The Fire Stallion

Considering he was supposed to be a movie star, Troy was not at all what I’d been expecting. He was handsome enough – a deep russet chestnut with a flaxen mane – and he was beautiful, almost feminine for a stallion. I guess he was the right horse for a princess, but he wasn’t quite what I’d pictured when Gudrun had talked about Jotun, Brunhilda’s famous stallion. If Brunhilda really was this ferocious warrior, then Troy seemed a bit tame for her. Not that I said this to Niamh, of course, who was totally in love with Troy.

“Don’t you think Jam is going to look amazing on him?” she said as she groomed his thick, shaggy blond mane.

“Jam?”

Niamh looked at me as if I were from another planet. “Jamisen O’Brien. She’s playing Brunhilda. You must know her! She was in that Hollywood blockbuster last summer – the musical one set in Greece.”

“Oh,” I said, slightly embarrassed that I hadn’t clicked immediately when Niamh called her Jam. “Yeah, of course I know her. I used to love her TV show.”

“Jamisen’s an amazing horsewoman,” Niamh continued. “She’ll be riding all her own stunts. The costume department have this enormous long blonde wig that she wears under her Viking helmet and it will look incredible blowing in the wind next to Troy’s flaxen mane.”

“It must be weird,” I said, “to be not that much older than me and be the star of an entire movie.”

“She’s used to it, I guess,” Niamh said. “What is she now? Sixteen? She’s been famous almost her whole life.”

The arrival of Jamisen O’Brien and Anders Mortenson had everyone talking at dinner. The two stars of the film had finally turned up on a private jet with their entourages in tow, ready to start work the next day.

“Jam’s brought six assistants with her,” Niamh told me as we piled up our plates at the buffet.

My mum had worked on a lot of films and she’d told me some stories but I swear I’d never heard of any celebrity who had that many assistants before.

“What do they all do?” I asked.

“One of them is her personal trainer, one of them is her hairdresser, one of them is her personal assistant …” Niamh rattled them off, counting on her fingers. “Don’t know what the others do.”

Anders Mortenson, on the other hand, had just his personal assistant with him. He’d been famous since he was ten years old when he played a spoilt rich kid in the TV comedy Cody and Toby and now, at the age of fifteen, this was the first time he’d play the hero. He was Prince Sigard, who would fight by Brunhilda’s side as her power grew and eventually marry his queen.

“They get here today and then it’s a week of training with us and the stunt co-ordinators,” Niamh explained, “and then filming will finally begin …”

The sudden hush that fell over the dining room at that moment made me think that maybe Jam and Anders had just walked in. But it was only Gudrun. She stood out from the rest of us in our North Face puffer jackets at the best of times, but today she was particularly wildly dressed in red trousers and a violet cape.

She made a beeline for our table and flung herself down beside me.

“Hilly, we need to talk.”

I saw Niamh tense up in her presence. She couldn’t stand Gudrun; she’d admitted that to me when we’d been working on the goat-hair suits together.

“Don’t you think it’s weird how she always talks to you?” Niamh had said to me once when she was going on about Gudrun’s odd behaviour.

It was true and, yes, I did think it was a bit strange. I was the least important person here and yet Gudrun treated me like someone who really mattered. It made me uneasy but I kind of liked talking to her too.

Niamh stood up to leave. “I have to go. Hilly, let’s meet up at the stables in half an hour, OK?”

“Sure,” I said.

Gudrun waited in silence until Niamh was out of earshot. Her green eyes were even wilder and brighter than usual.

“Do you know what night it is, Hilly?”

“Sunday?” I offered.

“Yes,” Gudrun conceded. “Sunday, the 24th of June. The Jonsmessa is here at last. It’s time.”

Then she leaned closer so that she could whisper to me: “I’ll come for you just before midnight. We must finish what we’ve started. It’s time to meet Brunhilda.”

That night I sat up on my bed, fully dressed, waiting for Gudrun. She said the ritual needed to take place at midnight but by 11.30 p.m. she still wasn’t here. Finally at around 11.45 p.m. I gave up on her and closed the blackout curtains in my room. I had only just started to get ready for bed when I heard this scratching on the glass of the sliding door. Then another sound, a thin, melancholic whimper. I sat bolt upright and listened. More whimpering, louder this time. I got up, and moved cautiously over to the window and flung the curtains apart.

In front of me, right on the other side of the glass door, stood two enormous grey wolves. They were standing there, side by side, like two statues, eyes blazing intently, tongues lolling from their massive open jaws. We were separated by the glass, so they couldn’t get to me, but that didn’t make them any less terrifying.

I put my hand up to the pane and one of the wolves edged closer. His breath steamed the glass and I could see saliva dripping from his white fangs. The other one cocked his head and moved forward too. They were massive, powerful creatures, and I was sure at that moment that if they’d wanted to they could have broken down the glass to get to me. But they didn’t try. They didn’t even growl. They both stared intently at me. Then, as if they’d heard someone calling them, they turned on their heels and bounded away, into the forest. A moment later, another shape emerged from the shadows of the trees. It was Gudrun! I slid the door open for her.

“Quick!” I hissed. “Get inside! There are wolves out there.”

Gudrun was perfectly calm. “There are no wolves in Iceland,” she said.

“I know what I saw,” I insisted. I wanted her to come in so I could shut the door, but she beckoned me outside instead.

“Seriously, Hilly,” she said. “There’s nothing there. Come on. It’s time. We need to go.”

I didn’t want to stay there arguing and risk waking Mum and so I stepped outside and slid the door shut behind me.

We walked to the Colosseum, Gudrun leading the way. The sky up above was cloudless, and the colour of rose petals.

“Quick, Hilly!” Gudrun leapt ahead of me, taking the stone steps two at a time to reach the grassy expanse of the arena. She grasped my hand and shoved the trowel into it. “Dig up the horn while I prepare.”

The dirt mound from our burial had become overgrown with grass, which surprised me as it seemed like such a short time ago we had done the ritual. Gudrun must have marked the spot somehow because she was quite certain where I should dig.

A few feet away she had placed a fire brazier stacked with logs.

“The Vikings always used mountain ash, from the boughs of the rowan tree, for the midsummer ritual,” she said as she rearranged the wood inside the bowl of the rusty brazier and set it alight with a taper. “They believed that rowan has magical properties to ward off evil.”

The wood caught fire almost instantly with a fairy dust sprinkling of orange sparks at first and then a deep, emerald-green flame as the rowan began to burn and crackle to embers. There was something very hypnotic about watching the fire, almost trance-like.

“Hilly!” Gudrun said. “Please, keep digging – it’s time!”

I plunged the trowel back into the earth and heard a thunk as it struck bone.

“I’ve got it!” I said, using my fingers to prise the horn out of the soil, wiping it clean. I expected the herbs inside to have rotted away but the flowers were still brilliant yellow and the leaves were still green. I was about to reach in and get my necklace out when Gudrun stopped me.

“Be very careful with it. You must not disturb its contents as you bring it to me.”

I held the horn as if it were a baby in my arms and walked to Gudrun, who was stoking the wood with an iron so that the green flames leapt up as tall as me. It was strange, but there was no warmth emanating from the fire. It was as cold as ice.

Gudrun stood and took the horn from me. “You kneel,” she said.

I dropped to my knees next to the brazier. Gudrun lowered her hands into the green flames and rested the horn on top of the logs. All at once the fire changed colour, first to brilliant pink, then to gold.

“Look into it,” Gudrun said to me. “Tell me what you see.”

I stared at the flames. Suddenly, in their flicker, shapes emerged. I was getting really weirded-out now, but the fire held me steady, entranced in its flames. “I see the two wolves,” I said to Gudrun, “the same ones who came to me earlier. But they are with a man this time. He’s very tall and very old.”

“And his face?” Gudrun asked me.

I looked hard at his face and I saw that on one side there was a black pit where an eye had once been.

“He’s got one eye,” I said. “And a long beard and there are these birds; big, black crows. They sit on his shoulders.”

“They are ravens, not crows,” Gudrun said. “Hugin and Munin – Thought and Memory. And his wolves, the ones you saw earlier, are Geri and Freki. They are his constant companions. I knew you were special, Hilly, the first moment I met you.”

“Who is he?” I asked.

“Odin,” she replied, as if this were obvious. “The All-Father. Greatest of all the Norse gods. Odin, who decides which warriors are honourable enough to lift up after death to sit at his side at the feasting table in his heaven, Valhalla. He is here with us now. This is a good sign. We can begin the ritual.”

And with that she produced a bunch of sage from her robes, lit the tips of it in the fire and began to move around me in a circle, chanting. The flames were mesmerising, licking up and then falling away to low-burning embers. The vision of Odin, his wolves and his ravens had disappeared and I looked up and saw blue eyes staring back at me from the fire, a girl no older than me, with blonde hair in tight braids.

She reached out a hand to me and my pulse quickened as Gudrun stepped forward to the brazier. Putting her hands directly into the embers, she pulled out the horn. The flames had turned it white, and now there were carvings in the bone surface – intricate patterns and symbols like the runes that Gudrun kept in her velvet bag. She reached inside the horn and pulled out my silver chain and beckoned me to her so that she could clasp it back around my neck. Even though it had been in the heat of the fire just a moment before, the filigree felt like ice at my throat.

“From ancient times, we bring you forth, Brunhilda. Let the exchange be complete so that we may know your truth!”

Gudrun tossed the bundle of burning sage into the flames and it exploded in a burst of golden sparks.

“Springa!” she cried out as the fire leapt once more. And even though she was speaking ancient Norse, this time I knew somehow that the word meant Jump!

Inside me, my spirit soared and left my body and suddenly I was in the flames, the fire so brilliant all around that it blinded me.

Later, when Gudrun explained to me how the Cross-Over had happened, how she had “transmogrified me into Brunhilda” as she transported me back through the fire, I would understand more deeply what had happened. At that moment though, as I felt myself shift shapes, I had no idea about transmogrification and no way to explain it. All I knew was that somehow I wasn’t Hilly Harrison any more.

And when I opened my eyes, the stone steps of the Colosseum were no longer empty – they were filled with people and horses. Two stallions, one pale grey, the other a chestnut. Both had their ears flattened back in anger, squealing and threatening each other with teeth bared. The men who held them tried to avoid being hurt as the horses reared up and lashed out with their hooves. The men were struggling to restrain them as they fastened the ropes to bind the horses together.

At last they had tied the final knot and the horses, now bound to each other, were let loose. As soon as the horses realised they were free from the men’s grasp, they turned their attention on each other. They rose up on their hind legs, hooves thrashing the air, and then, with a battle scream, the grey horse lunged to attack. As he bit into the neck of the chestnut, there were cheers from the crowd.

It was a horse fight! I couldn’t watch. I turned from the arena and ran. I was sobbing so hard I could barely breathe and the tears blurred my vision so that I couldn’t really see where I was going and then with a hard thud I was stopped in my tracks. I had run right into something. No. I’d run into someone.

A giant of a man was standing before me. His head was shaved right up the sides but he still sported a thick, full red beard. On his head where the hair had been shaved off he was tattooed with the symbols of the runes. He wore ragged clothes, but the golden bracelets that decorated his bulging arms showed that he was a man of power and influence, a chief, a king.

With a massive hand on each of my slight shoulders he grasped me and held me out from him as if to examine me, before he pulled me hard to crush me against his chest, embracing me in a hug. He held me so tight he choked the breath out of me as he said my name:

“Brunhilda.”

I smiled as I gazed up at him.

I had never seen him before in my life and yet I knew exactly who he was.

“Hello, Father.”

My father holds me by the shoulders and lifts me off the ground.

“Where are you running off to then, little one?” he asks. “The entertainments are in the other direction.”

I squirm, trying to relocate my feet back on the earth once more, feeling ridiculous dangling there from his gigantic paws.

In the pit behind me I hear the horses as they clash, their squeals mingling with the cries of excitement from the men gathered round them.

“I feel sick,” I tell him. I don’t say why. He would never understand my revulsion at this theatre of brutality. His life is all about bloodshed. How many thousands of men has he killed in his long boat raids? Their lives mean nothing to him, so how can I possibly explain my floods of tears, my distress over the death of a horse?

My father raises me up even further off the ground, holding me fast so that I’m looking him square in the eyes.

“You’re hungry, I think,” he says as if his proclamation settles the problem. “Never mind. The feast will be soon enough. Until then you will stay with me.”

He puts me back on the ground but he doesn’t remove his hands from my shoulders. He turns me round and shuffles me off to walk ahead of him. When we reach the arena, he puts his arm protectively round me from behind as we push through the throng, back the way I’ve just come, creating a pathway through the crowd-stink of sweat and beer, into the arena seats, where the noise of the people shouting all around is deafening.

An almighty roar rises up as the chestnut stallion, exhausted and lame with open wounds on his shoulder and neck, suddenly summons up the strength to land a glancing blow with his near fore. The grey reacts like a snake, twisting his neck to wrap it round the chestnut’s and bite him back. The chestnut falls back, trying to get away from the grey, and once again he finds himself restrained by the ropes that bind them together, unable to escape.

I’m trapped here too. A prisoner, with my own father as jailer. All I can do to get through it is close my eyes and bite my tongue and wait for this “entertainment” to end.

“Where is your brother?” my father asks.

“I don’t know,” I say. I haven’t seen Steen all day. I’m new to having a brother, but instinctively I know that I do not like him. I’m thinking about last night, and I know it can’t be my memory; it must be Brunhilda’s I suppose. It involves Steen and the dinner feast we had at Thing-Vellir. One of our tribe had just got married and so the bride and groom were guests of honour and there was much celebrating at the main table, and Steen leant across to me and whispered:

“That will be you next, sister.”

He’s so cruel! I don’t want to marry at all but there’s a queue of boys in my tribe lining up in anticipation of standing on the sacred rock and having their hand roped to mine. Not for love, but because of the power it would bring them. My father is the strongest of the chieftains, King of Iceland. Marrying me, Brunhilda, his daughter, gives you a direct line to the throne.

All the same, Steen would be wise not to mock me. “Be careful what you wish for, brother,” I replied. “If I do marry, then my husband could be the next king instead of you.”

I swear he had not even considered this. He turned very pale when I said it. Honestly, my brother is like Thor. Full of power and fury, always ready to swing a hammer, but never once using his brain. He never thinks before he acts, and that is why he should not be king.

The roar of the crowd is growing louder as the horses, entangled in the ropes, stagger about like punch-drunk fighters, weaving and striking. The chestnut stumbles forward and falls to his knees. I think I’m going to throw up.

“Brunhilda, go now and find him for me,” my father says. “I want him at the feast tonight when I address the chieftains at the Law Rock.”

“Yes, Father!”

I don’t wait to be told twice – I move fast, pushing my way out through the crowd. Oh, thank the great, wise Odin! I’m so relieved to have an excuse to leave. I can feel my heart pounding but I try to stay calm as I work my way between the stinking bodies of the men who are shouting at the top of their lungs. Being small has its uses and I weave through the gaps in the throng until I’ve left the noise and the stench behind me and I’m heading down the broad path that leads between the high rock cliffs towards the far end of Thing-Vellir.

I know where Steen likes to hang out and, sure enough, I find him in one of the little clearings, a rocky cul-de-sac where the waterfalls tumble down the cliff face. He’s there with a few boys and girls from our tribe. He has his sword in his hand and he’s fighting with Kari, his best friend. They play with blunted blades, dulled on purpose for sparring so they will not cut, although you can get a nasty bruise through your chain mail if you’re hit hard enough with one.

Steen and Kari are trading blows back and forth in a very choreographed way while the others sit above them on the rocks and watch. I think, as I watch him grunting and thrusting, blocking Kari with his shield and then grinning as he swoops around with his sword to hack at his shoulder, how Steen fights like a poor imitation of our father, his arms windmilling and his chest jutting forward. He is built like my father too, only smaller in height. He’s sixteen, two years older than me, and his beard is not yet grown and is still just a tuft of ginger fluff on his chin.

When he sees me he doesn’t pause, he keeps clashing his sword against Kari’s.

“Why are you here, Bru?”

“Father wanted me to find you,” I tell him. “The feast is soon. He wants to make sure you’ll be there.”

“Of course he does.” Steen thrusts his sword hard at Kari and even though they are just playing he only narrowly misses striking him in the guts. Kari looks nervous.

“Hey! Watch it!”

“He’s going to announce it tonight,” Steen says. “Wait and see.”

“Announce what?” I ask.

“His successor,” Steen says. “He’s an old man now. Time to move aside and let a young man take over.”

“You better not let him hear you say he’s old,” I say, “or the sword he uses on you will be a real one. Anyway, even if he’s announcing his successor, what makes you so certain it will be you?”

Steen stops fighting suddenly and lets his sword drop. He raises a hand to Kari as if to say, “Hold fast and halt a moment?” Then he turns his back on Kari and he glares at me.

“My father is the king,” he says to me. “And his father before him was king.”

I smile at the arrogance of him.

“My father is also the king,” I point out. “And where is it written that a woman cannot rule? The strongest warrior is the one who takes charge of our tribe. Father is not handing down the crown to the first boy who happened to be born.”

“The warrior is always a boy,” Steen counters.

I laugh. “I can hunt better than you and ride better than you. I’m smarter than you too.”

From the rocks above us there’s giggling. Steen looks up to see his friends smirking at him being bested in words by his little sister.

“Is that so?” He’s not laughing. He walks over to Kari. “Let me have your sword,” he says. Kari hesitates and Steen loses his temper, shouting at him: “Your sword, Kari! Let me have it now!”

Kari shifts his hand down the hilt and offers it out so that Steen can take it from him.

Steen now has a sword in each hand as he walks to me.

“And can you fight as well as I can?” he asks. He offers me Kari’s sword. “Because if you can beat me right now, then I will go to Father and tell him it should be you and not me who is to take over when he steps aside as king.”

“I will need chain mail or the fight is not fair,” I point out.

“Kari?” My brother treats his friends as if they are servants the way he speaks to them, which is another reason why he should never be king. I stand and wait as Kari wriggles out of his chain mail and hands it to me too. He’s much bigger than me and when I pull it on over my clothes it sags off my shoulders.

I put out my hand to take Kari’s sword from Steen and as I do so I note the slenderness of my own wrist. I am like a sparrow! My bones are so narrow and tiny beside Steen’s heavy hands. When I feel the heft of the sword as I take it from him, my arm starts trembling and I have to hook my elbow in to my hip for support and pretend that I’m holding it naturally so that he doesn’t see this. I step back from him and deliberately let the sword fall down so that the point is lowered to rest on the ground. And then, taking a deep breath, I square off and step my feet into position, my posture erect, and with renewed strength I raise the sword up so that it’s squared to the centre of my body, sticking out directly in front of me. On my left side my shield is so heavy I feel my muscles quivering. Let the fight begin soon please, because my arms already cannot last any longer.

“Let’s do this,” I say.

When we were little, Steen and I would sometimes spend the day together trapping birds beneath a basket using a string and a dowel. Steen would only wait until the birds were barely underneath the basket and eating the breadcrumbs, and then he’d give this warlike roar and throw himself at it to push it down over them. Of course they would hear him coming and be gone long before he could reach the basket. He was always astonished when he looked through the wicker and saw it was empty.

He will be the same today in the fight – impatient and half-witted. To win, all I have to do is use these traits against him.

And so I stand back and let him make the first move and, sure enough, with a growl he lunges right at me, front foot first, hacking and waving his sword theatrically above his head, all bluster and forewarning so that I see him coming in plenty of time – and all it takes is for me to sidestep and I’m clear. I slash crossways and take the first strike against him, whacking my brother hard in the ribs.