Bracelet of Bones by Kevin Crossley-Holland Page A

they appraised each other and laughed.
    Bruni gestured to his companions. “Vigot,” he said. “Solveig.”
    “Welcome!” said Oleg. “Man . . . woman . . .” He smiled sweetly at them and slowly locked his fingers.
    “No!” exclaimed Solveig. “No, we’re not!”
    “Not what?” asked Vigot.
    “Man and wife,” said Solveig. She felt her blood rush to her face. “He thinks we’re married.”
    Vigot just laughed. “She keeps begging me!” he told Oleg.
    “My young friends have heard about you,” Bruni said. “The smith of smiths!”
    “Stuff!” said Oleg.
    “Whoever wants to learn should work with you. Not that women ever make good carvers.”
    “I have two apprentices,” Oleg replied, “and that’s enough for me.”
    Solveig saw how restless Oleg was—picking things up, putting them down again, blowing soot from surfaces, pulling at his clothing, as if he couldn’t keep still for a moment.
    “Solveig wants to learn,” Bruni told him.
    Oleg smiled at her, and she could see that although the whites of his eyes were rosy with so much smoke and rubbing, the irises were brown as chestnuts and glistening.
    “For one . . .” Oleg said warmly, “for one, success at swordplay . . . Do you know this song?”
    “. . . For one a devious mind for chess,
    For one strength in wrestling . . .”
    “That’s you, Vigot,” said Solveig accusingly.
    “For one the hawk on the fist . . .” Oleg continued. “And for one the skill of the craftsman. What I think is . . . the craftsman’s workshop is a crossing place.”
    “How?” said Solveig.
    “Let me ask you this: Is anything beautiful unless it’s useful? And is anything truly useful unless it’s also beautiful?”
    “No,” said Solveig. “They go together. Please show me.”
    That was what Oleg did. He showed her the drinking cups he had just thrown on his wheel in the inner room. He showed her the decorated bone handles and arrowheads and rivets and nails and pieces of polished and cut amber and dress pins . . .
    Then Oleg dug into a pocket, pulled out a bronze key, and unlocked a solid hinged wooden box. It contained several pieces of metal jewelry, and the moment Solveig saw the bronze brooch, she knew it was the one. The one for Edith.
    Like a little double hammer, handle end to handle end. No . . . like a double cross. Two silver eyes in each of the hammerheads . . . Solveig couldn’t take her eyes off it.
    Oleg laid the brooch on Solveig’s right palm. She felt how heavy it was, and when she turned it over, she saw how finely Oleg had fashioned the pin catch.
    The craftsman took it back and peered closely at it. Then he pressed the brooch to the top of his workbench and picked up a little hammer.
    At once Solveig noticed how still he had become. When he’s talking, he’s all movement and busyness, she thought, but when he’s working, he’s so quiet. So still.
    Oleg gave the fastening the lightest tap, and then a second, smarter one, and eyed it again. “That’ll do,” he said. “Yes, poems, sagas, tapestries, ships, harps and pipes, swords, brooches—each has its own material, but they all have to be well wrought.”
    “This is the one,” Solveig told Oleg.
    “One what?” asked Bruni. “What are you talking about?”
    “Ask Odindisa!” Solveig replied. And then she told Oleg, “Odindisa, she’ll come here tomorrow and buy it. I’ll come back too, if I can.”
    Oleg smiled. “I’ll be waiting for you both,” he said.
    How old is he? Solveig wondered. His skin’s unlined, almost. He’s got no hair, though, except those pale patches over his ears. He’s supple and quick, but his eyes are age-old.
    Oleg’s sandy eyelashes flickered, and he gave Solveig a knowing look. “All ages,” he said with a merry laugh.
    After this, Vigot bought seven bronze fishhooks, and once the craftsman had wrapped them up in a scrap of oily sealskin, Bruni said it was time they were getting back to their