Harald
I was but a boy when I left home. I thought I was a man, but I was 15 years old, so what did I know. I lived in Ringerike, the fertile river valleys that empty in to Oslofjord. We farmed; oats, barley, hay for the animals, vegetable garden of cabbage, kale, and carrots. When the salmon were running we would spread our nets across the mouth of the river, haul them back, full of fish, to be sliced open, gutted, and hung out to dry. When the caribou came we hunted them in the hills. The rest of the time we did chores and told ourselves tales of gods and heroes to keep the boredom at bay. When the broken war arrow arrived announcing Olaf’s return I collected all the youth of the village, we armed ourselves with field axes and whatever would pass for a sword, and we went down to Olsofjord, to join up with Olaf and reclaim the kingdom of Norway.
We left the Oslofjord and marched through Sweden, over the mountains, and into the hills above Trondheim, looking down at our enemies in the valley below.
The battle cry of Olaf's men was:
“Fram! Fram! Kristmenn, krossmenn, kongsmenn!”
“Fight, Fight, Christians, Crossmen, Kingsmen!”
The cry of the opposing army was:
“Fram! Fram! Bonder!”
“Fight, Fight, Farmers!”
You can guess whose war cry was more effective – even the troops on our side identified as farmers before they identified as Christians, and they fought accordingly. The lines broke, Olaf was slain, and the troops that could ran off into the woods.
My friends and I made our way back to Sweden. We took over a farmhouse for the winter and by summer we were sailing to Novgorod in the Rus'. Yaroslav welcomed us warmly and then dispatched us into the field to help him suppress one of the local rebellions that were endemic to his kingdom.
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