The river was red. I remember that, more than anything else from that day. Women were screaming, children were crying, and I was being carried, numb. I stared downward as I was carried, and I saw pools of blood beneath me. I was tossed upward, I realized later that I’d been thrown onto a ship, but at the time I’d merely been glad that I didn’t have to look at blood anymore.

            They gathered us children, and the women they’d taken alive, and told us that we were slaves now. They put iron collars on us, and ran a chain through a loop on the back of it. The chain had an especially large link on one end, so that it couldn’t fit through the loop on our collars, and the other end was locked to a plate in the deck of the ship.

            We sailed for three days on the slave ship. At the time I did not know what it meant when one of the women slaves was released from her collar and taken below deck, and I am glad that I had not known, for I was small and still a bit innocent then. I am glad that the last of my innocence survived to be killed a few short weeks later, for the way in which one’s innocence is finally killed is one of the most important moments in a man’s life.

            After those three days we reached the open sea, and as the sky was growing dark on that third day, a panic seized the slave ship. The sail was raised, though there was no wind, and all the slaves, even I, the youngest at only six years, were pressed onto a rowing bench. We rowed, or attempted to, and I received many lashes for my arms were not long enough to be of any real help, and my muscles were much too small to do anything for the few seconds I could reach the oar.

            We rowed for a long time, though I was but a child, so it may not have been very long at all, and then another ship crashed into us, snapping our oars. Chains with sharp hooks landed on the front and back of our fat, slow ship. I watched, wide eyed, as brilliant, shining beings of steel and rage descended on the slavers.

To my eyes they seemed gods. Their boots were tall, reaching to the bottom of their knees, and most of them had polished steel belted onto their shins above their boots. All but two of them wore polished mail coats, and all had shields with various images painted onto them. I saw boars, serpents, horses, but only one caught my eye. It was a black wolf’s head on a light gray field, and it was coming toward me.

            I stared up at the man in amazement, and it must have been plain upon my face because he stopped to look at me, curious.

            “Aren’t you scared?” he asked, and he had a thick accent, for he did not speak English very well.

            “What cause do you have to kill me Lord?” I asked. I called him a lord for I was young, and innocent, and I was certain that this man was a god of death or war.

            “What cause do I have to spare you?” he asked. His men were watching us now, watching their great lord converse with a small slave boy.

“None, Lord, but I expect you would kill me quickly, and then I would not be a slave anymore, at the very least,” I said. My back was weeping blood still, and my vision was beginning to spin. I was determined to appear as strong as possible before these lords of war, though, and so I willed myself with all my strength to look as proud as a six-year-old slave could look.

            He laughed, and patted my shoulder roughly with a heavy, mailed hand. “I like you boy, what’s your name?” he asked.

            The other children were being killed, because there was only so much food and a long journey ahead, but the women were being freed from their chains, and so was I. “I can’t remember, lord,” I told him, and it was true.

            “Very well, I shall call you Gunnolf.”

            Thus began the best year of my childhood.

#

            I lived with Earl Hrolleif for over a year. It was Spring when we returned to the island over which he presided, and I stayed there for a winter before leaving in Autumn.

            I played with his children, learned the language of his people, and learned the sword. I spent every waking hour running and playing or fighting with a thin iron rod against one of Hrolleif’s oath-men, gaining many bruises and more wisdom. I also catered to the wishes of an old, half blind man, who had saved Hrolleif’s life many times through wisdom, and a few times by taking a blade meant for the war-lord himself. In repayment of this service, Hrolleif housed him in his own hall, and I sat and learned from his wisdom as much as I could.

            He taught me about the gods, how to read omens from them, how to appeal to them, how to gain their favor. He taught me about life, he taught me much about being a warrior, though I wouldn’t realize it until later, and he, together with Hrolleif and the thin iron rods of his many oath-men, the foundation of being a man were ingrained into me.

            During my first Autumn, while I played with Earl Hrolleif’s sons, his youngest, who was my age, fell into a deep creek, nearly drowning. I could not swim, but I leapt in after him, for he was my friend and I loved him like a brother. I pulled him from the freezing water, and while Hrolleif’s eldest son ran to get help, we shivered in the snow.

            Another boy, the son of another lord who lived on the other side of the island, came past then. I yelled for help, stuttering because I was cold, and he rode over to us on his horse. He was on his way to join Hrolleif’s crew, to wet his blade with blood and take the first step into manhood. His name was Karl, and he was a cruel coward. He laughed at us, freezing in the cold, and drew his short sword. He tossed it into the air, caught it, and flung it skillfully through the air. Earl Hrolleif’s youngest son was named Ragnar. He was as a brother to me, and I screamed in grief as I heard his dying gasp. In a panic, knowing he could not possibly survive, I pulled the knife from his stomach, and pressed it into his palm as he shuddered. His blood soaked into my skin, and he held tight to the handle as if it would save his life.

            It did not.

            When he had taken his last breath, and after I had fumbled my way through a quick prayer to the gods that they would allow a six-year-old boy into Odin’s great hall to feast until Ragnarök, I pulled the knife from his hand, the blood sticky on my skin, and rose to stare with hate at Karl. He laughed at me, and while he laughed, I charged across the freezing water of the creek and stabbed him in the groin, screaming. He shrieked in pain, and I stabbed again. I saw him reach for his sword hilt, and I cut at his hand viciously, tearing it apart. I screamed and screamed as I stabbed him again and again.

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            While Karl was dying, laying on the ground in his own blood, Earl Hrolleif and his eldest son rode up. They’d galloped hard, all the way from his hall, and neither were armed for they expected two freezing boys, not a warrior come to murder. Earl Hrolleif stared at me, looming over Karl, both of us covered in blood, and Karl raised his left hand, the less mangled of the two, in a pleading gesture.

            “What happened?” Earl Hrolleif asked.

            Then he saw Ragnar, and he screamed in rage and pain. He saw the anguish on my face, or else he trusted me well enough to know that I would not have harmed his son, and he joined me, glaring down at Karl.

            “Gunnolf,” he said, his voice was quiet and full of emotion, “what happened here?”

            I tried to speak, choked on my words, and had to take three slow, deep breaths before I could form words. “I dragged Ragnar from the creek, and young Hrolleif went to get you, lord. I saw him ride past and thought he might help us, so I called out to him. He laughed at us, and drew his knife. He threw it at Ragnar, lord, and it hit him in the gut. I,” my voice faltered then, probably not for the first time, but it was the first time I’d noticed it, “I put the handle in his hand as he died lord.”

            Earl Hrolleif took the knife from me then, and he was silent as he took Karl’s hands. He cut them both off, so that Karl could not grasp his weapon. He walked back to his horse and pulled a fur cloak from it. It was made of wolf fur, all light and dark gray, with a black wolf’s skin draped across the left shoulder of it so that the face of the wolf draped across my breast, and he placed the cloak around my shoulders to keep me warm. Earl Hrolleif had intended it as a gift for Ragnar.

            We watched Karl choke on his blood, dying slowly there beside the creek.

#

            The old, half blind man summoned a young man a week after Ragnar’s death, and for three days I was made to lie still for hours as he tapped a needle with ink into my skin. I think by then I was seven, but I am not sure. When he was done, there was an image of a snarling wolf on my chest and stomach. Its head was on the left side of my upper chest, in the same area as the wolf’s head of my cloak rested, and its body curved downward, covering the entire left side of my chest, with the tail partway down my left thigh. When I asked why I’d been given this visage of a wolf, for I was extremely pleased with it because my name meant fighting wolf and I thought that wolves were the most majestic and proud animal I’d ever seen, Hrolleif told me that it was so I wouldn’t forget my name again. I knew that it was also because I had given his son as honorable a death as he could have had, and he was grateful for it. I knew that he was proud of me as well, for he called me his son, and I did all I could to live up to his expectations, for even though I now knew he just a man, he still seemed far more than that.

            The wolves around Earl Hrolleif’s hall knew me by scent. Some of them loved me, and some of them distrusted me, but most of them tolerated me. And the ones that loved me wouldn’t let the ones who didn’t like me try to eat me. Sometimes they would let me rub their coarse fur and scratch behind their ears. Earl Hrolleif claimed that I must have come from the gods themselves, for he had never seen anything like it, but I thought that it was because they knew I admired them. They stopped bothering Earl Hrolleif’s sheep as much after I started playing with them, though in lean times a few still went missing, and Earl Hrolleif would pretend to be mad, though I knew he really wasn’t because he was amazed by my interaction with them, and thought that losing a few sheep was fine if it meant that the wolves were friendly.

            Three full moons after the wolf was tattooed onto my chest, a pregnant wolf came to the hall, panting, her belly swollen with her pups. She trotted through the open door, shocking everyone into inaction, and came to me, where she rubbed her head against my leg affectionately and then lay down, going into labor.

            When the pups were large enough to move, Earl Hrolleif made me move the mother wolf and all of her pups out into a shelter he’d helped me build, though I’d had to swear to a great many more duties around his home before he’d relented, and the mother gave me a happy lick on my cheek to thank me for my kindness. When I tried to leave one of the puppies yipped at me, and I turned, curious, the mother used her snout to push the small, black furred wolf toward me, and watched as I picked it up. The pup had a small spot of white hair on her chest, and another behind her ears. I put her back down and tried to leave, but the pup refused to leave my side. I named her Lys, which meant light in Earl Hrolleif’s language. Earl Hrolleif, when he saw how attached the pup had become, allowed it into the hall, though I suspect he wanted to turn all the pups into companions for all of his children, and that it would make his men even more fierce if the wolves fought with them.

            It was three full moons later, when the Templars came.

            The Templars hate the Danes and Norsemen who live on the islands of Pros. They claim they are pagans, heathens, and an affront to the grace of God. So, they took ships and decided to raid the raiders. They were encased in steel from head to toe, wearing dull mail coats and thick steel gauntlets. They wielded massive, two-handed swords with brutal efficiency, but Earl Hrolleif’s men were more vicious, were more skilled, and had the gods on their side.

            I, however, did not have the gods on my side. The Templars landed, saw a young boy playing on the beach, and took me, one kicked the young pup who’d been my companion in her fragile chest as she tried to defend me, and my heart broke as I heard her pained yelp. I was certain she’d been killed, and a seed of hatred was planted then, deep within my soul. I’m sure they thought they were doing me a favor, but I had loved Earl Hrolleif as a father, had loved his sons as my brothers, and had loved his daughter as a sister. They took me from that world, which I loved, and thrust me back into slavery. All in the name of their God.

            They took me to become a Templar, and I learned hatred for the first time against these men who claimed to be helping me.

#

            The monks tell us that dreams are a gift from God. They say that we should dream of the glory of fighting in His name to cleanse the world of non-believers. Failing that, they say, we should at least not dream of pagan things. We should not dream of riding one of the air ships built by the wizards, who are protected by King Arthur and Camelot. We should not dream of sailing, as the Viking raiders who live far beyond our own shores do. We should especially not dream of serpents, for they are messengers of the devil.

            Sometimes, I dream of wolves. I dream of one wolf, in particular. Her coat is mottled dark gray and black, with a white spot on the center of her chest, and another just behind her ears. She is alone, moving silently through a forest of fog in the dark, and then she stops to sniff at whatever tracks she is following, and looks up, directly into my eyes. Her eyes are green, and far too intelligent to truly belong to a wolf, if animals are dumb brutes as the monks tell us. Her eyes burn into me, and I wake with my heart racing and tears in my eyes, for I know her, and I remember her pained yelp as a Templar boot ended her short life. And the tree that has sprouted from the seed of hatred grows a little every time I remember the sound.

            I don’t tell the monks about my dreams. I tell them that I dream of killing heathens and bringing the glory of God to the rest of this barbarian land. I don’t tell them because I hate them. I think they know that, or at least some of them do, because they beat me most days. But there is little they can do. My pride and love for that pup and Hrolleif and his family is stronger than their rods and their kicks.