Racing down slope, Ulfrik tore his sword from its scabbard. Men passed him and converged on the attackers from all angles. The horn continued to blast, then cut off suddenly. Ulfrik faced the water, and spotted the six ships. Two ships were beached while four bobbed further out to sea.
He took fleeting consolation from all the mercenaries on those ships being held at bay. But hot anger overwhelmed him as he watched his own ships burn to ash.
Arriving at the fight, he encountered complete chaos. His left side grew taut with the blazing heat from his ships. Men swirled about the field slashing with yellow glowing blades. A few bodies piled on the grass. One rolled over, holding his face. Friend and foe were indistinguishable in the rippling light of the fires. He feared his men fought themselves in the confusion.
"Prisoners! I need prisoners!" Ulfrik shouted to anyone who would listen. Despite the ever growing press of men, he felt desperately alone. He had no control over this brawl.
A spear flashed at him, and he skittered to the side. Ulfrik's attention narrowed to the one man. He wanted to capture this one prisoner. He was a reed thin blur of a leather jerkin and a red shirt. The spear point jabbed again, keeping Ulfrik at a safe distance. Ulfrik circled a moment, both hands on his sword and wishing he had a shield. The wicked spearhead stabbed for his unprotected thigh. Ulfrik struck down the shaft with his sword and closed the distance. But his opponent's reaction attested to his experience. In the instant it took Ulfrik to glide up the length of the spear, the enemy had drawn a long knife and plunged it at Ulfrik's ribs.
Instinct saved Ulfrik. He read the man's smile, knew the blade was coming, and twirled away at the last moment. But now both of them had stumbled out of position and were staggering to regain momentum.
Ulfrik was faster. His sword hacked into the back of the enemy's thigh. He toppled forward with a scream. Ulfrik stepped on his spear then stabbed the man's hand. He kicked aside the spear and flicked the long knife away with his sword. For now, it was all Ulfrik could do. A new threat had arrived.
Back across the slope, points of orange light bounced in a ragged line. Like glowing ants, the trail ran from a bright burning flame on the shore and pointed at his hall.
"The hall is under attack!" Ulfrik was sprinting back up the slope. Warning shouts rose among the throng of men fighting by the ships. Everyone able to break off combat ran toward the hall, their enemies slipping away.
Men still arriving to the fight now turned toward the new line of attackers. Ulfrik screamed like a wild animal, his throat nearly bursting. He could not stop thinking of Runa and Gunnar trapped inside a burning hall.
The attackers resolved into view from the gloom of the night. There were more attackers than the points of torchlight revealed. The torchbearers flung their brands at anything in reach. Between them, archers put arrows on their strings.
Ulfrik dove to the ground as arrows shrieked overhead. The grass whipped his face as he slid on his belly. Several men around him screeched and tumbled in broken wrecks.
It had been a covering action for the withdrawal. The arrows shot recklessly, wastefully, into the night. But neither Ulfrik nor his men could risk facing the shooters. The enemy hustled back toward their ships. Ulfrik craned his neck above the grass to see beached ships already launched. He saw errant flashes and gleams of iron as men boarded another ship and sailed off.
Ulfrik got to his feet, ran to the man near him and found him with an arrow jutting from his chest. He crouched again, still fearing the enemy archers. He looked back toward the hall. It was safe, the torches smoldering harmlessly in the dewy grass. The threat to the hall had been a feint to extract the enemies who had burnt his ships.
He ran, bent at the waist in case more arrows came. He found men in laying the grass, either taking cover as he had or pierced with arrows. He urged those still alive to follow. Without a horn to signal his men, he summoned as much strength as he could to shout his message. "They are retreating. Quickly, to the ships! We can still save them!"
Ulfrik knew they couldn't be saved. Two had settled into a rippling flame of a long burning fire, like giant logs on a hearth. The third still flew banners of fire, and might be salvaged. At least his fourth was still intact.
Someone had located a horn and blasted three times. Men rose from the grass, looking like ghosts emerging from burial mounds. Ulfrik's run flagged to a weak jog. Finally he walked the final distance, stopping at the circle of heat and light. Others shambled over to watch the flames crackle and pop and streak up into the blue night.
Ulfrik bit his lip, closed his eyes, and imagined that once he opened them again the fires would be extinguished. But instead, the deck of the first ship collapsed, spraying sparks into the air like a swarm of fireflies.
The sun had risen, despite Ulfrik's belief it would never again shine on him. Fog lay thick on the land and mingled with the smoke chugging from the smoldering ruins of his ships. By the time the fires died, two were like blackened whale bones. The third appeared repairable, though its seaworthiness would be questionable. Ironically, the undamaged ship was Raven's Talon, Toki's ship. He wondered what the gods intended him to understand from that sign. It seemed as much an accusation as an affirmation of Toki.
More men had been killed in the raid. More mothers, wives, and children wailed as they found the dead on the field. Ulfrik joined the survivors in carrying their bodies to the side of the hall, where Runa, Gerdie, and Halla covered the corpses in sheets held down with stones. Seven more had died in the fight, while a dozen had taken injuries.
Ulfrik worked in grim silence, but felt the unspoken accusations. You've offended the gods. You chose your friends over your people. You put pride and competition before the safety of your own. No one spoke the words aloud. But they nevertheless clanged in his head like an iron bell.
He sighed as surveyed men picking over the litter of the battle. The air smelled sour with soot and ash. Not even the birds called on this morning. With the blurry figures shuffling in the fog, Ulfrik thought this was what Nifleheim must look like: gray, hopeless, and dead.
"We've got a few prisoners." Snorri appeared from behind. Ulfrik startled at his words, which sounded as loud as a crumbling glacier in the defeated silence.
"Let's get to work on them. I want to know what we're dealing with." Ulfrik's own voice was ragged and hoarse. He followed Snorri past the hall toward the edge of the village. As he left, Runa's gaze followed him. Her face was creased with worry and her hair curled wildly in the humidity. She looked as if one night had aged her a decade. Ulfrik turned away, and set his mind on the captives.
"We dragged them to Thorvald's forge."
"We can use his blacksmithing tools to get the information we need."
"My exact thoughts."
A thick group of men clustered at the forge. The squat building housed Thorvald's tools and supplies, and was a place for him and his family to sleep. But his anvil and forge were outside under a wooden roof. Toki stood at the edge of the group, and broke off to meet them.
"There are two men still alive. Thorvald just started working on them."
Ulfrik patted Toki's shoulder in greeting, and pushed forward into the group until he broke through the front. Two men were trussed in thin cords and seated on the dirt floor. Ulfrik smiled as he recognized the red shirt of the spear fighter he had crippled. The other was a man of average build, weathered skin, thinning hair, and many scars. If they had any valuables, those had already been stripped. Thorvald wore thick leather gloves and hovered over them as the onlookers encouraged him. He punched the crippled man in the face, snapping his head back.