Free Storm at the Edge of Time by Pamela F. Service

We’ll eat first and then go around looking at all the rafter ends in the village.”
    As they climbed the steep path and then continued up the village’s central street, Jamie realized that this would not be easy. All the buildings had stone walls with roofs made from slabs of grassy earth held up by beams, the ends of which just poked out from under the turf. A lot of those ends were carved.
    But it was hard to look at beam ends with all those interesting people on the street. They were dressed in heavy woolens and various types of fur. On the whole, Jamie didn’t think they looked either as mean or as clean as she’d imagined Vikings would look. Some greeted Arni as he passed, and gave his companions curious stares. She noticed Tyaak pulling his hood more tightly over his head.
    â€œThis is my house,” Arni said proudly. Jamie was not impressed and, by the wrinkling of Tyaak’s nose, she guessed that he wasn’t either. She hoped that whatever code of politeness the Kreeth had would at least keep him quiet.
    Pushing aside a leather hanging, they stepped through the low doorway. Inside, the rectangular stonehouse was all one room. Along one wall ran a built-in stone bench with bedrolls of blankets and furs. Most of the light came from the hearth in the center of the floor and from the smoke hole in the roof above it. Leather curtains were pegged firmly over narrow windows.
    â€œLooks like Mother’s out, and Father’s sure to be with the Earl.” Arni added proudly, “He’s not only Thorfinn’s skald, you know, he’s also his cousin and friend.”
    At the moment, Jamie was more interested in whatever was in the iron pot that stood on a tripod over the fire. At the first whiff, she’d realized how ravenously hungry she was. Trying to warm up, they crouched by the glowing coals while Arni ladled a steaming mass into three clay bowls. Jamie cautiously poked at hers with a carved bone spoon. Some sort of mush with chunks of something else in it. Fish? Gross, she thought, but hungrily spooned in mouthfuls anyway.
    After a couple of helpings, Jamie put down her bowl and asked, “This great-grandmother of yours, was she really a sorceress?”
    â€œOh, yes. But surely even in your times, you know the story of Eithne and the magic banner.”
    â€œSurely we do not,” Tyaak grumbled, “and surely we do not want to, either.”
    â€œBut you should anyway,” the younger boy insisted. “After all, she seems to be your ancestor too.”
    Arni put down his bowl and sat up rather stiffly. His voice became high as he switched into singsong chant. “Now, after Earl Ljot’s death, his brother Hlodvir took charge of the earldom and ruled well. He married Eithne the Sorceress, daughter of King Kjarval of Irelandand his Orkney bride, and their son was Sigurd the Stout. After Hlodvir’s death, Sigurd became a great chieftain and ruled Caithness as well as Orkney, defending them against the Scots. Every summer he went on splendid Viking expeditions as well, plundering in the Hebrides, Scotland, and Ireland.
    â€œOne summer it happened that a Scottish earl challenged Sigurd to a fight and, as his mother, Eithne, was a sorceress, he consulted her, saying that the odds against him were heavy.
    â€œâ€˜Had I thought you wanted a safe life,’ she taunted him, ‘I would have raised you in my wool basket. But fate, not wiles, will rule your life. Take this banner. I have made it for you with all the skills I have. It will bring victory to the man it is carried before, but death to the one who carries it.’
    â€œThe Earl took the banner, finely worked with the figure of a raven. He gathered what men he could for the battle and sailed to meet the Scottish earl. The moment the two sides clashed, Sigurd’s standard-bearer was struck dead. The Earl told another man to pick up the banner, but before long he too had been