Heroes of the Valley by Jonathan Stroud Page B

person who . . . Well.' She ran her hands down her kirtle, looked away. 'I've got to get ready. My father will be waiting.'
    Halli said: 'Listen, I'm sorry too. About your loss.'
    She smiled then, her eyes glistening. 'Oh, I go up the hill and talk to her all the time. Sit by the cairn, bring her flowers.
    Better than being at home with Father and my aunt, talking endlessly about marriage. Still—'
    But Halli was frowning now. 'Up at the cairn? What about the Trows?'
    Aud blew her cheeks out in disdain. 'Well, I don't cross over, and I don't go up at night. But even so . . . Who do you know, Halli Sveinsson, who has ever actually seen a Trow?'
    'Well, I have, more or less.'
    'Mmm. By "seen" I mean really set eyes on one, not just wet your leggings when the wind howled through the cairns or a hare ran from a thicket.'
    Halli drew himself up. 'Not two weeks ago I was high on the ridge, doing far-herding. There's a place where the wall's crumbled. A ewe got lost, strayed beyond the cairns. In the night' – his voice fell to a whisper; his round eyes stared left and right into the dim regions of the passage – 'in the night, I heard her screaming. At dawn, there it was – her carcass lying there! Torn to pieces, it was.'
    Aud yawned rudely. 'I can barely breathe for sheer terror, Halli. You're a born storyteller. What happened then?'
    'Er, that was it.'
    'What? That's your story? I've one word for you: wolves.'
    Halli sniffed. 'But this was the Trow moors.'
    Aud rolled her eyes. 'During your stay up there, did you see wolves?'
    'Yes, far off.'
    'Eagles?'
    'Yes.'
    'Then why assume Trows killed your sheep when the other options are there in front of you? Why make things more complicated than they are?' Aud's voice grew animated.
    'When I get an itch on my bum, I don't imagine a Trow's crept up and put it there, do I? I go for the simple explanation. Oh, Arne's blood, that's my father.' Ulfar Arnesson's voice could be heard calling loudly in the hall. 'I've got to go, and I'm still not packed. I'll see you before long anyhow, with luck – since your mother's invited me to stay this winter. But if you're passing Arne's House in the meantime, come and visit. We've got better beer down there than you serve, that's for sure.' She grinned at him a final time, waved and disappeared through her door, leaving Halli blinking after her in the silence of the passage.
    For two days Brodir's body lay upon a wicker pallet in the centre of the hall. Halli did not go to pay his respects. He had already seen his uncle dead, and the image was seared into his mind.
    On the third morning, when mists still hung upon the ground, the burial party assembled in the yard. As with every funeral it was Arnkel's duty to lead them to the ridge; now he stood at the hall porch, fumbling with the clasps on his coat. Behind him, Halli, Leif and Gudny watched as men emerged from cottages throughout the House. Each man carried a pick, a mattock or a spade. Grim the smith walked among them, taking stock of the blades' quality and removing some to his forge for hasty whetting; the rasp of his stone fell muffled on the ear.
    On the flagstones before the door, Brodir lay in his winding sheet upon a pallet suspended between poles.
    Another pallet supported the capstone for his cairn. The men talked in whispers, hoods shadowing their faces, breath pluming in the air. They held their hands inside their fleeces and stamped their boots on the stones like horses straining to be off. Arnkel waited; now Halli's mother, followed by Eyjolf and another servant, came slowly from the direction of the killing-shed, where a year-old ram had been led the night before. Each carried a parcel of meat wrapped in skin; these were passed to the burial party, who secured them on the pallet beside the stone.
    At last Grim came from the forge, carrying a small piece of shaped iron no longer than his forearm. This was Brodir's sword, to help him defend the valley. It would be placed upon his