Alyssia Patel's Story

No sooner did Thorvald arrive to gather Fulgar's crew, than another rider arrived from the mainland, informing Hrafn-Floki and his shipmates of the circumstances back at the ring fort. Floki had been a good friend of Ivar's father Ragnar Lothbrok, and after King Ragnar Sigurdsson died at the hands of Christian leaders, Floki became like a second father to the young ambitious prince. Ivar Ragnarsson trusted Floki, perhaps even moreso than he trusted his own brothers. Ivar's message was fairly simple and straight forward. He was sending Floki's gang on an ambassador mission to the distant land of Siv'en, which would require one of Floki's longships. A small crew of trained warriors would accompany them as bodyguards, while the rest of Floki's crew stayed at the docks and continued to work around the shipyard. It seemed now that Floki's prayer to the gods had not gone unheard. They were going to send him on an adventure afterall. Floki chuckled and screeched with excitement, unable to control his happiness. Others around the docks looked over at the strange shipbuilder ackwardly. Most of them seemed nervous, or more serious, everyone now preparing for a possible battle on the horizon. But not Floki, not this oddball among the vikings. Floki was excited and happy, for the Seamaiden was now ready, and Floki himself would be going on another voyage to distant lands unknown. Floki sheathed his seax and hung lazily off the side of the longship, eager not only for war, but also for the great adventures ahead.

Hrafn-Floki was sitting on board the Seamaiden, hugging the wooden carved mermaid-prow at the front of the viking longship when his leidang started to arrive. Floki the Shipbuilder had wasted no time in hand picking the 500 hrafnfylking who would be traveling with him on his adventures. He divided them up evenly on to 5 different longships, placing 100 sailors on to each ship. Besides the large Seamaiden, he also hand-picked four other longships called the Sjorulfur, the Sjohestur, the Waveraider and the Hafskongur to go as his fleet. These five viking longships looked very similar, apart from their prows. The Seamaiden had a mermaid or valkyrie-type prow. The Sjorulfur had a wolf-headed prow. The Sjohestur had a horse-headed prow. The Waveraider had a simple spiralling or swirling prow design typical of the Jellinge style, while the Hafskongur had a Dall horned sheep or ram-headed prow. All of them had square-shaped crimson red sails which bore a picture of the black raven in tribal knot-work design, a symbol that was by now firmly associated with Nordic vikings from the northern fjords.

Soon other vikings would arrive from the mainland, hoping for a chance to sail with Hrafn-Floki and join in on his adventures. 50 ulfhednar, 50 berserkar, 50 svinfylking, 50 hestahar, 50 kattrfylking, 50 hornuglar, 50 ljosalfar, 50 svartalfar and 100 thralls would all be chosen to join Floki the Vitki on his quest to Siv'en, and he divided them all accordingly, placing all 1000 of his vikings into one of the 5 distinguished ships. The remaining 500 hrafnfylking would stay at the docks and continue to do as they had always done, building and repairing boats at the shipyard, fishing the harbour and working close to the water. Angradi the Whaler was chosen by Hrafn-Floki to be the new commander of the hrafnfylking at the docks, and was appointed to oversee the shipyard's navy.

Without further delay, the rowers divided themselves on each of the longships, with 75 oarsmen on each side. Hrafn-Floki took his place on the raised platform at the front of the Seamaiden, and picked up the ivory curved horn, blowing into it. The sound of the horn was carried for miles. Floki then leaned over the side of the ship to kiss his wife Helga one last time as she placed a garland of holly on his head like a crown. Helga and the other housewives waved their husbands goodbye and watched quietly as the 5 longships slowly rowed away from the docks and headed out towards deeper waters. They knew it might be weeks, months or even possibly years before Hrafn-Floki's leidang returned to Iskjerne Bay, if they ever returned at all.