Ulf and Loke's Revenge

By Sophie Swerts Knudsen

On their way to England, mysterious storms nearly destroy the Seasnake, and only because Jarl Harald the Soft enters into a dark pact with the trickster God Loke, most of the men survive the shipwreck and reach the English coast safely. England however, hides more danger. The local landlord, Erwin, immediately attacks the Vikings in the dark of night and slays many of the crew members in their sleep. Now completely outnumbered and without a seaworthy boat, the Vikings’ future looks gloomy. But when Ulf captures a highborn lady, their luck seems to turn again. In return for the life of the hostage, Ulf demands a truce and wood to patch up the boat. While Ulf and his men face their challenges in England, Erlend, Ulf’s biggest enemy is lured into a devilish pact with Loke. Pushed by his own thirst for revenge towards Ulf and hungry for greatness, Erlend’s ax creates horrible chaos in Alekstrathir. Erlend’s murderous trail only stops when the Seasnake finally reaches the jetty of Aleksthratir again. But by then, it is already too late...

• Language: English
• Publisher: Sophie Swerts Knudsen
• Release date: Jun 7, 2020
• ISBN: 9780463739068

Sophie Swerts Knudsen

Sophie Swerts Knudsen was born in Belgium but currently lives in Copenhagen, Denmark with her Danish husband and two daughters. Sophie studied Translation Studies in English, Italian and Dutch at the University of Antwerp/Leuven in Belgium. After graduation, she worked as a tour director in the USA and Canada for two years.Today, Sophie teaches English at the University of Copenhagen and she writes books in her spare time. The inspiration for her books derives from her many travels in the USA and Canada, but also her immediate surroundings in Scandinavia.

Book preview

Ulf and Loke's Revenge

Published by Sophie Swerts Knudsen, 2020

www.sophieswertsknudsen.com

© 2020 Sophie Swerts Knudsen

All rights reserved

Other books in the Ulf series:

Ulf_Cover-thump

Ulf and the Sword of Thor (1)

Available at Smashwords

Other titles by Sophie Swerts Knudsen:

Lilli_Cover-thump

Lilli en de Bloemenelfjes

Available at Smashwords

ULF-2-cover-thump

Wolf

Available at Smashwords

Chapter 1

‘Move! Out of the way! The mast is falling!’

With a thunderous crash, the ship’s mast broke; the top end fell into the water and tilted the ship dangerously to one side. Wave after wave rolled in, crashing down on the crew, and with deadly speed the ship filled with foamy, salt water. Soaking wet and ice cold, up to their knees in the water, the Vikings could no longer keep up bailing and unless a miracle happened, they were lost to the sea.

Through the roaring of the storm, Harald shouted orders from left to right, but his voice got carried away on the hurricane-strong gusts of the wind. The downpour felt like daggers cutting their faces, the salt of the sea pricked their eyes and the howling wind deafened them to anything else but their own voices warning each other not to be washed overboard. Then, an enormous wave rolled over the ship, covered it with white water, and pulled back with an incredible force that made it impossible to stand on deck. Ulfrick and Svein, two of the youngest Vikings, bravely trying to cut the ropes that connected the sails to the mast, were swept off their feet and pulled overboard by the power of the retreating water. Their screams disappeared in the wind. With horror, Ulf stared at their gaping mouths and waving hands reaching out helplessly from the giant waves, but mercilessly, the wind drove the boat further away from them, and in no time the young men were out of sight and doomed. They would die the terrible death of drowning in afreezing, black, raging sea.

‘Tie yourself to the sides of the ship. Do it fast!’ Ulf yelled to the men around him. In panic, he grabbed a rope from his bench and tied himself to the beam underneath his shield, praying to the gods that the ship would not capsize. If it did, he would inevitably be pulled down with it.

Shivering from the frosty water that had drenched him and all the other crew members, Ulf curled up against the inside hull. Thyrfing, his sword blessed by the priestess Nana, and which carried the mysterious runes ‘Ulf Thorsson,’ now shone with a bright blue light, a sign that danger was all around them – but this danger he could not fight. All he could do was pray to his father Thor, but by the hairy asses of his goats, where in Odin’s name was he? Why did he do this to them? The young Viking hid his face between his knees to protect himself from the raging rain.

For what seemed an eternity, the ship was bashed by the sea. The waves were tossing the boat back and forth like a die on a playing board. Thunderous booms were followed by brilliant shocks of white light forked in the dark skies above them.

‘Father! Why this storm from Hel? What did we do wrong?’ With squinted eyes, Ulf peered at the skies, but he could not make out his father’s goats among the fat, gloomy clouds that had packed around the Viking boat. It was as if a dark force had surrounded the ship. In silence, he prayed to Thor and hoped he would spare his life and the lives of the rest of the crew.

When the morning finally arrived, the sea was calm. A ray of sunlight shone through the dense grey clouds, and the crew, battered and exhausted, woke up to an astounding sight. The damage that had been done to their boat was enormous; the Sea Snake was no longer seaworthy, but looked more like a raft that had survived a disaster. The mast and sail, as well as the prow and figurehead that had been the pride of the ship, had all disappeared. On one side, all the oar locks had been broken off, and most of the goods under the rowing chests were gone. The shields, foodars and weapons had almost all disappeared in the waves.

Broken, Harald the Soft sat at the front of the tormented ship with his back towards his crew. He simply did not understand why Thor would send a storm this devastating if his son was on board? Storms were normal; he had experienced many of them, but this one had been particularly nasty. Why in Odin’s name would Thor let that happen? Harald dropped his head and shook it in incomprehension.

‘Why have the gods forsaken us?’ Harald mumbled in his beard and buried his hairy face in his hands.

‘The gods did not forsake you…’ a creepy, almost inaudible voice whispered from beside him, as if the wind itself had uttered the words.

With a jerk, Harald looked up and tried to locate where the unfamiliar voice came from, but he could not see anyone to whom it belonged. The nearest Viking awake was Leif, and he was busy trying to gather what was left of the food, not paying any attention to anyone at all.

Harald looked up in the sky, turned left and right, looked once more behind him, and just when he decided to settle for having imagined the voice, he heard it again: a spooky, sighing voice that only he could hear. It swirled around his head like a veil of sticky fog.

‘Look at your pathetic boat Harald. What will you do now?’

This time, Harald could no longer deny he had heard it again. The hair on the back of his neck stood straight up, and chills ran down his spine from fear of the cruelty that was hidden in the chilling whispers.

‘Who are you?’ Harald said as quietly as possible, looking around in panic.

‘He-he, as if you don’t know,’ the voice said, and it blew ice-cold air into Harald’s already frozen face.

The jarl thought he was going mad. He was being toyed with. The gods had to be punishing him.

‘Show yourself, creature from the other world. Show your face, so I can see who is haunting me!’ With eyes full of hatred for the entity that mocked him, Harald leaned over the broken rail of the boat and stared into the water, peering through the tiny waves, trying to distinguish anything that might seem like an entity haunting him.

‘Where are you. Show yourself. Are you Hel? Are you the mistress of Niflheim ready to come and get me?’ His voice betrayed a deep fear for the cold place of death.

‘No Harald. You’re not dead yet! Unless of course…’ the voice snarled.

‘Unless what?’ Harald asked carefully.

‘Unless you don’t do what I tell you to do.’ Now there was silence.

‘What do you want me to do? Why should I do anything for you? You, who threaten me.’

‘Come to the front of your boat, Harald, and look into the water.’

Harald leaned over the side of the shattered prow and in front of him on the water surface, he noticed a reflection in the waves. He rubbed his eyes and looked again. The figure in the water started to take the blurred shape of a person, dressed in black, with long, shiny jet-black hair and piercing black eyes. The smile on his face was mysterious and evil.

‘By Odin and all the gods in Asgaard. Who are you?’ Harald whispered, trying not to let any of the others hear him. They would probably think he was crazy. He thought himself that he was going crazy.

‘I’m the one who will help you, Harald.’ The dark figure grinned.

Harald was perplexed. ‘Ha! How could you help a bunch of shipwrecked Vikings in the middle of the sea with nothing left but a raft?’

‘I could guide you to the shores of England…’ Now, the voice had become soothing and sweet.

Harald frowned. He didn’t trust the dark image in the water. The rippling of the waves made the image move up and down. He could not really make out the face of the figure and trying to focus on the ripples in the water made him feel seasick.

‘What say you, Harald? Do you want my help, or do you want to be devoured by the raging sea in the next storm? For make no mistake! I can assure you; a next storm is coming! Just look at the horizon.’ An arm in the water pointed into the direction of the pitch-black darkness towards which they were drifting.

Harald turned his head towards the south and noticed the giant thunder heads and he felt sick to his stomach.

‘Who, in Odin’s name, are you?’ He asked again, genuinely frightened by the prospect of fighting another storm and inevitably drowning in the sea.

‘Is that really important, Harald, when I am all you have left to save your petty lives?’

‘Thor would not let us suffer yet another storm. His son is on board. He would not allow us to sink.’ Harald replied as confidently as possible, but he did not really believe his own words. Why had Thor let them suffer so much in the first place?

‘Thor. Pfff, I spit on him. Can you see him in the thunder clouds? Was he here when your Vikings were swallowed by the sea? Did he stop this outrageous storm? No, he did not! Let me put it this way, Harald the Soft; the god of thunder and lightning is not really available right now. I’m all you’ve got.’ A splash of a wave in Harald’s face supported the message of the image in the water.

Harald’s eyes became big with disbelief. Thor had many enemies, but only one would dare to defy him: Loke!

‘By Odin’s one eye, this can’t be true? Loke, is it you?’ Harald asked in disbelief.

As soon as Harald had mentioned the name of the trickster god, his image in the water became clearer and the grin on his face more terrifying and ghoulish.

‘Yes, Harald the Soft, you guessed right. I am Loke, Thor’s brother, who I sincerely hate.’ The voice was full of heavy irony.

‘And in pursuit of my plan, I needed to cause some havoc in your life and that of your crew. You see, you, my dear soft Jarl, need to do something for me.’ And he spat out the word ‘soft’, as if it was a disgrace to be anything but soft.

‘Never! I don’t do business with you Loke, I know you don’t play fair.’ Harald, who had seldom been scared in his life, suddenly felt his intestines squeezing together.

‘We’ll see about that, my dear Jarl. I suppose you don’t really want to lose another two men of your crew, do you? It’s so hard for a captain to lose men. You think they’re safe but then one silly little wave rolls in and poofff, they are gone – forever.’

‘Were you behind their pointless deaths?’ In Harald’s words, Loke could now sense the despair and he knew he had nearly won.

‘In return for the souls of some of your men, I made a deal with several draugs. You know they once were Vikings too, like you, but then, the sea claimed them, and their untimely death turned them into monsters.’ A gruesome laugh emphasized the last words.

‘In fact, the storms created by the draugs make Thor’s storms feel like a breeze on an early spring day. Why? Well, my dear Jarl – because draug storms are all rage, fury and evil. Draugs are nothing but vengeful creatures who would do anything to hand others the same faith they experienced. They can’t wait to unleash another one of their storms on you, finish you off and drag you into their own wet grave.’ Loke’s laughter rattled in Harald’s ear. The jarl no longer spoke. He knew there was nothing he could do.

‘Now, my dear jarl, here’s what you’ll do if you want to survive the next storm. During what is left of this day, I ‘ll guide you safely to the shores of the English coast. There, you’ll camp by the river at the edge of the forest. Your Vikings will have doubts about the place because they will not deem it safe, but you’ll soothe them and convince them it is. Besides, they will be too tired to fight your decision and too eager to rest. I don’t care if you attack the village in the early morning and kill all its inhabitants, but I need you to swear one thing! If you swear, I will save you and your sorry lot.’

Harald stared at Loke. He knew with certainty that he would have to commit himself to something horrific because that was the nature of the trickster god, and he did not want to hear it. However, he had no choice. If he did not grab this one and only chance for survival of himself and all his crew members, then they would all die.

‘What would you want me do?’ Harald asked with his head bent and eyes closed, perfectly aware he was closing a pact with evil.

Emotionless, as if it was the most normal thing in the world to wish for, Loke said: ‘Ulf needs to die. He must never return home.’ He kept smiling his eerie smile.

Harald looked up in disbelief. Ulf? Ulf the Brave? The most courageous, noble boy in the entire region? Why… had he done anyone wrong? Shocked and completely unwilling to kill Ulf, Harald said, ‘By all the gods of Asgaard, whatever for? Ulf is the most promising warrior we have. He is courageous, intelligent and noble.’

‘Exactly for those very reasons. That half-son of Thor is too good to walk around. He needs to die!’ Loke snapped back.

‘Then why don’t you kill him yourself if you so badly want him dead?’ Harald asked.

‘It might be better for peace among the gods here at Asgaard that I do not kill young Ulf myself. Anyway, all of that is none of your concern. You will obey, or the sea will be your grave and that of your men.’

Harald closed his eyes, sighed heavily and nodded reluctantly. ‘Thor will not allow it. He will come and save us from you, save his son from the fate you have in store for him,’ he said with his chin jutting forward.

‘Ha! Thor, that big bully is asleep, and will be for a long time. I made sure he is. With the liters of beer that he drank last night at the table of our father Odin, he will not wake up for another day. That should give me more than enough time to execute my plan to unleash another storm on you.’ Loke looked at his fingertips and smiled eerily.

‘It will be done.’ Harald whispered ashamed, realizing he could not count an anyone to help him. He knew perfectly well it was utterly dishonorable to sentence one of his warriors to death for no reason, especially young Ulf whom he had sworn to protect when Gudrun, his mother had let him leave with the Sea Snake. But did he have a choice? Could he justify denying Loke Ulf’s life if that would save all his other men? One life was a cheap price in exchange for 45 other lives. Harald shook his head in despair. He knew he was only trying to convince himself and could not find any arguments for not protecting the young boy. He looked in the direction of the storm again, and noticed how bolts of lightning hit the water, and waves as high as trees approached their petty excuse for a boat with deadly speed. He looked Loke straight in his black eyes and said the words of Ulf’s doom again: ‘It will be done.’

‘Wonderful!’ Loke said joyfully, as if he had just struck a fabulous bargain. But immediately after, in a not to be misunderstood creepy tone, he added: ‘One more thing, Harald the Soft. In case you fail, I will make you and your dear ones pay!’

The image in the water disappeared but something that resembled a current suddenly pushed the wreck forward with an unnatural speed. Harald remained at the front of the raft and stared into the water. He looked over his shoulder and noticed Ulf