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  Orvar and I had waited half a day already. Not knowing exactly when the right opportunity would present itself for the girl to approach Thora, we’d figured that we had better arrive early. I didn’t mind the long wait; the prospect of reuniting with Thora made me so jubilant I barely noticed how time added up anyway. As I stood there behind the monumental, grayish-brown oak trunk, I peeked out at the Jarlabanke estate entrance from time to time. Orvar gently reminded me that doing so was unwise. What if one of the sentinels stationed next to the entrance saw me? But I couldn’t help myself. I didn’t want to miss a single moment of my beloved wife’s return to me. At last she knew the truth… I imagined the smile breaking up her rosy-cheeked face at the sight of me, how she would melt in my arms as we embraced, how delicious her lips would taste against mine. I wondered what she would look like now, if she would be wearing some lavish dress that would enhance her curvaceous body, bring out her beauty even more. She hadn’t changed much, according to Egin. If anything, she had become even more gorgeous.

  The sun had nearly disappeared behind the moist, gray hills in the west when she finally appeared. Orvar was sitting down at this point, leaning his back against the wide oak trunk, while I was still standing. At the sound of feet nearing our hiding spot, he immediately stood up, too, and we were both on our guard. Bending around the trunk, I stole a glance to verify that it was who I hoped. It was. Seeing Thora approach us dressed in a long, dark red silk dress with white embroidered borders, my stomach skipped with joy. The little slave girl was dragging her in our direction. Before long the two of them had arrived.

  When she discovered me, shock twisted Thora’s pretty features. It was soon exchanged for a wide smile, however, just like I had thought.

  “Leif!”

  I was momentarily frozen, not able to believe at first that we were back together at last. Recuperating swiftly, I took Thora in my arms and pulled her close. My lips met hers, and then it was just the two of us again, out on one of our walks in the woods under the star-pricked black night. I wasn’t sure how long we kissed; all I knew was that kissing her was as good as I had imagined it to be, better even. Reluctantly, I pulled her away from me so I could look at her. Her face was flushed, the pink cheeks making her blue eyes sparkle bluer than ever.

  “I cannot believe I’m seeing you again, Leif,” she said in a weak voice. “You are back and alive! I’m so happy.”

  “Yes, I’m back and alive. As you yourself know now, I never did any of what they accused me of. Ragnar set me up so he could take you away from me. And he did.” The last sentence must have come out more critical than I had intended, for a shadow fell over Thora’s face and she looked away. I took her face in my hands and moved it so her eyes met mine. “I’m sorry, my love. I know this has not been easy for you either. You did what you had to do. I didn’t mean to make you feel bad for having married Ragnar. What else could you have done?”

  She nodded. “Yes, that is true. I really had no choice but to marry him. Of course, had I known—”

  I put a finger over her mouth. “Don’t worry, my darling. What’s done is done. But the good thing is, we can arrange everything so you and I are back together, like we should be.”

  Thora’s large cornflower eyes lit up. “Oh, yes, Leif, take me away from this terrible person who has done such evil deeds, who killed and took advantage of his own sister!” She scowled. “Can you believe he justified what he did by saying she is only his half-sister anyway, her mother a slave? As if that means her life is worth any less.” She scoffed.

  I thought about her words for a moment before answering. “Actually, I can. Not that it makes what he did any less vile. I understand that he… that he at least never raped her, though?”

  Thora scrunched up her pretty face. “According to what he told Loke, he didn’t. But who knows if he was telling the truth. As far as I am concerned, he probably raped her, too.”

  I shuddered involuntarily. “I sincerely hope you’re wrong, Thora.”

  “I doubt it.” She closed her eyes and whispered, “Oh Leif, please take me away from him as soon as possible. I can hardly bear breathing the same air as him, never mind live in the same house and share the same bed. Considering what he is capable of, I might be next and… and…” When she opened her eyes again, they were filled with tears and the words choked in her throat.

  My heart breaking at the sight of her pain, I pulled her close again and rocked her slowly. “Shhh,” I whispered into her ear as she buried her face into my chest. “It’s going to be all right. Soon, all this will be over and we will be together again, just you and I. I’m so sorry you had to overhear Ragnar’s confession. Really, I feel terrible. Those kinds of things are not for a girl’s ears. But at least now we have a way to make him pay for what he did.”

  Thora removed her tear-stained face from my chest and looked at me.

  “How are you planning to make him pay for it, Leif? Please tell me. I need to know or I will lose my mind.”

  I stroked the soft blond hair on her head. “There is no need for you to lose your mind, my love. As soon as my father gets a retrial at the People’s Assembly, and you and Sven give your testimonies, my sentence will be revoked and Ragnar will be found guilty. And for sure a good part of their estate will be transferred into the hands of my family. So we will be rich, too!”

  Confusion spread over Thora’s face. “But… what do you mean… that I should give testimony…?”

  “I understand that it sounds daunting and strange to you, and I agree, a girl should never have to mix herself with these kinds of matters. But you see, sweetheart, we don’t have a choice. It’s the only way to get Ragnar.”

  She frowned. “But I don’t know if I can do that…What if my testimony is not enough? You know how they don’t take women’s testimonies as seriously as those of men. What if they don’t believe me?”

  “I know what you’re saying, Thora, but that’s just a risk we have to take. I’m certain your testimony together with Sven’s, who’ll confirm that Ragnar disappeared long enough that evening to have an opportunity to set me up, will be enough to get him convicted and my sentence revoked. Especially since his motive now is very obvious.”

  I squeezed her arms encouragingly, but Thora averted her eyes. When she didn’t say anything, I asked her what was wrong.

  “Oh, nothing,” she replied. “It’s just that… I’m not so sure they will revoke your sentence. I have never heard of such a thing before. And then, if they don’t, and what with me having disrespected my family and husband so much, Ragnar will for sure divorce me without giving me anything. And I’m not allowed to remarry again. After you and Ragnar, I’ve already been married twice. You know as well as I do that I’m only allowed to marry twice.”

  I stared at her, confused. “But you don’t have to remarry, Thora. I’m sure that our marriage would still be valid when everybody realizes what really happened.”

  “And if they don’t and your sentence is not revoked? What should I do then?”

  “Well, I suppose, in the very worst case you could always go live with your mother again, right? She and her brother’s family would take care of you. But that won’t happen anyway because you and I are the victims and the Law Speaker is a fair man. And so are the people and the judges. They would never allow my sentence not to be revoked. It’s very clear.”

  “I’m not so sure about that. Isn’t there any other way, Leif?”

  “No, Thora. There isn’t.”

  I kept staring at her, fighting the lightheadedness that suddenly overwhelmed me from taking over. I didn’t want to believe what I already knew she was about to tell me. But I had to know for sure, so I forced myself to speak.

  “Thora, are you telling me that you don’t want to testify against Ragnar at the People’s Assembly?”

  Thora refused to meet my eyes.

  “By Thor, answer me!” I demanded and tightened my grip around her shoulders to make her look at me, angst getting the
best of me.

  Finally, she did, fury coloring her features. “No, Leif, I cannot take such a chance. I think it’s wrong, really wrong of you to ask me to put myself in such a precarious position. There must be another way to get Ragnar.”

  “I told you already. There isn’t.”

  “Well, then I don’t know what to say, Leif. There is nothing I can do to help you.”

  I felt how my knees went weak. I braced myself. “So you would rather spend your life with a murderer than risk living with your mother and your uncle’s family…” The words felt unreal to me as I said them. She looked away, pouting.

  I let go off her and turned to Orvar. The slave stood with his back facing us a few steps away, waiting for us to finish our conversation. I called him. Orvar turned around, prepared for an order from me. I motioned for us to get going, my face feeling like it had turned into a mask. Our mission was completed.

  19

  I couldn’t fall asleep that night. It was as if my eyelids had been cut off, and all I could do was stare and stare into the vaulted ceiling of our longhouse. Every part of my body ached, every joint, every muscle; all the way into the marrow of my bones pain kept me awake, though worst of all was the pain in my heart. Excruciating, it had been with me since Orvar and I left my ex-wife and walked into the woods. Each instant the pain seemed to intensify, and I felt certain that soon it would tear my heart in pieces. Attempting to make it less palpable, I tossed and turned over the animal hide layers on which I lay, but it didn’t do much good. If anything, it seemed to have the opposite effect, making the pain worse.

  As it slowly became morning and the rest of my family began to wake up, I pulled myself together and sat up. I must have fallen asleep at some point because I felt slightly better, the pain having dissipated somewhat. On unsteady legs, I went outside to wash up in the wooden trough in the barn. The body heat that emanated from the two cows, our two remaining horses and a colt, and the goat lived inside this longhouse during the winter months. They made it more pleasant for our family to take care of our hygiene there rather than outside until it became warm again.

  I discovered that Elsa had already poured clean water into the trough. I couldn’t help but smile a little despite my pain. Old and sicker than ever, she still insisted on pulling her share of the household work. Grateful, I removed the clothes on my upper body and splashed myself with it, and once again that same sense of deep despair that had kept me from falling asleep rippled through me.

  Thora doesn’t want to help me.

  She would rather live with Ragnar, whom she didn’t love and who she knew was a murderer than take a chance on me, a chance that was bound to succeed. Clearly, she was more interested in her own material comfort than in the two of us being together again, making me wonder just how deep her love for me could have been. Had she ever really loved me? Maybe not… My stomach knotted at this possibility.

  I finished washing the rest of my body. Then I took a seat on the milking stool, rubbing myself dry with a large piece of wool, and pondered my situation. My life as a forest man would surely continue now. Not that this mattered much to me any longer without Thora in my life; I would be all right one way or another. Together with Orvar, I could travel far down into Denmark and create a new life for myself there. Even though I doubted I would ever be happy again, I was determined to continue living now that I knew that I wasn’t a crude rapist and killer. But what about my family? I couldn’t accept their suffering.

  My father wasn’t the only one whose life was gradually being eaten up, not to mention poor Elsa. The old woman had developed pain in her knees, the one part of her body that had remained strong and healthy despite her age, and she could barely walk now. Inga and Anna were withering away, too. Inga, the seven-year-old, who had always been on the slender side, had become so skinny you could easily count her ribs. She used to be so full of life, constantly on the lookout for an adventure, someone to play with. Now, when she was finished with her chores, she preferred lounging alone in a corner, doing nothing but stare lazily into the fire that always burned in the hearth. Anna, a year and a half older, had begun to lose her hair, her stomach was bloated, her gums bled and her skin had become dry and scaly. Petter, being a few years older and therefore stronger, was doing better, but I could tell that he, too, seemed weaker. Certainly, he had lost weight as there was little to eat after the tenant payment was taken care of. I couldn’t just leave them behind; at least my sisters and father would surely be gone within a few months if I did.

  There must be some other way for me to exonerate myself. There had to be.

  In an impotent rage, I kicked the wide oak stub on which the trough rested so hard I nearly turned over both trough and stub. Then I sunk down in a deep squat, resting my tired head in my cupped hands. I wished my mother was alive still so I could consult with her. She always had the best advice, much better than my father.

  When my mother died, I lost the one person who understood me, who meant more to me than anybody else. My father and I, on the other hand, had never gotten along well, mostly because I felt he lacked spine. I hated how he backed down as soon as someone contradicted him, like a dog scared of being kicked by his owner. I hated how he smiled and tried staying friends with people who didn’t deserve to have any. I hated his insistence on tried and true methods, his reluctance to taking a chance. According to me and my mother, boldness begot greatness. Not that I ever told him straight out how I felt, but I was certain that he could sense it.

  Unlike my mother and I, my father lacked pride. For example, it had been so important for him to fit into his new country that he had insisted on naming all his children except his oldest Swedish instead of Arabic names. Few Swedish families took such little pride in their heritage. When I had asked him why, he had claimed it was because we were really more Swedish than Arabic nowadays. But I was sure that wasn’t the real reason. No, it was because my father was afraid of being different. I was convinced this fear of sticking out was why he had embraced the province’s religion with such fervor as well. He knew the customs and rituals better than even the oldest priest.

  According to tradition, each spring during the harvest festival, every farmer had to kill three animals to honor Thor, the weather god; Solna, the goddess of sun; and Frej and Freja, the sibling gods of fertility. It was crucial to pick the fattest cow, the most productive egg hen, and the goat with the thickest and whitest milk so the gods wouldn’t feel slighted. This was no small sacrifice to make for our family, which was why my older brother, Achour the Second, had convinced our father not to sacrifice any more than the required number of animals. That had been no easy feat what with the man growing increasingly superstitious with the years.

  My father’s extreme superstition was another source of tension between the two of us. Not only did we fight about how many animals should be sacrificed in the harvest festivals or whenever extra luck was needed. We fought about whether to say prayers and use ancient rituals to cure disease instead of employing a knowledgeable medicine woman. We had even fought about the details surrounding my mother’s burial—my father had insisted on throwing a big, expensive traditional burial feast in her honor despite that we couldn’t really afford it, and despite that I kept reminding him that she hadn’t cared about such extravagances. She would much rather have seen that our family used the resources spent on the burial feast on ourselves.

  In the days following her death, I was so exasperated to find myself alone with my father that I had contemplated running away from home. The notion of leaving my younger siblings in the care of my weak father was something to happen to Achour the Second made me stay in the end. It proved a wise decision as a Viking expedition to England took my brother’s life shortly thereafter and, suddenly, I had become the eldest.

  There was only one thing my father and I agreed on— the story of how my father’s father, a slave from North Africa, had won his freedom must never be forgotten. It was so spectacular it had become so
mething of a legend in our province:

  Wolves had plagued the large Godfred farm that summer so many years ago. Night after night, the bloodthirsty beasts slew one or more of the cows, sheep, and goats. After four days nine cattle were dead. No matter how many men stayed around the pastures each evening in wait for the vicious animals to come, they were never able to kill many. Mostly, this was because the wolves didn’t get close enough for the men to reach with their spears. In order to really make a difference, you had to meet the beasts eye to eye. But no man was brave enough to volunteer doing such a thing, not even the Godfred sons, who had a high stake in the matter. Godfred himself was too old. That was when Achour, my grandfather, saw his opportunity. He went up to his master and told him that, in return for his freedom, he would enter the meadow and slay all the wolves on his own.

  Godfred had laughed so hard he had to sit down. Yes, Achour was a big and strong man, but surely he wasn’t that strong, and he definitely didn’t possess the skills to outwit a flock of wild animals single-handedly. Godfred had doubted that my grandfather could even fight.

  When Achour saw the disbelief in his master’s face, he told him that he was once considered the best swordsman in all of North Africa. Godfred had only Achour’s own words to support this claim, but he soon decided that he would rather risk losing a slave than any more of his cattle.

  The following night Achour entered the dark pasture, armed with a three-foot, wide-bladed sword and two daggers, while eighteen men came to watch this madness from a safe distance. He hadn’t been lying when claiming to be the best swordsman in his homeland; he did win a tournament only six months before being captured as a slave. Of course, that was about fourteen years ago, and he hadn’t seriously fought anybody or anything since then. But he would rather let the wolves eat him alive than continue life as a slave. There was nothing else he could do to give his wife and children a better life but this. Their situation wouldn’t worsen if he died.