Legends Never Die: First Raid (ch. 4) (Patreon)

“Shit,” I cursed, falling to the ground and landing on the soft grass and dirt, my legs giving out from underneath me. There were more than a few laughs at my expense, Father's loudest among them all. Using my axe and shield, I pushed myself up and used them to steady myself. Without them, I would have fallen over again immediately, because I began to list to the side, my body moving to account for waves that weren’t there anymore.

“You’ll get your land legs back soon enough, son. At least you gave me this -- all my boys got sick at sea, except you. I was looking forward to seeing you clinging to the side of the ship. It’s the best part about watching young men sail.” Father said, patting me on the back hard enough that I fell forward, landing in a prone position. “Sit for a time, until your body remembers what it’s like to be on land.” he said as he went to go unload the boats.

We had sailed for three days, stopping each night, and heading south the entire time. We stuck close to the shoreline, keeping it on our left until we saw it in front of us. We traveled for an additional day up the coast before Jarl Horrik spotted a raven amongst the trees and decided that it was a sign from Odin. He wasn’t a seer, so it seemed odd that he was interpreting signs from Odin, but the gods sometimes communicated with us with clear signs. I knew that better than most.

We shored, bringing the ship up to the coast, where we got out. I had absolutely no idea if there were any people nearby or not, but I was equal parts hoping there were as I was that there weren’t.

It had sunk in on the voyage here. I was here to murder people for their wealth and livelihood. People were going to die. Women were going to be raped. Children were going to see their families broken up either by death or enslavement if they weren’t enslaved themselves. The few that made it through the raid would have a tough time recovering. It was entirely possible we would be killing them too when winter came and they had failed to sufficiently rebuild their food stores. It would just be delayed by a year.

And I could do nothing to stop it. I was just a warrior, one of many. It wasn’t my place to say what we did, where we raided, or what we did to the defeated. Perhaps one day, if the gods were kind and I proved myself, I could become a thegn, and then I could make those decisions. However, for now, I had to accept that I was in the other role now. I was Viking.

While I was getting my balance back, scouts were sent out to bring back word on any settlements nearby. While we waited we were treating this as a temporary camp. A good thing too, because while we landed in the early afternoon, it was nearly nightfall when the scouts trickled back. They all found a road, one direction led nowhere that they found, but another path led to a village nestled at the mouth of a river that we hadn’t traveled far enough to see.

With that, our course was set. The warriors offered prayers to the gods for protection in battle. I offered my prayers as well, but for the most part, I used the time to come to terms with what I was about to do. We left two guards for the boats while the rest of us followed the path that the scouts had found. We traveled for a solid hour on foot before we were told to crouch down and stay low. We were about a hundred men in total, probably a bit less than more, so our approach was everything but silent.

Yet, somehow, we managed to sneak up on the village. It was a rather large one, and as said, it was right on the riverbank with a long bridge separating the two sides. There were no walls to speak of. Just a few dozen wood houses with thatch roofs, dirt roads between them, and a few animal pens. After three days at sea, the moon had waned until only the barest sliver was visible, leaving the light shining on the village rather poor.

“We need to secure the bridge first,” Jarl Horrik said, his voice low. “The river is wider than I thought it would be,” he admitted, revealing why this hadn’t been decided earlier. I guess he expected a ditch we could jump over. Instead, there was a sizable river that ran right through the village that had a long bridge crossing it, fashioned from a few thick tree trunks that had been roped together. I think this village might have started out as two separate villages that had been joined together by the bridge. The make and placement of the buildings were noticeably different on either side of the river. “Ten men should do the trick.”

“Should we try to sneak into the village first?” I spoke up, earning a disapproving look from the various men around us. Just because I was a man didn’t mean I was treated like one. My voice didn't carry as much weight, and there were some who clearly thought it shouldn't be heard at all. However, Jarl Horrik considered it.

“It will be a dangerous task, but a worthy one. We’ll cut the village in half,” Jarl Horrik decided. “Do you volunteer for it?” he asked me and I didn’t have to think about it before I nodded. He smiled, giving me a firm nod of acknowledgment. He started choosing the others who would be going with me, and I started to take off my chainmail shirt, and once I had it off, I saw him giving me an amused look.

“Didn’t you spend days selling those shirts to warriors in the market with words about not tempting fate?” he asked me, clearly amused as I now only wore my tunic. My sling was tucked into my belt, while I held my axe and a shield in my hands. A spear might be more useful, but I wasn’t a man fully grown yet, and the smallest spear I had seen was seven feet long. The distance was a nice thing, but a spear needed leverage I couldn’t provide.

“You shouldn’t ever believe anything that comes out of a salesman’s mouth,” I advised, and he looked like he was visibly swallowing a laugh.

“Go on then and do your father proud, lad. Before you make me give away our position,” he said, giving me a push forward. I walked through the underbrush, feeling much lighter without the chainmail weighing me down. I would have liked to keep it for the protection. If it wasn’t for the constant noise it made, I would have. I saw others following suit, all of them heading in the direction of the bridge with me.

I reached one of the houses and I heard panting and groaning on the other side of the wood wall, telling me everything I needed to know about why our approach had been missed. Reaching the front side, I crouched low, looking at the village square of sorts -- there seemed to be a method to the madness of the layout of the village, but it left for plenty of nooks both to hide in and to miss someone else watching us. I scanned the darkness as I clung to the shadows, seeing no one but hearing them all around me.

Skulking forward, I continued to keep a look out. I heard a grunt off to my left, and I looked over just in time to see one of the warriors bury his axe into the head of a man that had been pissing on the side of his house. He caught the body, lowering it down quietly, before he continued on. I did the same, heading to the bridge before I spotted a man standing in front of a well, working at the winch to lower the bucket.

My grip tightened on my axe as I walked forward, knowing what I had to do. All that was left was to do it.

I heard the man cursing to himself in a language I didn’t understand as he peered down into the well. I think he was worried that the bucket was caught on something. It happened, sometimes. He didn’t notice me as I approached, my footfalls silent with each step. I gripped my axe tightly, bringing the head back…

Then I slammed the edge of it into the back of his head with a solid thunk. The axe handle offered leverage that I used to lower him to the ground, arranging it look like he had just passed out, as long as you ignored all the blood, before I ripped my axe free. I looked at the man -- unshaven cheeks, unwashed hair, and a stained tunic that was soaking through with blood.

“Sorry,” I told him, but that was all I could give him as I headed for the bridge. The others were trickling in, some of them also having wet blades. When they were all with us, we headed to the other side of the bridge with me in the back. It was a decent bridge, large enough that three men could walk across it shoulder to shoulder. The warriors up front joined together to make a shield wall, layering their shields to provide a united front. Another two kept watch of our backs, while I and another readied long-range weapons. He preferred a bow, the fool. If only he knew the true power of a sling.

Once we were in position, a horn blew out and the tranquil village fell into utter chaos. The warriors swarmed into the village, kicking in doors and barging into homes. A handful of people managed to step out of some of the homes, hastily armed with whatever they had on hand. I spotted my Father rushing one, his dane axe lashing out and catching the man by the neck, severing his head from his body, and he moved on before the head had even hit the ground.

But my gaze didn’t linger behind us. The other half of the village was roused from their sleep, men rushing out of their houses, and on that side there were no warriors to run interference for us. They rushed forward, carrying fish hooks or axes, even hoes or a scythe. My sling spun in my hand, loaded with a stone from my stockpile, before I flung it at a man with enough force that his head snapped back and he landed on his back dead.

The men slammed into the shield wall while I loaded up another stone. I killed another man, then crippled another before I heard the whizzing of an arrow. I saw it punch through one of the warriors at the front of the shield wall, emerging from the back of his neck. My gaze snapped into the direction of the source of the shot and I saw a teenager with a bow that was already knocking another arrow.

I flung a stone at him, catching him in the eye, and his body dropped. And so did the shield wall. A fishhook lashed out in the gap the dead man had made as he let go of his shield, catching the warrior that went to replace him in the eye. The men yelled as they started to force their way through, forcing me to drop my sling and pick up my axe. I rushed forward, catching the man with the fishhook in the chest with my axe and pushing him back.

A hoe battered at my shield as I joined the melee, determined for my courage to be witnessed by the gods. The air was filled with noise -- battle cries, screams of pain, shrieks of terror, the crying of children, and the clash of metal and wood. It reeked of copper as another  of the warriors fell at my side, allowing the defenders to flank me. I learned that death smelled like shit.

I caught a swipe from a cleaver with my shield, returning the blow with a Power Strike to the wielder's knee, cleaving right through it. He fell to the ground as I shoulder-checked a man in front of me, pushing forward, swinging my axe as I did and catching him in the shoulder. The blade of the axe sunk into him, deep enough that it almost reached the shaft. Hitting him again with my shield, I ripped my weapon free with a spray of gore. No sooner than I did, I swung again at another villager, the one with the scythe that was swiping down at us from the back, trying to catch us in the head with the blade.

He managed it with another of the warriors, stabbing him in the shoulder, only to pay for it with his arm as I cut it off. He screamed, stumbling back as he clutched his missing arm. Another villager stepped up, only to catch an axe to the face, dropping him. Bodies began to pile up in front of me, my boots growing slick with blood and mud, the dirt darkening into a thick muck.

The villagers in the back seemed to realize that the tide was turning against them so they began to break off, turning tail and running. I was content to let them, dealing with those that stayed and fought, only to have the handful of men that survived the brief siege break off after them, either to give chase or to start looting. I frowned deeply, pressing forward and killing another villager, the last one that stayed and fought. I spared a glance at a good two dozen bodies piled up at the opening of the bridge.

My gaze met the villager that had wielded the scythe, still clutching his arm. He looked at me with wide eyes and a bloodless face before he said something to me. Polyglot made it easier to learn languages, but it didn't let me understand them instantly. I gestured to his arm, raising my axe to send a message. He swallowed thickly before he shook his head.

So, I used the axe to tear off a sleeve from a corpse. Walking over, I tied it around his arm to help with the bleeding. Then I shoved him to the ground, gesturing to the corpses. His wide eyes darted to them, then to me, then he offered a small nod before he pretended to be dead.

I don’t think it would save him, but it was easier to kill a man in battle than it was to finish him off. Not when he hadn't done anything to me or mine.

“Eivor!” I heard Father shout, making me turn back to look at him. He and a few other warriors were sprinting across the bridge towards us. “Find your wealth, lad! You’ve done well!” he shouted, and there was a fierce, unrestrained pride in his voice. I honestly don’t think he had ever been prouder of me than he was at that moment, and that was including defending the farm because this time he was here to see it.

I nodded, looking out at the various houses. There was screaming coming within, and I saw a few had their doors open as the inhabitants fled. I ran to one of them with the hopes that it would be empty. The interior was similar to my own home -- a living area with a hearth, dirt floors, and a wall with two doors. However, I soon saw that the house wasn’t empty.

There was a bed tucked in one corner and on it was an old man. He eyed me with hatred in his eyes, his covers pulled up. He had been left behind while the rest of his family fled, too old and frail to join them. I looked around the living room, noting that it seemed to be in poor condition. Even the small luxuries of common folk weren’t found.

“Hm,” I hummed, spotting a wood pitcher filled with water. I grabbed it as I kept an eye on the old man. Giving it a sniff, I found that it smelled like water should. Satisfied, I grabbed a cup before walking to the man’s bedside. The hatred lessened into cautious curiosity when I poured him a cup of water, handing it to him. He watched me over the rim, drinking deeply. Setting the pitcher near him, I left his side to explore the rest of the house. I found a pantry that was rather light on foodstuffs. Then a bedroom with a single bed.

Looking through it, I saw that whoever had fled the building took their wealth with them, based on the small hole in the corner of the room that was recently dug up. So, there was no point in staying. Grabbing an apple, I gave the old man a nod, who tentatively gave one back, before leaving the house and heading for another. I skipped the next few houses, going to the ones in the back at the periphery of the village while the sounds of chaos rang out behind me.

The next door I tried was barred, I found. Nothing that couldn’t be solved with a Power Attack, which reduced the door to splinters. Kicking the broken remains back, the door gave way to reveal a family that had decided to bar themselves inside. A man and two of his sons, based on the look of it. They had proper weapons, I noticed. The older man even had a scaled gambeson and a shield in hand, and all the men were wielding spears. They were guarding two women -- the mother, a daughter, and a baby.

They snarled the moment they saw me, their spears darting out to drive me away. The baby cried, disturbed by the violence of my entrance and the shouting of the men, while the girls screamed, making an awful chorus of noise. I eyed them, noting that they were also cleaner than the others I had seen. The house was larger too. A wealthy family that had carved out a plot of land after the village was already established?

The scene was almost familiar. I’ve never witnessed it with my own eyes, but I saw it in my dreams after the attack on the farm -- what could have been if I didn’t get that fateful warning or if I hadn’t been there. Only, the roles had reversed. I stood in the place of the raiders that would rape and murder my family. That, more than anything else, made my stomach clench uncomfortably.

I took a step back, gesturing to the doorway, saying nothing. Because there was no point. I couldn’t understand them any better than they could understand me. The man in the gambeson’s eyes narrowed into slits, glaring at me, but he seemed to briefly consider the offer. I was giving them an out. A chance to flee. To live. They might suspect it was a trap, but given how much blood I was covered in, they had to know that we had the best of the village by far.

Then one of the sons, a teenager, screamed at the top of his lungs as he ran forward, intent on skewering me. He was braves, but foolish. I reacted, battering away the tip of the spear with the shaft of my axe before I darted in, slamming the rim of my shield into his face. That made the decision for the rest of the family as the other son ran forward, followed by their father. I could spare a man in a one-on-one, but two on one when they were trying to kill me?

In the end, I valued my life too much. Too much to risk it trying to not kill them. I flung the apple I had taken at the second son’s face, hitting him in the head and making him flinch back.

The spear was a great weapon at keeping people away, but it quickly became a hindrance in close quarters. I swung with a power attack, hitting him in the neck and beheading him with a single swipe. The man screamed in rage while the girls screamed in horror. The older man made to tackle me, knowing his spear was useless this close.

However, he underestimated how fast I was. No sooner than my axe cleared his son’s neck, it was on its way back. Flipping it, I caught him in the side of the head with the backswing, my blade coming to a stop buried in the bridge of his nose. I ripped my axe free as he fell, the mother screaming with grief as she dove for him. Tears ran down her cheeks when she looked up at me, cursing and spitting. The son that started the fight was getting to his feet, horrified at the sight.

A sigh escaped me as I shook my head, going to him. Despite the fact that he was a few years older than me, I easily hauled him to his feet before I practically threw him out the door. “Get out, go. Run, you idiots,” I snapped at them, gesturing for them to go while they could. The daughter seemed to get it because she sprinted out the door, carrying the still screaming baby. The son ran back inside, grabbing his mom, and tearing her away from the corpse of her husband. He glared at me as he dragged his mom out, earning a scoff from me.

“I tried,” I told him, dismissing him with a wave. I looked to the two dead, another sigh escaping me. “I tried,” I told them before I began to search the house. It was empty of any more inhabitants, and as I suspected, much richer than the previous house had been. The cups were made of metal, so were the plates. The bed was covered in soft furs and the pantry was fully stocked. I began gathering up a pile near the bodies -- a pitcher that had been filled with wine, finely woven baskets, some animal pelts, cups, plates, and a candlestick.

Heading into the bedroom, I flipped the bed over, spilling a sack filled with straw over to find what I thought I might. Given that I had already seen that one household had buried their wealth, and that under the bed was my own favorite hiding place, I thought they might have buried something underneath it. And I was right based on the looser earth beneath it compared to the rest of the room. Using my axe, I upturned the dirt to find that there was a chest buried inside. More of a strongbox.

Breaking the lock, I flipped it open to find a few burlap sacks. One was a coin purse that was heavy with coin. Noticeably so. Opening it up, I saw silver pennies. Dozens of them. In terms of weight, it was about half a pound. In the others, I saw jewels. A small sapphire that was uncut. Two pieces of amber and a few other shiny stones. However, a frown tugged at my lips when I saw a chunk of metal with them. Taking it out, I turned it over, I couldn’t help but wonder what it was doing with gemstones.

My eyes narrowed as I brought the piece of metal near my axe and then I felt it. A tug.

“What… sort of magic are you made of?” I asked the odd piece of metal, tucking it into my boot. Why was it attracted to my axe? Why was it kept in the same space as precious jewels? It was clearly a mysterious artifact, so I decided to keep it with me. It was a small thing and it didn’t seem noticeable on a quick inspection. Tossing the load into the strongbox, I walked out and added it to the pile. Going to the pantry, I loaded up on dried foods, grain, and salt.

It was a good haul. Father seemed to think so too when he stepped inside, his eyes widening a bit when he saw what was within. “A fine first haul. Find anything special?” he asked, kicking the corpses with a frown on his face. His eyebrows shot up to his hairline when he saw the jewels, making him drop down to check around. “Give Jarl Horrik the blue one. Keep the rest. They’re yours by right.”

I nodded, snapping the strongbox closed. Tossing it in a basket and loading everything else on top of it, I hauled it all out with some help from Father who made sure no one snuck up on me. The screaming had died down a fair bit, telling me that most of the village was probably dead. My stomach clenched when I saw a warrior grabbing a woman by the hair and dragging her to a house that was filled with the last of the screaming left in the village. All of it from women.

Closing my eyes for a moment, I grit my teeth as I took in a deep breath. I knew it was going to happen. I knew it going in. And I knew that there was absolutely nothing I could do about it.

Because the warrior that was dragging the screaming woman away was Jarl Horrik. He waved at us, a smile on his face, and he was drenched in as much blood as I was. “Erik! Eivor! Come join us! Nothing can quench the fire in your blood quite like the softness of a woman!” he said with a laugh, still dragging the woman by her hair. She thrashed in his grip, looking at us with hate and fear before her struggles increased.

“We’ll join you later, Jarl Horrik. While all of you are wetting your wicks, we’ll be rich with plunder,” Father said with a laugh, Jarl Horrik joining in as he walked off. If he noticed I didn’t laugh with them, then he didn’t say anything about it. When he kicked open the door with a triumphant shout, Father spoke in a low tone to me. “Get used to it, Eivor,” he told me as we continued to walk to the bridge. “These things happen on raids. Harden your heart to it.”

My lips thinned, “They’re acting like animals. The people that attacked the farm would have done that to Mom, or my sisters, or Asta if I hadn’t been there.”

Father rounded on me, his expression as serious as I had ever seen it. It brought me up short, but I didn’t flinch from his look. “But you were there, Eivor. And you protected your family. These men couldn’t do that. They failed to be strong enough to stop us. The gods favored us over them, allowing this to happen to them. Jarl Horrik was right -- the failed raid was so this one would succeed.”

“Would you say that if I hadn’t been strong enough?” I asked him, uncaring of how his expression turned thunderous. The hypocrisy left a bitter taste on my tongue that I had trouble swallowing -- we were the raiders. This village was the farm. I had been praised for protecting the farm, and now I was being praised for killing the families in this village. It felt like I was the only one that saw how utterly hypocritical it was. “Winning a battle doesn’t give you the-”

I could have avoided the blow, but I didn’t. Father smacked me across the head, his nostrils flaring. “It does, Eivor. Winning the battle gives you every right to decide the fate of the defeated. It’s a gods given right, because they gave us the victory.” he snapped at me, only to look like he regretted it a moment later. “You’ve always been a kind-hearted boy. I was worried about how you would handle actual battle, but you’ve proven yourself to be a warrior. But, if you want to be a warrior, then you have to accept this. This is the fate of the defeated… and there is no room for mercy.”

We came to a stop in front of the bridge and I turned my gaze to the man I had spared. While I had been looting, someone split his head with an axe.

“Do you understand, lad?” he asked me, making my lips press together in a thin line. I thought I had understood, but seeing it in person was harder than I thought it would be. Killing… I could rationalize that just fine. In the end, I could accept it. Enslavement? Harder to accept, but again, I could accept it. There was a lot of hard labor to be done in the world and having a slave to do a job no one else wanted made sense.

Rape, on the other hand, didn’t really have a justification that I could find. It was just forcing yourself on someone because you desired them and they couldn’t fight you off. That was it. It served no purpose. It was just cruelty for the sake of cruelty.

I nodded slowly, my eyes dropping down to the slain man. Father reached out and rubbed the side of my head that he had slapped, and sighed. “I’ll give Jarl Horrik a reason why you can’t join the others,” he told me. I nodded again, not voicing my gratitude. I looked up at him to see he was giving me a sad smile. He opened his mouth to say something, only to be cut off by the sound of a horn blowing.

Our heads snapped in the direction of it. It sounded too close to be from the boat, it was an hour’s walk away. The horn sounded much closer. Much, much, much closer.

Father shoved me, “We’re under attack! To arms! Get your asses out here!” Father shouted at the top of his lungs, making people scramble out of the house, some with their pants around their ankles and blood on their cocks. I paid them no mind as I dropped my hoard of treasure when I spotted the source.

Warriors poured out of the woods, some riding horses, others bare-chested and holding great axes. They screamed war cries, declaring vengeance in an unfamiliar language. One of our warriors rushed out of a house near their point of entry into the village, only to swiftly be cut down. A horseman rode forward, galloping across the bridge as he screamed, brandishing a mace. Gritting my teeth, I threw my axe, catching him in the chest hard enough that it looked like he had been kicked off the horse’s back by a giant. He dropped to the ground dead but the horse continued on past us.

“Shield wall! Shield wall!” Jarl Horrik shouted, “Hold the bridge!” he screamed as I scrambled, picking up another axe from one of the fallen warriors. More enemies were rushing to follow the one that had fallen, stepping over his body as they sprinted towards us. The bridge acted as a choke point, directing them to one place, however, I saw an issue. Our ships were on the other side of the river. In the darkness, it was difficult to tell how many there were, but it seemed like a lot. With more on the way.

Regardless, we had to push through them. We were in their territory. They might know a way around the river and then we would be flanked. The moment they went on the defensive, we would run into the same issue that they would have attacking us -- a chokehold where our superior numbers wouldn’t mean a thing.

I took in a deep breath, and for the first time tonight, I let out a warcry, matching theirs as I charged across the bridge. I heard Father cursing, calling for me to come back as the shield wall closed behind me, just as I met the first of the warriors.

I didn’t mind. I preferred killing real warriors to helpless and unprepared villagers.

All that was left was to fight for my life.

...

As a heads up -- Eivor's name will be changing by next Wednesday. Eivor being a girls name was a feedback I got everywhere I posted this, and I really don't feel like getting reminded every time I post a chapter. That, and I think a name change would help clarify a plot point down the line.