Kushiel's Dart - Jacqueline Carey [184]
The great hall was full to bursting, and it was cursedly warm atop the rafter with the heat of the fire and so many bodies. Some had taken seats where they could, but most were standing, including Waldemar Selig, who stood taller than any man there. I had not missed much, it seemed. A priest of Odhinn had asked the blessing of the All-Father and the Aesir, and the assembled Skaldic chieftains and thanes swore loyalty to Selig, one by one; they were just finishing, when I began to listen.
Selig waited for them to quiet, his hands on his hips. A half-dozen of the White Brethren surrounded him, making a dark spot in a pool of white, seen from above.
"When our forefathers met at the Allthing," he began, pitching his voice to carry, "it was to settle disputes among the tribes, to make trade and marriage perhaps, to meet old enemies in the holmgang, or to affirm the borders of the territories each had carved out for himself. That is not why we meet." He turned slowly, surveying them all; I could see by their rapt attention that he held them in his palm. "We are a nation of warriors, the fiercest the world has known. Caerdicci nursemaids tell their children to hush, lest the Skaldi take them. And yet the world ignores us, safe in the knowledge that our savagery is contained within our borders, turned in upon itself, that while nations rise and fall, great palaces are built and crumble, books are written, roads are built and ships are sailed, the Skaldi snarl and bite and kill each other, and make songs about it."
That drew a grumble of protest; he'd cut to the heart of sacred Skaldi tradition. I could see Selig unmoving, though he raised his voice a notch.
"It is a true thing I speak! Across our border, in Terre d'Ange, the lordlings dress in silk from Ch'in and eat pheasant from silver plates in halls of Caerdicci marble, while we brawl in our wooden halls, dressed in hides and gnaw meat from the bone!"
"'Tis the marrow that's sweetest, Selig!" some wag cried; from my perch, I saw him receive a sharp elbow to the ribs. Waldemar Selig ignored him.
"In the name of the All-Father," he continued, "we are better than that! Do you seek glory, my brothers? Think on it. What glory is there in slaying one another? We must take our place in this world, and make a name for ourselves; no mere bogeymen to scare children, but a name such as the armies of Tiberium won long ago, to be spoken in fear and reverence across the face of a thousand lands! No more will the Skaldi be fighting dogs on a chain, bought for hire to safeguard the passage of Caerdicci or D'Angeline caravans, but rulers at whose passage the sons and daughters of conquered nations will kneel and clutch their forelocks in respect!"
He had won them over; I shuddered at the resounding cheer, gazing down at their flushed faces. Even the women, I saw with sorrow, shouted approval. Even kind Hedwig, whose eyes shone at Selig's words, imagining herself, no doubt, mistress of a marble hall, swathed in silks and velvet.
I cannot blame them, in truth, for desiring. To glory in the splendor of one's homeland is a magnificent thing. But they were like children, who have only just begun to grasp the idea of a thing. And like children, they had no notion of laboring to create, but only of having . . . and no thought given to the cost, to others, of taking it.
One man, some forty years of age, fully as broad through the shoulder though not so tall as Waldemar Selig, spoke up. I did not know who he was then, but I learned it later: Kolbjorn of the Manni, whose thanes had been foremost in gathering information to the south. "How do you propose we achieve this, Selig?" he asked pragmatically. "This I know, the city-states of Caerdicca Unitas are on guard against us and have made treaties to defend against invasion. There are watch-towers and garrisons from Milazza to La Serenissima, and swift roads all the way south. Tiberium may no longer command an empire, but she can still