142 Bloodbath

Sven froze. He tried to guess whether the dog's barking was caused by its getting wind of strangers or by something harmless, such as a piece of meat dangling just out of its reach. He glanced left - Lasse's eyes were fixed on him. He glanced right - Jens was watching him, too. They were both waiting for his decision, for his move.

Henrik was in position for sure, but Lennart probably wasn't. It didn't matter. If the barking dog made the inhabitants of the village aware of the Vikings preparing to attack their settlement, then every moment that passed was a moment lost.

Sven stood up and raised his arm and swept it forward and down, pointing at the village with his ax. Then he started running towards the buildings. He heard Lasse and Jens start running, too.

He was about twenty paces away from the shed when a man appeared from behind the building. He was walking in the direction of the lake, and didn't even glance Sven's way for several steps. But then he did, and opened his mouth to shout, and Sven took a gamble and threw his ax.

It cartwheeled crazily through the air, flying straight at its target. But the man was looking in that direction and saw what was coming and ducked, at the last possible moment. The ax sailed past his head, and Sven swore and broke his step to draw his sword.

Something hissed next to his left ear, and an arrow thwacked into the man's neck before he could make a sound. Good old Lasse! Sven felt a rush of warmth spread over his body - it was glorious to rush into combat with trusted comrades, friends that knew what to do and did it right! He roared like a wild animal pouncing on its prey.

He ran through the gap between the shed and the cabin and halted. To his left, maybe thirty paces away, two men were staring at him open-mouthed: they had no weapons. To his right, a couple - a man and a woman were emerging from their cabin, and the man was holding a sword.

A sword! They had swords! Sven ran at the enemy swordsman, and the idiot pointed his weapon at him as if he was trying to impale a rushing pig. Sven smote it to the side with his weapon, and ran his blade across the man's belly in the return movement. Forehand, backhand! That was the way all Vikings were trained to fight. There were no unnecessary, preparatory moves - upswing was just as lethal as downswing. Morons that harmlessly raised their swords before striking a blow asked to be skewered with a thrust.

It took him two steps to stop - he'd been running fast. He whirled round, his blade hissing through the air. But the man whose belly he'd split open was in the act of dropping to the ground, making grotesque bleating noises. The woman that accompanied him was frozen with terror. She had short brown hair cut short, it was like a helmet, and Sven's sword split it in two with such force that bits of her brain spattered and stuck to his face.

He heard shouts to his right, and whirled round in time to see a a woman run out from between the buildings. She was holding a two-tined, primitive pitchfork and he uttered a half laugh, half bark. He swatted the pitchfork to the side with his sword and looked at her face just as he was about to slash her belly open.

She was beautiful. She had golden hair braided and twisted into a tight crown atop her head and cornflower-blue eyes that seemed to take up half her face. Her breasts raised the rawhide shift clear off her chest, and the legs under it were slender and strong.

Sven fell in love with her instantly. It was magic, the kind of magic that inspires poets. He froze. He stared at her as if he'd just seen God.

God was about to plunge a long knife in his belly when Lasse's bow twanged again, and the arrow he sent pierced the woman's cheeks like a skewer going through a chunk of meat.

It was far from a lethal strike, but it made her hesitate. Sven didn't, not any more. He nearly cut off her head with a savage strike at the base of her neck, and followed it up with a swipe that sliced off the hand with the knife. She collapsed and he gave the corpse a kick for good measure.

He heard shouts to his right, familiar voices, and knew that Henrik had begun his attack. He whipped round in a circle, sword ready, but he saw no more enemies. Lasse and Jens were crouching over the bodies of the two men they'd killed, Lasse holding his bow ready with the arrow stringed.

There were screams from the other end of the village, horrible screams full of suffering. Sven tensed, then relaxed when he realized that the voices didn't belong to his men.

He ran up to Lasse who was standing over the man he had killed, with a new arrow ready on his bow. Jens was retrieving his ax from the back of the man who had tried to run away. A fresh explosion of screams indicated Henrik and Lennart weren't wasting time.

"Houses," snarled Sven at Lasse. "One by one. I'll open each door and stand aside. Nail anyone that you see, then I go in and finish the job."

Lasse nodded. Sven ran up to the nearest door, belonging to a large building that belched smoke from the opening in its roof. He wrenched it open.

It was the communal kitchen. A large fire was burning in the center, its flames licking a big, round blackened metal pot. They had metal pots! There was a woman standing next to a pot, holding a cleaver. Sven laughed. He was next to her in an instant, his stabbing sword breaking a rib with a loud crack before she even managed to raise the cleaver.

He whirled round and saw another woman, trying to hide in the dark corner of the big room. She was holding a bundle of some sort. It was a baby, an infant. Sven's sword passed through both bodies and hit the wooden wall behind them with a thunk. He wrenched it free and the woman sank to her knees, still holding the halves of her baby: it had been cut in two. She tried to say something and blood gushed out of her mouth, splattering Sven's feet. He grimaced, and put her out of her misery with a quick chop to the head.

There was no one else inside the building. He ran to the doorway and saw Lasse raising his bow and releasing an arrow. Sven's eyes followed its flight and saw it hit the corner of the shed-like building, right next to the head of a man - no, it was a boy, he couldn't have been more than fourteen. The boy turned and ran straight into Henrik, who had just appeared from behind the shed.

Henrik killed the boy with a careless swipe of his sword, almost as if he were batting away an obnoxious insect. He looked at Sven and their eyes met and they both threw their heads back and roared like wild animals.

When they fell silent, the silence was total. There were no shouts, no screams. Only the hurried slapping of feet running on wet ground.

Lennart emerged from behind a cabin to Sven's left. He was holding a sword; he'd used up all three of his throwing spears.

"Lasse," said Sven, and pointed with his sword at the door of the cabin. Lasse nodded, pulling a fresh arrow from the quiver on his back.

Lennart needed no orders. He wrenched open the cabin door and stood to the side as Sven went in, sword ready.

There was no one inside the cabin, and for once Sven was able to look around at his leisure. They had fucking beds! The bed inside the cabin had a sturdy wooden frame, and was wide enough to accommodate three fully grown people. There even was a proper table, with three-legged stools arranged around it! A beautifully shaped clay jug surrounded by stubby mugs on the tabletop! Sven felt envy and anger, immediately followed by a feeling of triumph - all this now belonged to him. He'd won it fair and square.

"Hey, Sven! Sven?"

It was Lennart's voice. Sven exited the cabin and saw that almost everyone was assembled in the broad, muddy lane between the two rows of buildings. Johan, the new boy, was there too. He was pale and looked as if he was about to throw up. But the blade of the long knife he was holding was red with blood, and Sven walked up to him and patted his shoulder and said:

"You'll get used to it."

He turned and gave the others a questioning look.

"All clear," said Henrik, and Lennart nodded.

"Good," said Sven. "Anyone check that shed?"

"Sure," said Henrik, and grinned before adding:

"It's half full of supplies. Smoked meat, hides, mounds of all kinds of wild roots. And a million mushrooms stringed and hung up to dry."

"Nice of them to have dinner ready for us," said Sven, and everyone roared with laughter. Even the pale Johan smiled, a little uncertainly.

"Okay," said Sven. "Henrik, take a couple of men and find a good spot to dig a pit for the bodies. I saw a patch that looked free of roots behind that shed. Lennart, run along that path with the fish scales and see where it leads. When you return, check on every single fucking square centimeter of this village. Make an inventory, and help Henrik get rid of the corpses. Then set up an ambush for anyone who might show up, and wait for my return."

"Where are you going?"

"To that mine of theirs," said Sven. "I need three people with me. Hey, Lasse. Lasse?"

"Yes?" called Lasse. He was busy retrieving an arrow out of the body of one of his victims. He pulled it free and shook off the tendrils of flesh clinging to its barbs.

"You're coming with me. Jens, you too. And Johan."

Everyone was surprised, Johan most of all.

"Me?" he said disbelievingly.

"Yes, you. You're a good man." Sven paused to let this sink in, then said to the others:

"We should be back inside a couple of hours. If we don't return, don't send a search party. I want all of you to come running to the mine before they castrate us and gouge our eyes out." He laughed.

Everyone else laughed with him. Sven being taken prisoner - that would be the day! Sven looked at them and listened to them laugh and felt immense love for all his men, felt the powerful bond that forms between men that have killed something or someone together.

"All right," he said. "Quick break. Retrieve all your weapons before you start fucking around with the corpses. Lennart, you really used all three of your spears?"

"I missed once," Lennart said guiltily. "He was running and jinking left and right."

"You got two?"

"Yeah."

"That's good enough. Okay, guys, let's get down to work."

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