141 The God of War (1/2)
The morning mist was lifting, and Sven was finally able to make out the buildings of the settlement across the lake.
His war party had arrived in the area the previous afternoon. It had been raining hard all day, and everyone was in a nasty mood. Some of his men wanted to attack the settlement right away, and Sven knew why.
”You'll have to stay wet for one more night,” he told them. ”We won't attack until we know the exact layout of that village. I don't want anyone there to get away.”
They scouted out the village's perimeter that same evening. They came across a path leading away from the lake and into the forest. Sven would have missed it in the rain and the murk that came with the dusk, but Henrik once again proved his worth as Sven's best scout.
He halted the scouting party with an upraised hand, dropped to one knee, and examined the ground. He beckoned Sven to join him, and whispered:
”There are people walking through here regularly. Not many, maybe a couple, once or twice a day. They're coming and going, to the village and away from it, inland. The ones going to the village are carrying heavy loads.”
”How can you tell all that?” marveled Sven. ”I can't see a fucking thing.”
”My grandfather took me hunting a lot when I was a kid. I loved it. He taught me how to track animals. He could tell whether it was a moose or a reindeer that had passed, whether it was walking, trotting, or running, and how much it weighed. Those people going to the village... The ground is wet, so maybe they aren't carrying as much as I thought. Tracks are always deeper in soft, wet ground.”
”I still can't see a single fucking track.”
”There.” Sven's eyes followed Henrik's pointing finger, and indeed he there was suspicious hollow in the moss. The ground everywhere was liberally sprinkled with pale, dried-out fir needles, and Sven saw that the ones in the hollow were bent or broken.
”It's probably the path to the mine,” he whispered to Henrik.
”What mine?”
”They have a blacksmith, so they have metal ore. They must have a mine somewhere.”
”They'll have people working there.”
”Correct.”
”Maybe we should check this out before we attack.”
Sven shook his head.
”No,” he whispered. ”We'll capture the village, and lie in ambush for anyone that shows up. Chances are they've got hunters and gatherers out in the country. It's September, my guess is most of them will be busy harvesting food for the winter. We'll wait for them to come home.”
They spent a couple more hours that evening reconnoitering the area around the settlement. They found another path leading along the shore of the lake. It was marked by fish scales scattered here and there, and Henrik guessed it must lead to a good fishing spot further down the shore.
”It will clear soon,” said Sven, and took Uwe along on a trip to a good observation point across the lake from the village. It involved getting thoroughly wet while crossing the river, and Uwe wasn't happy about that.
”I feel I have a bad cold coming,” he complained soon after they found a good lookout spot atop a small cliff close to the shore.
”I'm as wet as you are. You want to go home?” said Sven. That shut Uwe up.
As Sven predicted, within an hour after sunrise the mist had cleared enough to see the village. It seemed dead. Nothing and no one was moving. But there were people there, all right: Sven could see the smoke rising from the rooftops.
The settlers definitely had metal tools, and good tools too: the small pier had been built with well-hewn timber. There would be several very sharp axes in that settlement, for sure. For a moment, Sven regretted bringing just one bow and two crossbows. But he brushed the thought away: all his men excelled at melee combat.
Every single male in Holm's nascent empire was obliged to spend at least an hour every day training with two weapons of his choice. A year and a half added up to a lot of hours. They had good swords and axes and throwing spears, and knew how to use them. It was time to start putting thought into action.
”Okay, we've seen enough,” he said to Uwe. ”Let's rejoin the others.”
When they did, Henrik had some news.
”Karl and I went to have a look at that path in full daylight,” he told Sven. ”You know, the one you said leads to their mine. Almost the moment we got there a guy comes trotting along with a big wicker basket. It was pretty heavy, he shifted it from hand to hand twice while we watched him, and we only watched him for a couple of minutes, maybe less.”
”He didn't see you?”
”Of course not.”
”He was going into the village?”
”Yes.”
”Then that mine must be pretty close,” said Sven. ”He must have left some time after dawn, and that was what, two hours ago?”
”A little longer than that.”
”And you saw him when?”
”Uh, maybe an hour ago. Yeah, around an hour.”
”The sun moves faster with every day now,” Sven reminded him.
”You're right, I didn't allow for the day getting shorter Less than an hour, then. But not by much.”