256. The Helm of Awe (2).
256. The Helm of Awe (2).
"No—!!"
"Go—!!"
[Splash! Splash! Splash! Beep— Beep-beep-beep— Beep—!!]
"Winner! Árós of the—"
[Yaaaaa!]
"Yes! That's it!"
"By Hel!! Odin!! Thor! Tyr! Frey!!"
"Valhalla—!"
The fervor of the Great North Sea Games showed no sign of cooling as the days went on.
Looking down from beneath the sun-shielding awning atop the high-built platform, it was as if the seething heat of the people and their colossal roaring, boiling like a furnace, made one's whole body tremble and one's very soul breathe in unison with them.
"Helgi! We won!"
Was it because the scale was far greater than the last games, and because guests with distinct facial features had come from lands whose names she had never heard before in her life?
Leaning against the firm embrace of her husband, into which she had melted from the moment she first saw him, Inga cried out in a voice full of rapture.
"Hahaha! That's right, we won. Oh? Look at this! Sigmarr likes it too!?"
"Gud—! Kih—eem— ki—all!"
"Hahaha! Kill them all, he says!"
Just as her husband had said, Sigmarr, cradled in arms as solid as logs, was turning his snow-white cheeks bright crimson, imitating the adults around him by crumpling his adorable little face into a scowl and shouting.
For the past few weeks, Sigmarr had been uttering words like "Ma-ma—" or "Da-da—" "Gran-ma—," and seeing him now saying things like 'good' or 'kill them all' was, fortunately, a sign that he was growing up healthy and well.
Watching the two men she loved most in this world happy together, Inga felt the tension that had unconsciously gripped her body while watching the fierce competition slowly drain away.
Letting one's body suddenly go limp would be dangerous if there was nothing to lean on, but Inga had a pillar more steadfast than anything else in this world.
[Swiik—]
A man who received Inga's body, larger and sturdier than most men, without the slightest burden. Resting her head against her husband's chest as his left arm gently wrapped around her, Inga slowly turned her head and gaze to sweep carefully over the guests of honor.
"Ha. ha. ha. ha. Truly, the warriors of the North Sea are strong in the salt water... But why is there no chariot race among the events? Jarl Hrolf? That is what our Rome has—"
"North Sea!! North Sea!! North Sea!! Land of the Goddess Hel and sky of Odin! Sea of Njord! People of the Fylkir! May all be eternal!!"
"Let's goooooooo—!!"
[Bwooooooong—!]
"This is what a proper athletic meet should be! How do you like it!!"
"Let us drink and die today! Cleanly, on to Valhalla!"
The Roman delegation, smiling brightly and clapping in congratulation yet somehow faintly stiff, was the closest. Beside them were the people of Lotharingia, newly become friends of the North Sea, who were looking around in a dazed, bewildered state, much as Inga herself had been when she first saw Helgi and Árós.
Further beyond, the Magyar and Khazar envoys, who would fight at the drop of a hat and had thus been seated separately to the left and right, were pointing fingers at each other's athletes and cursing. Farther still, the nobles of the North Sea were laughing and chatting loudly, raising their cups and pouring the contents down their throats.
In contrast to the men, who were generally going mad over the games themselves, in the rear section of the honored guests' platform, where soft fur-covered chairs (sofas) had been arranged, the women of the North Sea sat cheering or conversing quietly among themselves.
'Perhaps even more dangerous than men... are the women.'
There was her father, clinging to the railing and yelling at the top of his lungs alongside the smith Master Randi, who was treated as an honorary Jarl, just like Inga's own father. Inga's father had been a chieftain of high renown among the Sámi people of the north. For the closer a land was to the territories of the Northmen, the more important it was to the Sámi, and building a great reindeer farm in its heart was truly a feat that could not be achieved with ordinary skill.
Naturally, Inga, who had grown up as the only daughter of such a father and had been prepared to inherit the family business, knew well that in a herd of reindeer, and likewise in a gathering of humans, the most important things were a large body and great antlers.
No matter how great a human might be, it was the way of nature that, within a driving blizzard, one could do nothing but curl up helplessly and beg for mercy.
Inga knew well that her beloved husband was a mythic hero the likes of which would never be seen again in this age, yet the two mothers, Asta and Áslaug, ever full of wisdom, had always said that strong allies must be built for the House of Fylkir.
"North Sea!! North Sea!!"
"Nor—sea— Nor—sea—!"
Looking at Sigmarr beside her, who kept trying to mimic his father's words with his childish lisp, she could not help but laugh endlessly, yet at the same time, within the heart of this strong Sámi-Norse mixed-blood woman, an even firmer resolve was forged.
'Constantinos, was it?'
Where Inga's gaze landed was the corner-most seat of the honored guests' platform, the place arranged for the family of exiles from the Eastern Roman Empire. There sat a woman wearing a faint smile and a boy who looked clever and bright.
Whether reindeer or humans, there were always herds of kindred minds, and factions inevitably formed. Though Helgi and Sigmarr stood at a station that needed no such thing, the more arrows one had ready to loose at any moment, the better. Within Inga's mind, as she leaned against Helgi's chest, various candidates who could be prepared for Sigmarr and the grandchildren of the generation below him rose and faded.
The clergy of Hel that Mother Asta was already preparing. The chieftains of the Suomi, Sámi, and Finns, who had already sworn loyalty to Sigmarr, in whose veins ran the blood of her father and Inga herself. The rising lords such as Jarl Stórolf, Guthrum, Uhtred, Sigebryht, Ecgberht, and Leofric.
Mother Áslaug had said that for the Fylkir's sake, she would bind the sons of the Ragnarsson brothers, Helgi's own nephews, to the powerful families of the Scandinavian mainland...
But Inga knew well that among those who would covet the position of the reindeer herd's dominant male, there were both brothers and distant kin.
Mother Áslaug was a kind person, and Helgi's brothers and nephews would all lay down their lives for her husband. But what if it was for Sigmarr, and not Helgi? Or for Sigmarr's son?
Everything would be fine in the future. Inga was far too clever to harbor such naive thoughts.
And surprisingly, the answer lay very close indeed. Inga's hand, as she leaned against Helgi, slowly caressed his chest. Answering that touch, Helgi's wicked hand, which had wrapped around Inga, surreptitiously stroked down her snow-white shoulder.
"Oooaah—! Goo—! Nor—sea!"
"Hahaha! Well done! Sigmarr! Oh, my son!"
"Eheh— oohoohee!"
Vigorously moving his arms to bounce Sigmarr up and down, Helgi still managed to slyly meet Inga's eyes and flash her a playful expression.
Watching that scene, Inga silently mouthed the words "I love you," and somehow sensing it, her husband pulled her close and pressed a kiss to her forehead.
[Pat! Pat!]
"Oo-ah! Mama-Mama-! Me too!"
"Haha! How did you know, Sigmarr? There!"
"Oo—"
Witnessing that, Sigmarr, who smacked Helgi's chin with his little hands, pouted his own adorable lips and slowly approached Inga's forehead. Inga let out a soft laugh and willingly offered her brow.
A big, warm touch followed by a small, warm touch.
Feeling a vast love within them where no difference in scale could be detected, Inga's resolve to protect her family, her love, her own, hardened more and more.
*****
"Please, come in, Bishop. I am still somewhat lacking in the Angle tongue, so I hope you will forgive me with a generous heart."
"Forgive you? Nonsense. Besides, you speak the Angle tongue better than I who have lived here all my life, so it is I who am rather ashamed of my poor Norse."
"Thank you for your kind words."
[Glug-glug—]
This was surely the beloved Northumbria where Alquin himself was born and raised. How could it feel so utterly foreign?
Wine red as blood fell into a wooden cup carved with beautiful trees.
Soon, the Örn wine splashing against the cup spread a sharp grape fragrance through the space surrounding Alquin and Haldis, the priestess of the goddess Hel. It added an antique aroma to the chamber lit here and there by oil lamps and candles, yet Alquin's heart only grew more uneasy.
Haldis, Priestess of Hel. A woman who had established herself in Vernika in northern Northumbria and effectively held authority over all followers of Hel in Britain.
He had heard she was roughly an Örn arm of Asta, the Drottning and mother of Fylkir Helgi Ragnarsson. In the presence of someone of such standing, not only Alquin himself but all the Ealdormen— no, the Jarls of Britain would bow their heads.
So now, Alquin had but a single curiosity. Why had the priestess of Hel summoned Alquin himself at this late, dark hour?
Being a man who had already staked his life by proclaiming his break from Rome, Alquin's mouth immediately voiced his brain's curiosity.
"Why have you asked to see a powerless man such as myself?"
Even Alquin himself thought it was a disjointed and unrefined question, but Haldis, still smiling, took a small sip of wine and set her cup down.
[Tock.]
Was that the sound of my death?
"I was well aware that the Bishop of Lindisfarne is a man who cares deeply for those around him."
It seems the time of my death has not yet come.
Alquin, who had been inwardly tense, relaxed his slightly stiff neck and listened to Haldis's voice.
"If it were not so, you would not have dared to step before the Fylkir and summon the courage to save people's lives. And on top of that, you have the support of Jarl Uhtred and other fine men. Since a man such as yourself has made the decision to break with Rome, the Fylkir may soon convey his gratitude in person."
"It was not done to receive thanks."
Words that burst from Alquin's mouth the moment Haldis finished speaking. Though Alquin was still a child of the Lord and Christ, her words made it sound as if he had orchestrated all this for the sake of heathens. His heart had reflexively bristled before he knew it.
"...It was not a deed done to receive an expression of thanks from the Fylkir. Of course, I always bear a grateful heart for his mercy, but this was solely for the stubborn people of Northumbria, nothing more."
Still, he added this, thinking he had been too rude to the person who had summoned him with goodwill. But Haldis continued to regard him with the same gentle smile.
Thanks to that, Alquin, feeling a bit abashed, was just stealthily reaching for the wine that had been teasing his nose on this hungry dawn when Haldis urged him to drink and spoke.
"It is wine from as far as Miklagard. If you wish, I shall have several casks given to you, so please, drink your fill."
"Thank you. Then..."
Since wine for the Eucharist was already overflowing, would it not be all right to taste this wine said to be from Constantinople? It was proper to observe the virtue of temperance and always guard against gluttony, one of the seven deadly sins, but today, Alquin wished to get drunk.
Thus, just as the cup touched his lips and the liquid within passed over them, Haldis attached a word as casually as someone stepping out for a drink.
"Bishop. There is a book among the Catholics that records the holy word, yes? Might it be possible for you to translate that book into the Norse tongue, or at the very least, into Angle?"
"Pfft—! Pffpff! Hack! Cough!"
The wine that had entered his mouth promptly erupted back out through his nose, whereupon his brain, outraged, commanded his eyes to pour out tears.
Trickle— Trickle—
"Hel in heaven... Are you all right?"
Covering her mouth with one hand, Haldis hurriedly brought over an entire length of fine cloth. Alquin admired the ready gesture of offering this precious cloth to wipe his own face, and at the same time, felt a chill of fear.
'My thoughts were correct. For my brothers and sisters to survive, everything must be surrendered to the Fylkir.'
More than that, what in the world was this talk? Translate the Bible!? Ah, of course. This person is a heathen. It was possible she did not know.
Humbled by her magnanimity in freely offering cloth of a clearly extraordinary quality, Alquin decided to ask Haldis first.
"If you are not considering converting, Priestess, for what purpose would this be?"
And Haldis readily gave him an answer.
"The Fylkir may have slain the old gods of the North, but people still chase after their shadows. Rather, the more the Fylkir reveals himself, the stronger the faith grows. So the High Priestess has observed the believers of the cross carefully, and wished to learn from them."
"It is not the content of the Bible, but our system that you wish to learn."
"Long ago, the Fylkir ordered Jarl Sigurd to investigate all the tales of the North Sea. It is still being carried out at the University of Árós, but that alone was not enough. As you have guessed, Bishop, the Temple of Hel shall reshape the faith of the North Sea."
These Northmen have now come to plunder even faith itself.
Alquin felt the wine that had gone into his nose drip back down his throat.