"Saga" - chapter 5
Content - Brokeback AuAu fic taking place in the Viking era (Scandinavia, ca AD 850).This chapter rated PG.
Disclaimer - The original Ennis and Jack who inspired this fic do not belong to me, but to Annie Proulx, Diana Ossana, Larry McMurtry and Focus Features. I intend no disrespect and make no profit.
A/Ns - Explanations of names and terms follow after each chapter. Thank you to Soulan who beta’d this chapter.
Warnings - None for this chapter
Link to previous chapters:
Chapter 1: http://gilli-ann.livejournal.com/22271.html
Chapter 2: http://gilli-ann.livejournal.com/32308.html
Chapter 3: http://gilli-ann.livejournal.com/33130.html
Chapter 4: http://gilli-ann.livejournal.com/33946.html
Saga - Chapter 5
The last leg of the road home took them past Mjod’s farm. Both brothers agreed there was no reason to delay the talks on how to handle the betrothal. In fact, their willingness to tackle the matter as soon as possible and before Mjod heard of Ketil’s return from others might well mean the necessary difference in their favor.
It was early evening when they rode in among the low long houses to dismount in the courtyard. The farm was a goodly size and though it wasn’t the biggest in the valley, not one was better kept. Just as importantly though, Mjod was a respected man in the community, even-tempered and generous, and he knew the laws in every detail. Therefore he often was called on to judge disputes at the tings. His word was listened to and his opinions counted.
Mjod’s men knew Einnis well enough to recognize him at once. One went to inform their master that his son-in-law had arrived, while another took charge of the visitors’ men and goods, helped lead the horses off and showed where to unload and stable them.
A short while later, Arna Mjodsdottir herself appeared, accompanied by a thrall woman carrying a bucket of water and some cloths. A hectic blush tinged Arna’s cheeks flatteringly, and though her everyday dress was homespun and plain, she wore several strands of colorful beads between the two oval dress brooches, and also a headscarf of fine foreign cloth interwoven with silk threads. It looked newly tied, but still did not completely cover the wisps of hair that were escaping from her long brown braids.
She smiled happily as she gave Einnis her hand.
“Einnis, welcome home and well met!” she said. “I am glad to see you returning so soon, husband-to-be, and looking in good health!” Mindful that there were others present, she behaved with the formal restraint and dignity that custom required. Her gaze went to Ketil, interest and curiosity plain in her eyes.
“I hope all is also well here with you and with yours,” Einnis answered in his turn and drew a breath. “Arna, perhaps you do not recognize him, but this is my brother Ketil. He has unexpectedly returned to us from long travels in the East, to our good fortune.”
He didn’t have to say anything more. Arna’s face stiffened slightly, but her smile remained fixed in place and she welcomed Ketil politely before showing the both of them to the box bench in the house where they would be sleeping.
“When you have had the chance to clean up and wash away the dirt of travel, there will be food in the hall, and my father will be there to greet you,” she said, giving Ennis a long searching look as she took her leave.
--
Mjod received them with good food and excellent drink. Talk at the high table mostly circled around Ketil’s adventures in the East and also, for a brief while, Einnis’s raids in the West. The brothers heard news from the farms in the valley and from the home country, where there had been unrest and many rumors of war over the summer.
When the meal was over and the tables had been cleared, Mjod asked his guests to remain seated, and signaled to Arna to come up from the women’s table to sit next to him. ““What we have to discuss concerns you too, daughter.”
A bowl of ale and a drinking horn filled with mead was brought forth, and with that they were left alone and could speak freely.
Ketil, being the older of the brothers and therefore representing the clan, spoke up first. After thanking Mjod for his hospitality and praising his household, he turned directly to the subject of the betrothal, laying out the new circumstances and the ways the brothers proposed that things be arranged. Einnis would take over the old outfarm, he said. It had fallen into disrepair and would need to be completely rebuilt, and though it currently was used for pasture, new fields would also have to be cleared so it could support a full household. But on the other hand, both brothers were returning home richer men than when they set out, and so instead of acreage they would be able to put forward a weight of gold and silver to pay Arna’s mundr and to serve as a respectable bride price, equivalent to her dowry - which would however have to be reduced compared to the previous agreement.
Mjod heard Ketil out in silence, his face calm and observant, not betraying any thoughts. He asked some questions, and at this Einnis too broke his silence, responding with more details. The mead horn and the talk passed back and forth between the three men, and Arna sat quietly listening, eyes lowered but face intent.
At last Mjod nodded his understanding of their proposal and turned to her. “What say you to this, daughter?”
“I think it is good that Ketil Elmarson has returned and is here to speak for Einnis today, father. The support of a strong brother is of great value, it strengthens the clan, and just so will the kinship also be valuable for those who come to call Einnis and his brother their in-laws,” she responded evenly.
Mjod let a tiny proud smile cross his face.
“You don’t object to their proposal, then?” he queried mildly.
“I don’t, father.”
Ketil abruptly lifted the ale bowl and drank deeply.
Mjod paid him no heed now but let his eyes rest on Einnis, considering the situation and weighing the options.
“I am of one mind with my daughter in this”, he said at last. “It is well that your brother has returned, and that you both came here to sort things out so quickly. It is clear that you seek to be fair to Arna in what you have proposed, and to stand by your plight troth as a man of honor. But she is the last of my daughters that I marry off, and I will not see her become a lesser woman than her sisters. She will only marry a man who is the master of his own farm, so that she will move in the mistress of a household in her own right, and can carry the keys proudly.”
He nodded in confirmation.
“I therefore agree to uphold the betrothal despite altered terms, but I will also make full use of my right under the law to have the wedding delayed for one full year. This is my condition. If the outfarm is rebuilt and improved the way you plan it, so that you and Arna can move in there and live prosperously and well, then we will call each other proper in-laws in one year’s time and be in full agreement.”
Ketil and Einnis exchanged looks. Einnis nodded. A relieved smile made his face light up with sudden delight.
Arna’s hands lifted as if in involuntary protest at her father’s words, and her head twitched, but she pressed her lips firmly shut, looked down and spoke no word.
Thereupon Mjod called for witnesses, and the brothers shook hands with him to seal their agreement. Arna still kept silent, but her hand gripped Einnis’s firmly when the time came for them to solemnly re-confim their troth. She held his hand and was smiling again by the time he gave her the coming-home gift he had brought for her; he’d found it in a box of treasures carried by a hapless group of Irish trying unsuccessfully to flee the Norse invaders. It was a small and beautiful golden trefoil brooch, clearly made by a skilled goldsmith, decorated with scrollwork and filigree, and with an inset of three large jewels. One was sky-blue, one showed translucent shades of brown, and the last was a crimson garnet, its tear-drop shape making it look almost like a splash of heart’s blood.
--
The male thralls’ room was small, crowded and smelled strongly of damp straw and smoke, unwashed bodies and the stomach illness that ailed one of the men. Eoin tried bravely to get some rest and to sleep where he had been shown, sharing a narrow pallet in one corner with a tall thin man who kept farting loudly. Smoke from the unseasoned wood that had been put on the tiny open hearth hung heavily in the air. Snores and mutters filled the room.
He was a long way away from the small monastery church suffused with lights, the stark simplicity of the novices’ hall and the monk cells with their cold bare stone floors, the silence at prayer, the beautiful chanting before the altar, the cloister gardens and fields.
Now he even missed the fresh salty air and chill rain squalls on the Norsemen’s ship. A ship filled with barbarians and strangers! He would never know who among the monks had been killed, and how many managed to escape. He could only pray they were all of them alive somewhere. There had been no other monastery captives onboard the Raven’s Wing.
The man next to him grunted loudly, then turned over and slammed an elbow into Eoin’s side, before snoring on, oblivious.
The worst thing of all was the constant disdain. As a thrall he was invisible to most, it seemed, but some freemen looked at him with open contempt. As soon as his owner wasn’t around they’d send a cuff or a kick in his direction if he didn’t get out of their way or immediately do as he was told. He had recognized the look in their eyes all too well, having grown up with exactly that same disgust and scorn from his mother’s husband. “Father” was an ill-fitting word in his mouth.
The thralls here at Mjod’s farm on their part were suspicious of a foreigner who couldn’t even speak properly, who took up space and needed a share of the food, who made a foreign god’s sign and probably thought himself far above them. Luckily they were worn out from the day’s labor and appeared largely disinterested in anything else than their solid portions of porridge and in getting to sleep, so Eoin had been left alone.
He stared into the near-darkness, feeling ready to choke at the stench and lack of air. His eyes stung from the smoke and itched with dust motes from old crushed hay.
He sighed. Only one person had looked directly at him, seen him for the man he was and sworn to keep doing so. But Einnis Elmarson had suddenly changed his ways. Perhaps that haughty brother of his had told him not to squander his honor and time on a lowly thrall. Eoin wasn’t blind to Ketil’s disdainful glares in his direction.
Silent prayers didn’t help calm his mind, and at last he could lie still no more. He crawled over his snoring bedfellow and cautiously stepped over several other prone shapes to get to the door. Pushing it carefully open he made the sign of the cross and ducked through to the outside.
The contrast of fresh air was surprising and so wonderful it nearly overwhelmed him. It was like emerging from one of the circles of hell to step back into the realm of the living.
He had no real business being outside, he knew, although he could always use needing the latrines as an excuse. But he craved a little peace and quiet. He slinked around the house and the cowshed, stopping to lean up against the stable wall, staying hidden there by deep shadows. He listened to the comforting low noises of the horses in their stalls, and looked out over the silent courtyard to the main hall directly opposite.
Rain-clouds had drifted in from the east, and the night was dark. But after a while he could nevertheless make out a few approaching shapes by the flickering light from the main hall’s torches. The bulky form of Ketil Elmarson was easily recognizable walking in front. The man behind him, who had to be Einnis, was partly obscured from view by a woman in a long trailing dress and with a brooch at her throat that glinted in the torchlight.
The three of them stopped by the door of the house next to the hall. A few words were spoken, and with that Ketil ducked through the door and disappeared. But Einnis and the woman remained standing outside in the near-darkness, close together, heads inclined towards the other, seemingly speaking softly. As Eoin watched, the woman reached up and determinedly put both arms around Einnis’s neck, clinging close and offering herself up for kisses. Einnis responded with clumsy slowness at first, but did lean in to meet her. Then he put his arms around her firmly, kissing her in earnest now. Their two shadows in the night merged into one, holding the embrace, swaying slightly in the concealing darkness.
Eoin looked away. It was getting very late and he shouldn’t be outside, away from the thralls’ room, loitering about in the dark. If he was discovered he’d probably be given a beating or worse. They’d surely assume he was up to mischief - thievery, maybe, or even flight.
He returned to his pallet as quietly as he’d left. The smelly, noisy, stifling darkness fit his mood. He felt about as bad as he ever had, and that was saying something, for Eoin of Telach Og had not had an easy life.
Tbc….
Notes and explanations;
Dowry, bride price, mundr - A woman who married got a dowry from her family. The husband had to present a “bride price” of equal worth. Depending on the family wealth, the values involved could range from multiple farms and properties to some few bolts of cloth. In addition the groom also had to pay mundr, which was an additional gift/fee on the marriage contract. All this was required for the marriage to be legally binding (and hence for it to count in inheritance cases). Just as importantly from a woman’s standpoint today, the dowry, bride price and mundr all were the marrying woman’s legal property. Her husband would normally manage it in marriage, but if he squandered it, this gave her legal grounds for divorce, in which case all the remaining assets followed her out of the marriage.
Right to delay a wedding - a betrothal was a legally binding agreement, but the laws did actually contain a clause allowing one party to demand up to one year’s delay in certain circumstances.
Norse women’s clothing - Normally an apron overdress over a longer underdress, and with a domed oval brooch at each shoulder holding the overdress in place. Between the two brooches there would be strings of bead necklaces as well as other jewelry, and also she would have keys, scissors, a fire striker etc. (depending on her duties and her station) hanging from the brooches or from a woven belt. Women also wore headscarves, and shawls when needed. Here is a link to a picture of a woman in replica Viking dress: http://www.lofotr.no/gfx/Husfruen%20serverer%20sodd.jpg
