Hakon of Rogen's Saga

2

IT is HAKON, who did it!" I hid deeper among the bearskins, believing that if I could not see my pursuers, they would not be able to see me — for it was I who had "done it." I had broken one of my father's arrows. This would not have been so serious, if it hadn't been his "lucky arrow"; the arrow he had received as a gift from the Earl of Tronhjem. "Where is he?" I heard my father's deep voice, and buried my face in the skins, so that not one ray of light illuminated the darkness I wasstaring into. "Come on. Out with you." I lay motionless under the skins, keeping my eyes closed. Then my cover was torn from me. A hand grabbed me by the ear, and I was brought to a sitting position. "Get up." As I rose from the bed, I looked at my father's face, trying to guess the extent of his anger. "Why did you do it?" Grownups always seem to know "why," and children hardly ever do. Why had I taken the arrow and played with it? I didn't know. But I did know one 6 2 thing, and this was that the truth would serve me badly. "I wanted to use it." Hardly had I spoken these words before I knew that they would not suffice. "What isthe use of an arrow without a bow?" "Rark was going to make me a bow." This was a half-truth, for though the slave had promised to make me a bow, he had not said when. But my father's anger was already spent. He stared at me, as if I were a stranger; then turned and gazed at Gunhild and the children, who were witnessing my shame. "Don't touch what doesn't belong to you." He made this statement in a flat, low voice; then, as if he had suddenly remembered that one more action was expected of him to finish the ritual, he raised his arm and struck me a blow with the flat of his hand on my cheek. He did not wait to hear me cry out, but turned on his heel and marched out of the room. "Why did he hit me?" I was talking to Rark, who was sitting on the little wharf to which the smaller boats were moored. "Because you had deserved it." My cheek was still burning from my father's blow. Rark hadn't convinced me. "Maybe I did deserve it, but that wasn't the reason he hit me. I think he did it because the others expected him to." Rark smiled and changed the subject. "You want me to make you a bow?" "Yes, I need to learn to shoot." At this Rark laughed. "Your seventh summer has not yet ended and you think of becoming a warrior." 7 When I had awakened that morning, I had not given the bow a thought; but now I knew that I wanted it more than anything I had ever wanted before. "I shall make you one, but first you must ask your father's permission." "I don't ever want to talk to him again." I knew that these were childish words, and being angry with myself for having said them, I picked up a pebble and threw it out into the sea. "A slave may not bear weapons. What would your father say if he saw me making a bow and arrows?" Rark had spoken the truth, and I could not answer him; therefore, I got up and walked toward the house. "Only a fool does not know that pride makes a poor shield," he called after me. The great hall was empty except for Helga, the daughter of the slave woman Gunhild. She was sitting playing with a small doll, which Rark had made for her. "Your father was very angry." I merely looked at her without saying anything. "Did it hurt much?" "No!" I answered, and then added meanly, "What concern is that of yours?" Helga was a strange child: small of stature, yet not dwarflike or ill-proportioned. Her face was always serious , as if she knew the fate of all of us and, therefore, was willing to forgive us. She and I had been brought up almost as sister and brother; the bond of having suckled at the same...