"Is this it?" Solveig called out. No trees stood on the battlefield. Nothing but little scrubby, twisted black bushes. Without breaking his long, limping stride, Halfdan glanced over his shoulder. "You all right, girl?" It''s all dead, thought Solveig. There''s nothing left but black fingers, black hands, thousands of them. Stiklestad. What can ever grow in this place again? She caught up with her father and slipped her hand through his right arm, and he turned and embraced her.

He almost crushed her, and Solveig could feel him trembling. She looked up at him, startled. "I wanted you to see it so you''d understand," Halfdan told her, "and I wanted to see this place again myself. Once more in my life on this middle-earth. Stiklestad to fuel me! Stiklestad to put fire in my belly." Then the two of them loped across the middle of the battlefield, the fighting-farming Half-Dane and his shining daughter. The gusty night-wind had gone quiet, and the sun - at least, the bright eyeball glaring through the lumpen, grey-brown clouds - had already climbed as high in the skull of the sky as it meant to. "Today''s the battle-day," her father reminded her.

"The last day of August." "Five years ago," Solveig replied. "Harald was fifteen," her father said. "Same as you." "I''m fourteen." "Rising fifteen," her father said with a half-smile. "Fifteen and rising. But I was ready to follow him, all right.

So were many others along the fjord. Harald Sigurdsson, he was born a leader. Mind you, King Olaf thought he wasn''t strong enough to fight, but Harald told him,  If I''m not strong enough to swing this sword, I''ll bind my hand to the hilt. "King Olaf wasn''t surprised," Halfdan continued. "He knew what his half-brother was made of. There were three thousand of us, Solva. Three thousand. But even so, there were many more in King Cnut''s army.

"I can still smell it. The sharp stink of fear, the thickness of sweat, the sweetness of blood, the scent of grass mangled and trampled, the body of earth gouged and churned. I can still hear it. The clang and the clatter and the moaning and shrieking--" "Father!" protested Solveig, and she put her warm right hand on his brow. "Now you''ve come back here, you can leave it all behind you for ever." "This is the battle that needs to be told and retold," Halfdan went on, "and in this place more than anywhere, to honour all the men who died here. The wolf chased and swallowed the sun. It was still early in the afternoon, and by the time the sun was born again King Olaf lay dead.

" Halfdan pointed. "Just over there. I was in the shield-rampart around him. I lost my footing, I stumbled, and one of Cnut''s men slashed the back of my right knee. The bastard cut right through my hamstring." Solveig grabbed her father''s arm and her eyes flooded with tears. "That''s why your right leg''s shorter than your left," Solveig gulped. "But you''re still as tall as a pine tree.

Always getting in your own way. Odin knows how many times you''ve cracked your head against the lintel." "I know," said her father. "I''m like one of those clumsy great frost-giants I''m always telling you about. And over there, see, just by that knoll, that''s where your uncle ." "Eskil!" exclaimed Solveig. "Your mother''s best brother. One man cut him down and another hacked off his right leg.

" Solveig screwed up her face. "He was only eighteen. And marrying that September." Halfdan grimaced. "Where was I? Yes, the shield-rampart. Harald''s wounds were worse than mine. Much worse. Cnut''s men beat him to the ground.

One arrow was sticking between his ribs, and another had pierced his stomach. Blood was spitting out of that one, and because of the barb it was impossible to pull it out cleanly. But Harald would rather have been the cause of his own death than allow Swedes to kill him. He just grabbed the arrow shaft and ripped it out of his own stomach. "After that, Harald lost half his blood, and some of his guts as well. That''s when I called over to old Rognvald - he was one of the king''s earls - that I knew a farm hidden in the forest ." "Ours, you mean," said Solveig. Her father nodded.

"A safe house." Solveig shook her golden hair and stared in admiration at her father. "You''d have done the same, Solva. I don''t know quite how - Rognvald white-haired and me with my severed hamstring - but we half carried Harald, half dragged him." Her father frowned. "I can''t remember much about it. Except how much it mattered. More than anything.

That, and the pain." "I remember," Solveig said. "Well, I half remember. You and Asta arguing, because she didn''t want Harald in the house." "She was afraid for Kalf and Blubba." "Afraid!" Solveig exclaimed scornfully. "I remember that saying you told me." "Yes," said Halfdan.

"Fearlessness is better than a faint heart for anyone who puts their nose out of doors. The length of my life and the day of my death were fated long ago ." "That''s right," said Solveig. "She was afraid for you too, Solva." Solveig sniffed. "I can still see Kalf and Blubba stretching a sheet of canvas between the rafters, and you putting Harald over your shoulder and somehow getting him up the ladder." "Earl Rognvald only stayed for one night," Halfdan went on. "He said he''d never be safe, not in Norway.

He kissed Harald''s forehead - it was so pale and cold - and said he''d be waiting over the mountains in Sweden." "I didn''t know that." "Harald''s recovery took weeks, not days. Months, in fact. By then it was winter, so Harald had to lie low. And wait. He wasn''t much good at that." "I''m like that.

" "Yes, Solva, always impatient! But that was the time when Harald and I talked. We talked and talked. We told stories. We laughed." "I remember how he laughed, and how he loved your stories." "He brayed. He shouted with laughter, and our turf walls shook. But then came the day when Harald asked me which way Earl Rognvald had taken into Sweden.

He was planning to escape east and south with him and other survivors until they were strong enough to return and fight again and win back the kingdom of Norway. Itold Harald it was best to sail down the fjord, because I''d heard of a traders'' track leading west over the mountains from Trondheim. But he said, "No, that''s not the best way. Not for Rognvald. Not for me. I don''t want to be recognised." "So I led him along the string-paths through the forest, along the sheep-runs east into the Kjolen Mountains. Each of us carried an axe, and Harald was wearing his sword as well, under his cloak.

We each had a sack over one shoulder stuffed with food - smoked mutton and good whey cheese." Solveig nodded and patted her left shoulder. "Ah!" exclaimed her father. "You made it?" "I always do. And we''ve got carrots. And pink plums." "You''re right," Halfdan said. "It''s well after midday.

I''m hungry." "Over there?" suggested Solveig. "There''s a bit of grass by that bush." That was when she saw it. It was jammed inside the twisted bush, and at first she thought it was a piece of canvas, then a wedge of pinewood. "What is it?" her father asked. Solveig pulled it out and held it between her fingertips - a blade of bone, stripped by sea eagles, bleached by frost, sharpened by time. Halfdan took the bone and inspected it.

"Poor sod!" he said. "His shoulder blade. One of us? One of them?" Solveig closed her eyes. "Any of them," she murmured, and she gently shook her head. "Eskil. All of them." "I know," Halfdan said. Solveig secured the bone inside the waist-cord of her felt cloak, and stroked it.

"I''m going to carve it," she told her father. "Or Asta could use it. For smoothing." Solveig screwed up her face. Her father shook his head and gave a rueful smile. "You and your stepmother." Solveig opened her bag. She pulled out a tatty old piece of cloth and, inside it, whey cheese and pink plums.

As soon as she''d broken off a nugget of cheese and swallowed it, she lay propped up on her left elbow and looked at her father with her left eye - the violet one - and then with her right. "Well?" Halfdan asked her. "Was she tall too?" "Your mother?" Solveig nodded. You always know what I''m thinking, she thought. Halfdan looked at his lap. "Yes," he said slowly. "Tall. Very tall.

So it''s no wonder you are." "And golden?" "You know she was." "I know. But when you talk about her, you make her alive to me." "Siri . Always so alive." "She''s still alive for me." Solveig hesitated.

"I like the way you say her name." Halfdan put a plum in his mouth, drew the juice from it and spat out the stone. "I was telling you about how Harald escaped," he said, "and how I led him east over the mountains. Mile after mile, me limping, Harald wearing a broad strap to hold in his guts." "Before you left," Solveig said, "Harald took both my hands and swung me round and round. Until I was giddy. "Your father," he told me, "your hamstrung father, he''s still worth double any other man. Don''t you ever forget it.

"'' "Is that what he said?" asked Halfdan, grinning. Solveig tilt.