted that, despite the down on his cheeks, he would one day hold a high position in the realm, no matter who controlled the kingdom, for the Bjälbo lineage was very strong, as reckoned in lands and retainers.

   Birger came riding up like a whirlwind in the snow one evening before the other guests had arrived. With loud shouts he drove his sleigh into the courtyard in front of the longhouse and with an abrupt skid made snow spray from the runners. He leapt down briskly from the sleigh and left it in the care of stable thralls who came rushing over. He also tossed a dead wolf onto the ground so that it could be carried away at once to the tannery to be flayed. Many of the thralls thought that it was unlucky to let a dead wolf come too close to where people lived.

   Then he heaved the knapsack with his good clothes onto his back and was already on his way into the longhouse as Magnus came stumbling out to welcome him. When Birger entered the longhouse and met Sigrid, whom he greeted with caution and chivalry, he was at once full of praise for their construction. Led by Sigrid, with Magnus traipsing along behind, he walked through the hall and felt the heat radiating from the stone gable wall with the log fires, rubbing his hands in delight. He quickly selected a place to sleep, dropped off his change of clothes, and pulled the woolen blanket over his sleeping place. Then he promptly went over to the bench near the fire, and began to tell them about his journey across the ice of Lake Vättern. He recounted how he had discovered a pack of wolves and how the horse managed to catch up with them on the ice covered with a thin layer of snow and how he shot a wolf, but the fallen wolf unfortunately got caught up in the sleigh's runners and the other wolves were able to flee.

   Then he stretched out his hand in a practiced gesture and was handed a tankard of ale without so much as casting a glance at the house thrall who brought it. He drank a toast to his hosts and heaved a great sigh of satisfaction.

   Magnus felt almost dumbfounded by his lively young brother, for whom nothing ever seemed difficult or impossible. Who would even think of venturing out alone on a sleigh ride across unstable ice in bad weather, traveling all the way from Bjälbo to Arnäs in a single day without the least trepidation? It made Magnus wonder how much having the same father actually meant since he and his half brother had different mothers.

   It took a long time before they had sufficiently discussed all their kinsmen at the two estates, and Magnus almost timidly was able to turn the conversation to the difficult questions awaiting them the next day.

   But none of this seemed difficult for Birger, either. He disposed of the whole problem in a few sentences.

   "It is true and certain," he said as he reached out his arm to take another tankard of ale, "that this Erik Jedvardsson is a man who will either end up as king or be a head shorter, or both. We all know this. But as things now stand, he can't get us involved in any strife. He can't turn Eastern Götaland against Western Götaland or vice versa. He could possibly win over the Swedes to his cause, with or without a heathen sacrifice. If he does that, we'll have to consider then what position to take. Then the game will have changed. But enough of these minor matters, when do we eat?"

The arrival of Erik Jedvardsson at Arnäs on the following day was an event not missed by anyone. He came in four sleighs and had twelve retainers with him, as though he were already king, or at least the jarl, the second in line to power. Moreover, he arrived four hours before he was expected, due to the fact that he had left his home estate of Ladås the day before, stopping halfway and staying overnight with King Sverker's man at the king's Husaby estate, although he was reticent about what had transpired during such a brief visit.

   The meat being tended by the roast-turners was still half raw; the turnips were still being carried into the cookhouses, and Sigrid had scarcely managed to sweep the hall and hang the tapestries; so after a brief welcome for form's sake, when they tested the ale and shared some of the white bread that was the pride of Arnäs, they divided up the company in the most opportune way so as to make the time pass without boredom. Magnus asked his eldest retainer to take care of his warrior brothers from Ladås, get them settled in, and assuage their thirst. Sigrid took Kristina on a tour of the house and around all the new buildings on the estate, and Magnus took Erik Jedvardsson to see the work on the fortifications.

   Erik Jedvardsson was not impressed. He thought that the walls were too low and too fragile, that the double moat might be an ingenious idea, but that it didn't do much good to have deep moats if they had to defend themselves in the winter when the water turned to ice. And he went on like that, boasting the whole time about his own structures and comparing them, especially the church building in Eriksberg, which was now nearly completed. Naturally he used English stonemasons, whom he had requisitioned from his father's clan; these Englishmen, he proposed, might be hired out to Magnus when the spring came instead of returning home.

   Magnus let him talk. If the walls at Arnäs were too low and fragile, then he meant they were too low and fragile for a king. If there was a king to capture in the fortress, then the besiegers would be both more numerous and more stubborn than if there were only a tradesman inside. It wasn't difficult to see that Erik Jedvardsson was already dreaming of being king.

   But Magnus did not feel comfortable in his company. The other man was taller and heavier, which made him speak and behave as though he were the host and not the guest.

   This made the surprise so much the better for Magnus when they left the fortifications and began to inspect the stables and the longhouse. This was indeed a whole new method of building—the long pine logs stacked on top of each other—and the stonework gable of the longhouse, with its three big chimneys on the roof ridge, was also entirely new to Erik Jedvardsson. At his home they were still building with vertical logs that were sealed with straw and clay.