The Lord of Vik-Lo: A Novel of Viking Age Ireland (The Norsemen Saga Book 3) by James L. Nelson Page B

wondered that the ship had not yet grounded, but she only drew a few feet, and with the momentum of the men pulling oars she skated closer and closer to the town.
      And then she slowed and stopped, so fast the men were knocked off balance, a few actually tumbling off their sea chests as the mud grabbed the bottom of the ship and checked her way. For a moment they were silent and everything around them was silent. All the noise to which they had become accustomed - the moaning wind, the beating rain, the slap and shudder of the seas striking the ship, the creak of the rigging, the rush of water down the sides - it was all gone. It seemed strange, unsettling.
      Then Ornolf shouted in his considerable voice, “The Far Voyagers have arrived! Bring out the women! Bring out the drink!” and the odd mood was gone like so much smoke. The men laughed, grinned, stood and slapped one another on the back, found wineskins and mead. This was the release from having stepped so close to the edge of death and then stepped back again. Thorgrim knew it well.
      He, too, was grinning. For all he had seen and done in his life he was still not immune to this sort of reaction. And then he noticed the gang of men on shore, a dozen or so, standing at the end of the plank road, clearly come to see this new arrival. They were well-armed, which was hardly cause for concern as all Northmen, Danes, Norwegians, Swedes, it did not matter, all were in the habit of arming themselves whenever they stepped from their homes.
      Behind the dozen armed men stood more, holding long planks, a man at each end. They tossed their boards into the mud alongside Far Voyager , one after the other, until there was a relatively dry line of planks out to the ship. The man in front approached, and the others followed behind. The laughing aboard the ship died away as Thorgrim’s company saw the armed men coming toward them.
      Thorgrim stepped off the afterdeck and walked forward to where the newcomer stood beside the ship. Ornolf followed behind.
      “I am Thorgrim Ulfsson,” he said to the man. The fellow was younger than Thorgrim, well-made, with long brown hair bound behind and a beard that could not be called sparse. He looked along Far Voyager ’s deck, fore and aft, before he spoke.
      “I am Bersi Jorundarson,” the man said. There was a hint of wariness in his voice, as well there might be. It was good to be wary when one did not know to whom one was speaking. Thorgrim was wary as well. But if Bersi Jorundarson was a man of influence in Vík-ló, which Thorgrim assumed he was, then he wanted the man’s trust because he needed his help.
      “Please, come aboard,” Thorgrim said. “You men,” he turned to his own crew, “rig out that gangplank and be quick about it!” The gangplank was put over the side and first Bersi and then the others came up the narrow board and hopped down to the deck.
      “Where do you come from, Thorgrim Ulfsson?” Bersi asked, but Ornolf interrupted before Thorgrim could answer.
      “Get some drink for these men!” he shouted to the company in general. “Have you no manners, guests aboard our ship and not a drink offered them?” Thorgrim smiled. Sometimes the old man knew just the tone to strike.
      Cups of mead were passed along to Bersi and his man and Thorgrim said, “We come from Dubh-linn.”
      “And before that?”
  “I am from Vik, as is my father-in-law, the jarl Ornolf,” Thorgrim said, indicating Ornolf with a nod of the head. “The rest of these men…they are from all places, as seamen are wont to be.”
      Bersi nodded and drank and his men drank as well. He did not seem filled with joy to be in the company of men from Vik, he himself no doubt being a Dane, but neither did he seem much concerned.
      “Why do you come here?” he asked. Thorgrim could feel his irritation rising with each query, particularly as he did not yet know Bersi’s status at Vík-ló, whether he was important