We talked as best we could: despite what I had said, Helmuth's Latin was not good, and it was polluted with many strange words in several languages. Even so, in the days to follow, we began to understand one another better and I pieced together the story of how he came to serve Gunnar. With many hesitations and much misunderstanding on both sides, Helmuth eventually explained about the war that left old Ake the Reticent and his bellicose son, Svein, dead, and Rapp the Hammerer on the throne. "Rapp was no believer in anything save the war hammer in his hand," Helmuth observed bitterly. "Rapp made slaves of all the undead. No, ah-he made slaves of those who yet lived-"
"The survivors."
"Heya, the survivors! Some he sold; some he kept. He reckoned Saecsens useful, so he kept Ceawlin and me; he thought we might make good hostages if the Saecsenfolk attacked him. We served in his hall until he died."
"What happened then?"
"He had twice boychilds-"
"Two sons. He had two sons."
"Heya. Thorkel, the elder, and Ragnar, the younger. After Rapp died-choking on a marrow bone in his drinking hall-Thorkel took the throne. He was not a bad jarl, but he was no Christian man, either."
"What happened to him?"
"He went a-viking," Helmuth said wistfully, "and never returned. They waited two years and then made Ragnar kung."
"King?"
"Heya. Yellow Hair has been kung ever since." The swineherd shrugged. "The people like him because he is more generous than his father and brother ever were. Whatever he has, he gives away with all regret-no regret, I mean."
"Including his slaves."
Helmuth sighed. "Including his slaves, heya. He gave me to Gunnar's father, Gronig, who made me his swineherd-though I can read and write, mind-and here I have been ever since. I make no complaint; I am well treated."
"Have you never tried to escape?"
Helmuth spread his hands and opened his eyes wide. "Where would I go? There are wolves in the forest, and wild men everywhere else." He smiled a little ruefully. "My place is here; I have my pigs to look after." He looked around, counted them quickly to assure himself that all were still in sight.
"What of Odd?" I asked.
"Gunnar bought him to work the farm," Helmuth said, and explained how a blow on the head when he was captured had deprived Odd of all but the simplest speech. "Slow-witted he may be, but Odd is a hard worker, and very strong." He paused, then said, "I would know, Aeddan-"
"Aidan," I corrected.
"I would know how is it that you come to be here. Has Gunnar won you, or did he buy you in Jutland at the slave market?"
"He captured me," I answered, and told him about the night raid on the village-careful to omit any mention of the pilgrimage or the treasure. "Then, when we reached the settlement, he gave Yellow Hair three gold pieces for me."
"Gunnar is a good master, heya," Helmuth told me. "He seldom beats me, even when he is drunk. And Karin is a woman worthy of praise in any tongue; she is master of the kitchen, and all that passes beneath her-" he hesitated, "eyesight?"
"Gaze," I suggested gently. "All that passes beneath her gaze."
"Heya. They are good people," he said, adding thoughtfully, "Gunnar says that he shall carve out both our tongues if I do not teach you to speak like a Dane before the next full moon."
With such an attractive incentive before us, we began my formal instruction that very morning. Helmuth, faltering and tongue-tied, grew more certain as more memories of his childhood occupation under Ceawlin's tutelage came back to him. After a shaky beginning, we soon worked out a system of learning whereby I would point to a thing saying the Latin word-thereby helping Helmuth recall his learning-to which he would reply with the appropriate word in the northern speech. I would then repeat this word aloud many times to impress it on my memory.
After many days of such discipline, I obtained a rough sense of the tongue-if sense it was-and could name a good many of the common things around me. Helmuth gradually introduced words that implied an action: to chop, to dig, to plant, to make a fire, and so on. I found in him a willing teacher and easy companion, good-natured, patient, eager to help. What is more, I no longer thought he smelled of pig dung.
Odd, finished with his day's work, would sit and gaze at us in bewildered amazement. What he thought about it, I never knew, for in all the time I knew him, I only ever heard him grunt.
