Gnawing the last scraps of meat from the rib, Rurik licked the grease from his fingers and sat back, stomach content for the first time in days. The firelight flickered across the rough timber beams of the farmhouse, warming the shadows with a faint orange glow. He wondered, as he so often did, where he might lay his head that night. Winter was creeping nearer with each cold wind, and the thought of sleeping outside with nothing but his ragged cloak for cover filled him with dread.
Fortune, however, smiled on him. A family nearby was repairing their roof after a recent storm, and they had taken him on for two days' labor. The pay was modest—no more than a small bag of precious salt—but they promised food and lodging as well. For Rurik, who had grown accustomed to hunger gnawing at his belly, this was more than fair.
After supper he set to work again, helping saw planks beside the hearth. The master of the house hunched on a low stool, sharpening the edge of his axe against a whetstone with steady, rasping strokes. Sparks spat briefly in the fire's glow, while his wife and daughter sat nearby, churning butter from sheep's milk.
In a clay jar, a thin skin of cream floated atop the still liquid. The woman skimmed it with a long-handled spoon, then beat it with a wooden rod until the sound of sloshing cream thickened into the duller rhythm of butter forming. The smell of warm milk and smoke mingled, filling the small space with homely scents. For a while, Rurik felt almost comforted, as though the harsh world outside had been pushed to arm's length.
But from beyond the farmstead came another sound—a distant roar, faint but unmistakable. The longhouse of Olaf, the local lord, was alive with noise. A feast was underway. Laughter, the clink of horns, and heavy boots striking in rhythm reached even this far.
Rurik tilted his head, listening, and slowly began to distinguish the voice that dominated the celebration. Olaf himself, drunk and boastful, was raising song in praise of Ragnar and his raids upon Britain. He called Ragnar a hero, a scourge of foreign kings, a name to be remembered.
Yet even as Rurik listened, the mood within that hall began to shift. The laughter ebbed, replaced by harsher tones. Soon it became a quarrel.
"You are nothing but a lucky hireling!" Olaf's voice carried, loud enough for half the town to hear. "You borrowed my ships, led my men to plunder. What right have you to bargain with me? Two shares in ten is already a gift! What more do you want?"
There was a pause, then Ragnar's reply, hot with anger: "Before we sailed, we swore three shares to me and seven to you. Now you would break your oath?"
The voices clashed back and forth, rising in fury. Rurik's skin prickled. He crept to the door and pressed his eye to a crack. Outside, shadows shifted in the torchlight: men stood in ranks around the hall, forty or more, most armed with shields and axes, six in iron mail.
An ambush. The feast was no feast at all but a trap.
Moments later, Ragnar emerged from the longhouse with fifteen companions. They bore small sacks of silver and trinkets, but their faces were dark, jaws clenched in fury. They stalked into the night cursing Olaf and his broken word.
"Is that all?" Rurik muttered, disbelieving.
The householder beside him shook his head, speaking low. Ragnar, he explained, was thirty-six, born a commoner, with three sons. Year after year he hired himself to lords across the North—sailing each spring to raid, returning in autumn to settle his account. His deeds had brought him fame, his name whispered in every hall, yet fame did not change his birth. Against men like Olaf, Ragnar had no shield.
Rurik nodded slowly. "So even legends must bow their heads," he murmured. In truth, Ragnar's band resembled no more than mercenaries—feared and praised, yet forever servants to the lords who hired them.
The thought had barely left his lips when a scream split the night. Shouts followed, and the unmistakable clang of iron on iron. The householder shoved his wife and daughter into the cellar, slammed the trapdoor, and seized his axe. Rurik's blood turned cold, but he too drew his small hatchet and crouched low, peering out through the gap in the boards.
Chaos unfolded before his eyes. Men surged in the torchlight, steel flashed. Then Olaf himself appeared, striding from the longhouse like a war-god clad for slaughter. He wore mail that clinked at each step, a heavy cloak of black wool over his shoulders, and a plain Germanic helm upon his head. In his hands gleamed a monstrous two-handed axe.
"Form up! Shield wall!" he bellowed.
At once, his men locked shields edge to edge, pressing forward in tight formation. To steady their courage, they struck the backs of their shields with axe heads in rhythm. The rolling thunder of wood and iron filled the air, and Rurik felt the sound deep in his chest.
Through the darkness came Ragnar once more. He had returned, no longer retreating but charging. His eyes in the moonlight shone sharp as a hawk's, his jaw clenched in rage.
"Why set archers to ambush me?" he shouted.
Olaf sneered across the distance. "By Odin's will. He calls you to Valhalla." At his signal, the shield wall advanced.
The last thread of parley snapped. Ragnar and his men drew into a wedge, sixteen men with Ragnar at the tip.
"Inn! Odin!"
Their voices shook the night as they hurled themselves forward. Like an axe biting wood, the wedge split the shield wall.
Rurik's breath caught as the formation burst apart. Ragnar struck like a storm, cutting a straight path toward Olaf. Four guards rushed to block him.
The first went down in a scream, shoulder smashed by Ragnar's sword. The second swung his axe—Ragnar slid low beneath it, slashed across the man's thigh, and hot blood sprayed across his face.
The third wavered, shield trembling. Ragnar drove a boot into his chest, sending him sprawling. The fourth tried to meet him, shield high—but Ragnar's stroke was monstrous. His blade split wood and bone alike, shearing the man's wrist clean away.
In the space of heartbeats, four lay upon the ground. Ragnar stood amid them, chest heaving, his blade dripping red. The night grew still save for the whistling wind, carrying with it the stench of blood.
Olaf's face paled. "Whoever slays Ragnar, I grant him thirty pounds of silver!" he shouted, voice cracked with fear.
Greed was stronger than loyalty. His guards surged forward, and even common townsfolk burst from their houses, hungry for wealth.
Ragnar was surrounded once more. He struck like a bear, like a wolf in blood-mad frenzy, cutting down all who came near. But numbers pressed close. At last he broke through the press, sprinting after Olaf, who fled into the dark.
Rurik swallowed hard. His heart thundered, his mouth dry. "Such ferocity…" he whispered.
The man fought with the strength of a beast and the cunning of a fox. He moved with impossible grace for his size—nearly two meters tall, yet quick as a hare. This, Rurik thought, was the truth of the Viking age, the peak of its martial fury.
Unable to bear the dryness in his throat, he turned away to drink, gulping water from a clay cup.
Then came a crash.
The door burst inward, timbers splintering. Two figures tumbled across the threshold, locked in a deadly embrace—Ragnar and Olaf, grappling like wild beasts.
They clawed and throttled one another, muscles straining, breath ragged. Exhaustion weighed on both, but Olaf's bulk pressed Ragnar down.
"Quick!" Olaf gasped, eyes wild. He turned toward Rurik and the farmer. "Help me! Kill this hireling, and I'll reward you richly!"
But neither man moved. Fear rooted them where they stood.
Cursing, Olaf bore down harder, his left hand fumbling at his belt until it found the jeweled dagger hanging there. With a snarl, he raised it high.
"Damnable mercenary! May Jörmungandr swallow your soul!"
Rurik's body moved before his mind. Snatching a blazing log from the hearth, he hurled it with all his strength. It struck Olaf full in the face.
The lord reeled, blinded. Rurik's hatchet flashed. One stroke severed Olaf's wrist, sending the dagger clattering to the floor. Another tore the helmet from his head. The final blow buried the axe deep in his skull.
Olaf toppled backward, dead before he struck the ground.