Dubh-Linn: A Novel of Viking Age Ireland (The Norsemen Saga Book 2) by James L. Nelson Page A

Silence. “I don’t know. But I don’t think all those men were from that one place. Perhaps they reckoned they’ve done enough for Cloyne, and are going off to protect their own homes.”
      Thorgrim looked at Starri and Starri nodded slowly. “That would stand to reason,” he said. Thorgrim let the memory of the wolf dream swirl around in his head. He frowned, looked away, looked back as another image began to materialize. The more he thought on it, the more vivid it became, and the more he understood its importance.
      “What is it?” Starri asked.
      “I saw something else,” Thorgrim said.
     
      Arinbjorn White-tooth was asleep. It had been a long day, beginning in the pre-dawn hours, as the longships readied for the attack, and stretching on through some hard fighting. Arinbjorn’s sword had been well-bloodied, no one could accuse him of not being in the thick of it. Thorgrim, he had noticed, had not even joined the shieldwall during the fight.
      He had drifted off to sleep with thoughts of Thorgrim playing out to the last. Whatever part the Night Wolf had taken in the battle had apparently been admirable. Arinbjorn heard men talking of it. The last Arinbjorn had seen of Thorgrim, as the Irish had pressed home their attack, he had been hanging back, behind the shieldwall, and that would not do. Then, seconds later, the Irish were on them and Arinbjorn had been too locked up in his own fight to notice what Thorgrim was doing.
      But Thorgrim had acquitted himself well, apparently, which was good, because they were linked now in the minds of the men of the Black Raven and the others: Arinbjorn and Thorgrim. Arinbjorn had taken a risk, a carefully calculated risk, asking Thorgrim to join his company. He had done it to enhance his own status by association with the man from Vik. Thorgrim’s reputation was spreading in Dubh-linn, and Arinbjorn hoped to get some of that bright light to reflect on him.
      It could have gone the other way – Thorgrim could have let Arinbjorn down, or worse, outshone him. But thus far it seemed to be playing out as hoped. Arinbjorn the leader and his hirdsman Thorgrim. Which was not exactly the case. To say Thorgrim was a hirdsman was to suggest he was a permanent part of Arinbjorn hird, his private force of warriors. And Thorgrim was not that. Thorgrim was part of the félag, the fellowship of men who had signed aboard the Black Raven for this voyage. They owed allegiance to Arinbjorn, and to one another, for the time that voyage lasted, and no more. But that still meant that any glory Thorgrim accrued would be shared by Arinbjorn.
      And so Arinbjorn did not just sleep, he slept well. Nothing had occurred on that day of battle to trouble his mind and disturb his rest, and his circumstances were comfortable enough. Unlike many of the Viking host, who were asleep on the damp ground wrapped in furs, Arinbjorn was lying on a portable bed, the posts of which were carved into the heads of leering beasts. That and his armor and weapons and sea chest were housed under a red and white striped marquee which his slaves had hauled up from the Black Raven once he was certain the Irish were gone for good.
      In the dream he was having, Arinbjorn was arguing with someone, and then a second person joined in, and though the words were not very distinct, and the topic of the argument (it might have been a negotiation as well) was not clear, Arinbjorn was winning handily, turning each of their rhetorical thrusts away. He had a sense of euphoria and triumph. And then, suddenly, he was no longer winning. His arguments were collapsing, he was tongue-tied, he could see the grins on the faces of the men with whom he was debating. The euphoria turned to panic.
      He woke with a gasp and looked around the marquee, dimly lit with a single candle he kept burning all night. He realized there were voices outside the flap. One was Hrafn Troll, the man assigned to stand guard for the night watch.