The Northron Skein - Part 3

After Fulgrim’s revelation, the Jarls of Hogunmark are speechless. Thorjak immediately performs the transference ritual, passing Freila’s investiture from Fulgrim to Cathal. The Jarls disperse, some in anger, and the Yngvi clan return to Þeothanheall to feast and celebrate Cathal’s quest.

The mood in the hall is dour, but Cathal and Fulgrim encourage the Yngvi to cheer, and soon the place is loud with song and laughter. Cathal leaps up onto a table and leads the warriors in a song, stomping on the table to start a beat.

O Blast my eyes and take my hands

Pour my treasures into the sea

O burn my hall and steal my lands

But leave me with my song and mead

The gods are cruel so many wail

When they are left with nought but need

But no, not I, I never fail

As long as I have song and mead

O honey sweet and voices high

Raised up, raised up though we may bleed

Though mortal fate is that we die

Take heart my friends in song and mead

Dolan catches the eye of an imposing warrioress named Ysgerda and spends some time fretting over her to Cathal. Fulgrim seems happy that some joy has returned to his home, but still retires early. Cathal worries his blood brother may be wearing himself thin with the stress of leadership. He and Dolan accompany Fulgrim to his chamber to have a brief discussion.

Cathal and Fulgrim have a brief discussion about what has transpired. Fulgrim apologizes for springing such a huge responsibility on his blood brother. Cathal voices concern that Fulgrim is alienating his vassals, but Fulgrim assures him that he has everything under control. Cathal leaves to seek out Njorna in order to find a lead on the queen while Dolan returns to the feast.

Cathal finds Njorna sitting apart from the feast, surrounded by a small cadre of young girls in robes. Cathal engages her in conversation, trying to gauge just who the seer is. He is struck not only by her youth; she is younger still than he, but also by her honesty and composure. She speaks to him of Freila’s final days in Veikanger and speaks of how the queen had asked specifically for Cathal. She offers to perform a divination to discover where he should start his search. Cathal agrees.

Njorna’s servants disperse and start to arrange artifacts on a clear space of the floor in a strange pattern. One of them calls to the musicians, who stop their playing mid-song, and upon seeing what Njorna prepares for, begin to play a slow, steady beat. The entire hall has stopped to watch the seer. Njorna kneels upon the floor and begins to mutter in a low, droning voice; the same timbre of ancient Rjuven Cathal heard upon the sea when the Kraken struck, though that voice was not Njorna’s. After a few minutes of chanting, Njorna’s voice changes and she looks to Cathal.

“Seek you, in the east, where at the root of the mountain, the bear meets the thunder. There you will search for a stone. The stone with the eagle and the wolf.”

The message bears some meaning for Cathal. The bear and thunder. A chieftain of the Trygvaar, those vicious clansmen who serve the White Witch, Thorbjorn Thrumrsson, who takes a bear as his sigil, holds lands just east of the Hogun province of Valkenheim. His land abutts the Steps of Kirken, where the thunder god is once said to have fought giants. The stone though, is a mystery. Njorna continues:

“Cathal of the Fulcarni! We will grant you a single question. Ask now, quickly, and we will answer.”

Cathal struggles briefly to find the right thing to ask, but in the end blurts

“How can I save Rjurik and Anuire?”

The voice immediately responds

“You must embrace your family.”

And with that last, cryptic answer, Njorna relents, and slumps to the floor. Cathal moves to aid her. He thanks her for what she has done and lifts her to her feet, bearing her slight frame easily. She asks help to her chamber so she can rest. Cathal obliges, then returns to the hall until the feast winds down.

The next day, Cathal and Dolan ride out from Veikanger with Egil and 50 of Fulgrim’s Huscarls. They make a quick pace, led by the Anuirean horsemen, to the hills of Valkenheim. They pass, uneasy, into the western fringes of the White Witch’s lands, passing ruined huts and abandoned villages, until they follow the old wagon path into a dark wood.

The wood thins into a broad clearing, marked with a tall stake of wood festooned with a stack of human skulls and hung with a huge bearskin. At the center of the clearing is a fortress of wooden palisades, a hall standing above the wall on a stout hill, dirty and plain. Cathal orders the Yngvi to hold their position and rides forward, just out of bow-shot, and shouts

“THORBJORN THRUMRSSON. BEAR LORD, SKULL TAKER! I AM CATHAL FULCAIRN, THE BLACK HOUND OF THE SOUTH. I WOULD TREAT WITH YOU.”

After a moment, a huge and weathered Rjurik warrior appears atop the palisade. Thorbjorn asks Cathal what his business is and after hearing it, allows the Anuirean inside with a token retinue as bodyguard. Cathal agrees and enters the raider’s hall.

Cathal is honest with the Trygvaar, and they speak of Queen Freila. Thorbjorn is surprisingly respectful when he speaks of her; it seems she made a great impression upon him. He says she did in fact travel to Kirken’s Steps. When Cathal mentions the stone, Thorbjorn claims to have it in his possession. He had sent warriors to follow the queen, and they retrieved the artifact after she had found it and left.

They then negotiate for the stone. The Trygvaar either demands an extortionate bounty in trade goods and forty of Cathal’s companions as hostages, or twenty-five of Fulgrim’s best to swell his ranks for a season. Loathe to leave so many of his brother’s warriors in the dubious care of the Trygvaar, Cathal negotiates him down to ten hostages by offering him a chance at the empty seat upon the Jarlsmoot. The Hogunr with Cathal are noticeably troubled by the offer, but Thorbjorn agrees to that, or the bounty of gold and supplies should Cathal fail to convince Prince Fulgrim. Cathal agrees and is given the stone.

Cathal, Dolan, and the Yngvi return to Veikanger. Fulgrim balks at the price demanded by Thorbjorn, but when Cathal tells him the alternatives and reminds him of what could hang in the balance, he relents. He will not have Thrumrsson on the seat, but parts reluctantly with the demanded treasure, nearly a quarter of what remains in the treasury.

The stone, bearing a carved likeness of a winged wolf and covered all over with ancient markings, is inspected and divined by Njorna, who tells Cathal the meaning of the marks, and eventually reveals that the Queen will have been guided south, to the wartorn lands of Rjuvik.

Cathal and Dolan steel themselves once again, and prepare to journey south, across Rjurik. To the storied Taelshore, and the lands of the rumoured Reaver-Queen.