Father Henri nodded shamefully. He should have known all this, even though he specialized in writing, theology, and music, not medicine or horticulture. He hurriedly gathered the brothers to begin a very long hour of prayer.

   For the time being, Sot had decided to obey the monk, even though she thought it was a shame not to lighten her mistress's suffering. She now took charge of the other women in the room, and they pulled Sigrid out of bed, let down her hair so it flowed free: long, shiny, and almost as black as Sot's own hair. They washed her as she shivered with cold, and then pulled a new linen shift over her head and made her walk about the room, to hasten the birth.

   Through a fog of fear, Sigrid staggered around the floor between two of her thrall women. She felt ashamed, like a cow being led about at market. She heard the bell chime from the longhouse but was unsure if it was only her imagination.

   The next wave of pain hit; it started deeper inside her body, and she could feel that it would last longer this time. Then she screamed, more from terror than pain, and sank down on the bed. One of the thrall women held Sigrid under the arms from behind and lifted her body upward, while they all shrieked at once that she had to help, she had to push. But she didn't dare push. She must have fainted.

   When the twilight turned to night and the thrushes fell silent, a stillness seemed to come over Sigrid. The pains that had come so often in the last few hours seemed to have stopped.

   Sot and all the others knew this was an ominous sign. Something had to be done. Sot took one of the others with her and they padded out into the night, sneaking past the longhouse where the murmuring and singing of the monks could be heard faintly through the thick walls, and on to the barn. They brought out a young ram with a leather rope around its neck and led it away in the falling darkness toward the forbidden grove. There they bound the rope around one rear hoof and slung the other end over one of the huge oak branches in the grove. As Sot pulled on the rope so that the ram hung with one hind leg in the air, the other thrall woman fell upon the animal. She grabbed it around the shoulders, and forced the animal toward the ground with all her weight, as she drew out a knife and slit its throat. They both hoisted up the struggling, screeching ram, as blood sprayed in all directions. After they tied the rope to a root of the tree, they stripped off their shifts and stood naked beneath the shower of blood and smeared it into their hair, over their breasts, and between their legs as they prayed to Frey.

   When the morning dawned, Sigrid awoke from her torpor with the fires of hell burning in her anew, and she prayed desperately to the dear blessed Virgin Mary to save her from the pain, to take her now, if that was how it was to end, but at least to spare her from the pain.

   The thrall women, who had been dozing around her, came quickly to life and started running their hands over her body and speaking rapidly to one another in their own unintelligible tongue. Then they began to laugh, smiling and nodding eagerly to her and to Sot, whose hair was so soaked that it hung straight down, dripping cold water as she bent over Sigrid, telling her that now was the time, now her son would soon come, but for the last time she must try to help. And the women took her under the arms and raised her halfway up in a sitting position, and Sigrid screamed wild prayers until she realized she might wake her little Eskil and frighten him. So she bit her wounded lip again and it began to bleed anew, and her mouth was filled with the taste of blood. But softly, in the midst of all that was unbearable, she found more and more hope, as if the Mother of God were now actually standing at her side, speaking gently to her and encouraging her to do as her clever and loyal thralls instructed. And Sigrid bore down and bit her lip again to keep from screaming. Now the monks' voices could be heard out in the dawn, very loud, like a praise-song or a psalm meant to drown out the terror.

   Suddenly it was over. She saw through her sweat and tears a bloody bundle down below. The women in the room bustled about with water and linen cloths. She sensed them washing and chattering, she heard some slaps and a cry, a tiny, tremulous, bright sound that could be only one thing.

   "It's a fine healthy boy," said Sot, beaming with joy. "Mistress has borne a well-formed boy with all the fingers and toes he should have. And he was born with a caul!"

   They lay him, washed and swaddled, next to her aching, distended breasts, and she gazed into his tiny wrinkled face and was amazed he was so small. She touched him gently and he got an arm free and waved it in the air until she stuck out a finger, which he instantly grabbed and held tight.

   "What will the boy be named?" asked Sot with a flushed, excited face.

   "He shall be called Arn, after Arnäs," whispered Sigrid, exhausted. "Arnäs and not Varnhem will be his home, but he will be baptized here by Father Henri when the time comes."

Chapter 2

King Sverker's son Johan died as he deserved. King Sverker had of course followed the advice he had been given by Father Henri, to see to it that the Danish jarl took his wife back to Halland at once. But both King Sven Grate and his jarl scornfully rejected the subsequent part of Father Henri's plan, to arrange a marriage between the royal but roguish son and the other violated Danish woman, so that war could thus be avoided with a blood bond.

   The fault lay perhaps not so much in Father Henri's plan as in the fact that King Sven Grate wanted war. The more proposals for mediation came from King Sverker, the more King Sven Grate wanted war. He thought, possibly correctly, that the king of the Goths was exhibiting weakness when he offered first one thing and then another to avoid going into battle.

   As a last resort, King Sverker had prevailed upon the Pope's Cardinal Nicolaus Breakspear to pay a visit to Sven Grate on his way to Rome and speak of reason and peace.

   The cardinal failed at this task, just as he had recently failed to ordain an archbishop over a unified Götaland and Svealand.

   The papal commission to name an archbishop had failed because the Swedes and Goths were unable to agree on the location of the archbishop's cathedral, and thus where the archbishop should have his see. The cardinal's peace-making assignment failed for the simple reason that the Danish king was convinced of his coming victory. His newly conquered realms would then be subject to Archbishop Eskil in Lund, so Sven Grate could see no Christian reason for refraining from war.

   King Sverker had made no preparations for the defense of the realm, since he was too wrapped up in mourning his queen, Ulvhild, and preparing for a wedding with yet another twicewidowed woman, Rikissa. Perhaps he also thought that all the intercessions he had secured for himself at the cloister would save both him and the country.