Viking Gold by V. Campbell

breakfast.”
    Redknee took a handful of the
roasted pine kernels and stuffed them into his mouth. They’d always been his
mother’s favourite. He remembered her teaching him to count with them when he
was little more than a babe in arms. He held out a second handful for Silver.
    His mother smiled and turned
towards the far wall. At first, he thought she was looking for something on the
floor, then he realised she had opened a secret door beneath the loom. He
peered over her shoulder and saw the door hid a shallow compartment hewn in the
dirt.
    She pulled out a long, thin
bundle of rags. “I didn’t want the men to find this,” she said. “And what man
ever comes into the weaving hut?”
    Redknee smiled, for it was
true.
    She unwrapped the parcel and
Redknee gasped. A blade as long as a man’s leg and straight as an arrow, shone
in the lamplight. The sword was the finest he’d ever seen. As he took it in his
hands, heat surged along his arms and spread through his body. Every nerve
tingled. He made a sweeping motion with the steel blade that seemed to split
the air in two. Silver’s amber eyes followed its every move.
    “Was it my father’s?” he
asked.
    His mother tilted her head to
one side, studying him. “Your father used it for a while,” she said eventually.
“But it belonged to my father – your grandfather.”
    Redknee inspected the
workmanship more closely. A pattern of interlaced copper decorated hilt and
pommel. He turned it in his hand. A shallow groove ran the length of the blade,
the better to collect blood and aid withdrawal from spasmed muscles.
    “It’s yours to keep.”
    “Mine? But you’ve heard the
men, I’m no fighter—”
    “You’re my only child. And,
much as I wish it wasn’t true, I’ve a feeling you’re going to need it. But you
must promise me you will never use it in vengeance.” Redknee nodded.
    “No,” she said. “You must say
the words, for it will not be easy.”
    “Alright,” Redknee said,
shrugging. “I’ll never use it for revenge. But what about Uncle Sven?”
    She folded her hands beneath
her cloak. “What about him?”
    “He would have more use for
it.”
    “My father didn’t want it to
go to Sven.”
    Redknee digested this. From
the stories he’d heard, he couldn’t understand anyone favouring his father over
Uncle Sven. Strong and clever Uncle Sven who had taken Redknee under his wing
as his own son and who led the village so ably. “Why?” Redknee asked.
“Why did grandfather not want the sword to go to Sven?”
    “I don’t know,” she said,
tensing. “But it belongs with you.” As she said these last words, her eyes
darted towards the door.
    His mother knew more, but he
nodded slowly, in a kind of understanding. She had kept the sword for him – she believed in him. That was enough. Perhaps his grandfather had too,
though he didn’t remember the old man.
    He thought about pushing her
again for answers about his father. But her pinched face warned him not to. He
would bide his time – ask her again when the time was right. Eventually, he
asked, “Does the sword have a name?”
    “If it does,” she said
smiling, clearly more comfortable with this question, “I don’t know it.”
    Redknee held the sword aloft.
Sunlight streamed through a crack in the door and reflected off the blade. “I
shall call you Flame Weaver ,” he said, “after this place where you have
hidden, waiting for me.”
    Shouts came from outside the
weaving hut. “Wait here,” Redknee said, pushing Silver into his mother’s arms
as he sped through the door.
    Women and children were
running for the longhouses, their faces pale with fear. Equally terrified men
ran towards the approach road. He saw Magnus struggling into his leather
breastplate and grabbed his arm. “What’s happening?”
    “Ragnar is coming,” Magnus
said, fumbling with a complex arrangement of straps. “Will you help me into
this damn thing? My hands are shaking.”
    Redknee secured the