Birth of the Kingdom. Jan Guillou

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СКАЧАТЬ Arn remembered how one time – when they had ridden to the ting of all Goths that ended so unhappily for the champion of the Sverkers’ side but so happily for the Folkungs – they had spoken about this very idea of exporting the dried fish from the Lofoten Islands in Norway in large quantities. And now it had become a reality.

      Arn thought this was very good news. Just as he considered it very wise to take payment for the dried fish in pure silver and not in things that only had value for the vain. But he asked himself how good a trade it was to transport iron to Lübeck and steel the other direction, instead of making steel out of the iron they had in their possession.

      Eskil was pleased by his brother’s unexpected good sense, which he had not displayed back when he set off for the Holy Land, even though they both had inherited their wits from their mother Sigrid. But now Eskil’s ale was gone, and once again he went over to the arrow loop to yell for more, while behind his back Arn poured half of his own ale into the tankard of his thirstier brother.

      This time a house thrall had been waiting down by the door to the tower with fresh ale, so two new tankards arrived as swiftly as the wind.

      When they resumed their drinking, Eskil’s half-full tankard had been replaced without him noticing, and Arn felt youthfully pleased at having avoided discovery. By then they had lost the thread of everything that was left to tell. Each saw the other’s predicament and both tried to get in the first word.

      ‘Our father and Erika Joarsdotter—’ said Eskil.

      ‘You are well aware that I intend to celebrate a bridal ale with Cecilia,’ said Arn at the same time.

      ‘That’s not for you to decide!’ snapped Eskil, but regretted it at once and threw out his hand as if trying to wipe away his words.

      ‘Why not?’ Arn asked softly.

      Eskil sighed. There was no way to avoid his brother’s question, no matter how much he wanted to postpone it along with much else until the following day.

      ‘When you came home – and may God bless your homecoming which is of immeasurable joy to us all – the game board was changed completely,’ replied Eskil quickly and more gently, as if he were speaking about the trading of dried fish. ‘The clan ting will decide, but if I know our Birger Brosa rightly, he will say that you must go to the bridal bed with Ingrid Ylva. She’s the daughter of Sune Sik and so has Karl Sverkersson as her grandfather – King Karl, that is.’

      ‘Am I supposed to drink the bridal ale with a woman whose uncle I helped to murder?’ Arn exclaimed.

      ‘That is indeed a good thought. Wounds and feuds must be healed for the sake of peace, and it is better done with the bridal bed than with the sword. That is our thinking. In peacetime a man’s vow is stronger than his sword. So it must be Ingrid Ylva.’

      ‘And if in that case I should prefer a man’s sword?’

      ‘I don’t think anyone wants to exchange blows with you, and I don’t think you wish to come to blows either. Your son Magnus is also old enough to marry, just as Ingrid is. It must be one of you, but it also depends on how much silver is required. No, don’t worry about that matter, my brother; the “morning gift” will be taken care of by us from Arnäs.’

      ‘I can take care of the morning gift myself. I had not intended anything immoderate, only the Forsvik estate, as was once agreed at the betrothal feast for Cecilia and myself. One must honour one’s agreements,’ said Arn quickly and in a low voice, but without revealing what he felt, although his brother would surely understand.

      ‘If you ask me for Forsvik, I can hardly say no. On a first evening like this, I cannot say no to anything you may want from me,’ Eskil continued in the same tone of voice, as if they were two businessmen talking. ‘But I still want to ask you to wait with such a request until after our first day and evening together after so many years.’

      Arn did not answer, but seemed to be pondering the matter. Then he got up and took out three keys which he carried on a leather thong around his neck. He went over to the three very heavy chests that were the first to be carried into the tower from his caravan. When he unlocked them one by one, a bright golden glow spread through the room, although the rays of the sun were visible only at the bottom of the western arrow loop.

      Eskil stood up slowly and went around the table with his ale tankard in his hand. To Arn’s pleasure and surprise he did not look covetous when he gazed at the gold.

      ‘Do you know how much there is?’ asked Eskil, as if he were still talking about dried fish.

      ‘No, not in our mode of reckoning,’ said Arn. ‘It’s about thirty thousand besants, or gold dinars, calculated in the Frankish manner. It might be three thousand marks in our currency.’

      ‘And it was not ill-gotten?’

      ‘No, it was not.’

      ‘You could buy all of Denmark.’

      ‘That’s not my intention. I have better things to buy.’

      Arn slowly closed the three chests, locked them, and tossed the three keys across the table so that they slid to a stop just in front of Eskil’s place. Then he went slowly back to his stool and gestured for his brother to sit down again. Eskil did so in meditative silence.

      ‘I have three chests and three thoughts,’ said Arn when they had raised their tankards high. ‘My three thoughts are simple. As with everything else, I will tell you more about it when we have more time. But first I want to build a church of stone in Forshem, and with the most beautiful images that can be worked in stone in all of Western Götaland. Then, or rather at the same time, since all the stone must come from the same place, I want to build Arnäs so strong that no one here in the North can vanquish it. To fortify it in such a manner is something that I and the men who came here with me know how to do. We know much about building methods not yet known this far north. And the remaining third chest I will gladly share with my brother…after having purchased Forsvik, of course.’

      ‘For such a rich man Cecilia Algotsdotter’s kinsmen will have a hard time offering a proper dowry. Her father is dead, by the way, he ate himself lame and blind at last year’s Christmas ale.’

      ‘Peace be unto his soul. But all Cecilia needs is a dowry that is equal in value to Forsvik.’

      ‘She cannot afford even that,’ replied Eskil, but now with a little smile, which showed that he had not yet weighed every coin in this bargain.

      ‘I’m quite certain that she can. For Forsvik she need not pay more than four or five marks in gold, and I know as well as you do where she can get such a small sum,’ Arn shot back.

      Now Eskil could restrain himself no longer; he bellowed with laughter so the ale splashed out of his tankard.

      ‘My brother! My brother, in truth you are my brother!’ he snorted, and downed more of his ale before he went on. ‘I thought that a warrior had come to Arnäs, but you are a man of affairs who is my equal. We must drink to that!’

      ‘I am your equal, since I am your brother,’ said Arn when he lowered his tankard after only pretending to drink. ‘But I am also a Templar knight. We Knights Templar conduct many trades in which the most peculiar goods change hands, and we can strike these bargains with the Devil himself and even with Norwegians!’

      Laughing, СКАЧАТЬ