The Liar's Key (The Red Queen's War 2)

To distract the men at the harbour wall from the fact we were smoothly pulling away into the night I raised a hand and bid them a royal farewell. “Good-bye, citizens of Olaafheim. I’ll always remember your town as . . . as . . . somewhere I’ve been.”

And that was that. Snorri kept rowing and I slumped back down into the semi-drunken stupor I’d been enjoying before all the night’s unpleasantness started. Another town full of Norsemen left behind me. Soon I’d be lazing in the southern sun. I’d almost certainly marry Lisa and be spending her father’s money before the summer was out.

Three hours later dawn found us out in the wide grey wilderness of the sea, Norseheim a black line to the east, promising nothing good.

“Well,” I said. “At least the Dead King can’t get at us out here.”

Tuttugu leaned out to look at the wine-dark waves. “Can dead whales swim?” he asked.

SIX

Our hasty departure from Olaafheim saw us putting in two days later at the port of Haargfjord. Food supplies had grown low and although Snorri wanted to avoid any of the larger towns, Haargfjord seemed to be our only choice.

I patted our bag of provisions. “Seems early to restock,” I said, finding it more empty than full. “Let’s get some decent vittles this time. Proper bread. Cheese. Some honey maybe . . .”

Snorri shook his head. “It would have lasted me to Maladon. I wasn’t planning on feeding Tuttugu, or having you borrow rations then spit them out into the sea.”

•   •   •

We tied up in the harbour and Snorri set me at a table in a dockside tavern so basic that it lacked even a name. The locals called it the dockside tavern and from the taste of the beer they watered it with what they scooped from the holds of ships at the quays. Even so, I’m not one to complain and the chance to sit somewhere warm that didn’t rise and fall with the swell was one I wasn’t about to turn down.

I sat there all day, truth be told, swigging the foul beer, charming the pair of plump blond serving girls, and devouring most of a roast pig. I hadn’t expected to be left so long but before I knew it I had reached that number of ales where you blink and the sun has leapt a quarter of its path between horizons.

Tuttugu joined me late in the afternoon looking worried. “Snorri’s vanished.”

“A clever trick! He should teach me that one.”

“No, I’m serious. I can’t find him anywhere, and it’s not that big a town.”

I made show of peering under the table, finding nothing but grime-encrusted floorboards and a collection of rat-gnawed rib bones. “He’s a big fellow. I’ve not known a man better at looking after himself.”

“He’s on a quest to open death’s door!” Tuttugu said, waving his hands to demonstrate how that was the opposite of looking after oneself.

“True.” I handed Tuttugu a leg bone thick with roast pork. “Look at it this way. If he has come to grief he’s saved you a journey of months . . . You can go home to Trond and I’ll wait here for a decent-sized ship to take me to the continent.”

“If you’re not worried about Snorri you might at least be worried about the key.” Tuttugu scowled and took a huge bite from the pig leg.

I raised a brow at that but Tuttugu’s mouth was full and I was too drunk to hold on to any questions I might have.

“Why are you even doing this, Tuttugu?” I ran ale over my loose tongue. “Hunting a door to Hell? Are you planning to follow him in if he finds it?”

Tuttugu swallowed. “I don’t know. If I’m brave enough I will.”

“Why? Because you’re from the same clan? You lived on the slopes of the same fjord? What on earth would possess you to—”

“I knew his wife. I knew his children, Jal. I bounced them on my knee. They called me ‘uncle.’ If a man can let go of that he can let go of anything . . . and then what point is there to his life, what meaning?”

I opened my mouth¸ but even drunk I hadn’t answers to that. So I lifted my tankard and said nothing.

•   •   •

Tuttugu stayed long enough to finish my meal and drink my ale, then left to continue his search. One of the beer-girls, Hegga or possibly Hadda, brought another pitcher and the next thing I knew night had settled around me and the landlord had started making loud comments about people getting back to their own homes, or at least paying over the coin for space on his fine boards.

I heaved myself up from the table and staggered off to the latrine. Snorri was sitting in my place when I came back, his brow furrowed, an angry set to his jaw.