When the blood-soaked rites had ended, Ragnar at last led forth the greatest host ever gathered beneath his banner and turned their prows to the sea.
From the Northlands there were two well-worn roads to Britain. The northern route hugged the jagged fjords of Norway, then leapt westward to the Shetland and Orkney isles to take on fresh water, before descending upon Britain's northern shores. The southern route was harsher, demanding a straight crossing of the North Sea from southern Norway, where only the mercy of the Atlantic currents might deliver them to the eastern coast of Britain.
Because his fleet carried twenty heavy cargo-ships, ponderous and slow, Ragnar chose prudence: the northern way. He steered his host along Norway's coast, pausing at Bergen for rest.
For two days, 3,500 raiders trampled the town like restless wolves. The local lord, though wearied by their presence, dared not slight so vast an army and feigned courtesy until, to his great relief, the fleet set sail again toward the west.
"By Odin's hand," he muttered as their sails dwindled on the horizon, "may the sea rise and swallow that rabble whole."
Rurik traveled aboard a longship of forty warriors, captained by Ívar the Boneless, Ragnar's firstborn. Ívar had sailed beside his father since boyhood; though scarce more than a youth when he first went raiding, he had mastered not only the sun-dial and the North Star but also the rare craft of the sunstone.
Seeing Rurik's curiosity, Ívar held the crystal up to the pale sky. "When clouds smother the heavens and the sun is hidden," he explained, "the stone parts the light in twain. Align the beams until they are equal, and there—" he pointed, "—there lies the sun."
Rurik tried the method and soon grasped its use, though he found it crude compared to the seafaring arts he remembered from another age. "This," he sighed inwardly, "is naught but gambling with one's life."
Night fell, and when Rurik's turn came to wake, he found the world drowned in a shroud of gray mist. Searching the heavens, he saw no star, only a suffocating pall of cloud.
"What now?" he asked. Ívar raised a horn and blew three long notes, summoning the fleet. The call faded into silence. No answer came.
They were lost.
Days passed beneath the low, smothering sky. Ívar steered as best he could, holding the sunstone aloft whenever a glimmer pierced the clouds, but the Shetlands never appeared. On the third day he gave the order: "Release the raven."
Each longship bore two or three such birds, for a raven, once freed, will fly to land in search of carrion. If it vanished to one horizon, men knew to follow. If it circled back, the sea stretched empty still.
The black bird rose, circled wide, and—alas—returned to its cage. A murmur of dread passed among the men.
"It is Jörmungandr's breath!" a youth cried, eyes wide with terror. "The Midgard Serpent has sent this fog to devour us!"
Ívar struck him down with a single blow. "Bind him," he ordered coldly. "On the sea, fear is a plague. Left unchecked, it kills more surely than the waves."
The sky remained sealed. The winds grew harsh, and the sea heaved the longship like a child's toy. Some men whispered of sacrifice—one life cast into the deep to placate the gods. Ívar answered with his fists, snarling, "This ship has one master. If any man disputes it, let him face me in the ring!"
The whispers died, but unease lingered in every glance. Ívar's mind gnawed at itself. If hunger gnaws and hope fails, who will still stand at my side? He counted silently: Björn. Rurik. Nils. Fewer than five names rose to his lips.
On the eighth day the sea grew calm, the sky still heavy but the wind gentler. Ívar proclaimed it the gods' mercy, and set his men to their oars with renewed fury. At noon he loosed the last raven.
With a harsh cry, the bird wheeled above them, then turned to the southwest and vanished.
"Follow it!" Ívar roared. Every oar bit water like a spear, and the ship surged ahead.
Hours passed. Then Nilsen, keen-eyed, pointed with a shout. "Land! A cliff!"
Through the mist, gray crags rose like the teeth of giants, jagged and merciless. They had found shore.
The keel grated across a stony strand, startling a flock of gulls into flight. Leaving ten to guard the ship, Ívar led the rest inland. Soon they came upon a cluster of turf-roofed farmsteads, smoke curling from their chimneys.
He kicked open the first door. Within, a family crouched by the hearth, broth steaming in their pot. At the sight of armed strangers, they snatched up axes.
"You are Norsemen?" Ívar demanded.
"Aye," said the farmer, wary-eyed.
"Then lower your blades."
After a tense pause, Ívar declared his name. A boy of thirteen gasped aloud. "You're Ívar the Boneless? Take me with you!"
The father clamped a hand over his son's mouth, pale with fear. "Take what you will, but spare us."
Ívar chuckled, flashing what he thought a kindly smile. "Peace. I am no berserk driven mad with slaughter." He tossed them two silver coins and asked if they had seen a great fleet.
"Aye," the man replied, pouring him a bowl of soup. "Three days past, a host sailed south. These are the lands of the Picts. Poor soil, yet kinder than Norway's rock."
The Picts, thought Rurik. So we have washed upon the shores that will one day be called Scotland. In his memory, the word "Scotland" had yet to be spoken. Not until Pict and Gael were slowly bound together in the crucible of centuries would a new people emerge, and a kingdom take shape.
And as for "England," that, too, lay unborn. It would not be until Alfred the Great, king of Wessex, broke the power of the Vikings and his heirs seized the scattered realms of the Heptarchy that the English crown would rise.