"One day," Ragnar said, holding up a single finger. "Give me fifty men, the spare timber from the ships, and twenty-four hours. I will give you three Wall-Breakers."
King Horik stared at him. The King was standing on the wet sand, his boots sinking into the English mud. His stomach rumbled loud enough to be heard over the breaking waves.
"One day?" Horik asked skeptically. "It takes my shipbuilders a month to make a good keel. You want to build three siege engines before the sun sets tomorrow?"
"It's assembly. We aren't carving dragon heads. We are bolting logs together." Ragnar said, his mind already calculating the labor division.
The King looked toward the smoke rising in the distance. A Saxon village lay just beyond the ridge a source of food, gold, and probably angry men with pitchforks.
"I am hungry," Horik decided, tightening his belt. "And my army is hungry. We cannot siege York on empty stomachs."
He turned to his commanders. "We take the village. We eat tonight."
Then he grabbed Ragnar's shoulder. "I leave you fifty men. The ones with strong backs and small brains. If those machines aren't standing when I get back with the roast pork, I will feed you to the pigs."
"Understood," Ragnar said.
Ulf, Ragnar's father, tightened the straps of his leather armor. He looked at Ragnar with a mixture of pride and worry. "Stay behind the shield wall if trouble comes," Ulf grunted. "You are valuable now. Don't try to be a hero with a hammer."
"I'll be too busy yelling at people to be a hero," Ragnar promised. "Bring back something that isn't fish, Father."
Ulf laughed, clapped Bjorn on the back who was staying behind as Ragnar's bodyguard/heavy lifter and turned to join the King.
"Move out!" Horik bellowed.
Four thousand five hundred Vikings roared in response.
Ragnar stood on the quiet beach with his fifty confused-looking warriors.
"Right!" Ragnar clapped his hands. "Welcome to the First Viking Industrial Corps. Listen up!"
The warriors stared at him. One picked his nose with a dagger.
"We are not building one machine at a time," Ragnar shouted, channeling every project manager he had ever known. "That is inefficient. We are doing batch production!"
He pointed to a group of ten men with the largest axes. "You! The Tree Team. Go to that copse of woods. Cut down twelve oaks. Don't strip them. Just drop them and drag them here."
He pointed to another group. "You! The Stripping Team. When the trees arrive, you strip the branches. Fast and rough."
He turned to the last group, which included the village carpenter he'd brought along. "You are the Assembly Team. You drill the holes where I mark them. No thinking. Just drilling!"
"And what do I do?" Bjorn asked, flexing arms that were thicker than Ragnar's thighs.
"You, brother," Ragnar grinned, "are the forklift."
Ragnar ran back and forth across the beach. He used charcoal to mark cut lines on the timber before the trees even stopped rolling.
"Measure twice, cut once!" Ragnar screamed at a warrior who was eyeing a log with malicious intent.
"I cut!" the warrior yelled back happily, swinging his axe.
"No! Wait for the mark!" Ragnar intercepted him, drawing a line. "Now cut!"
In the 21st century, building a trebuchet would require permits, OSHA inspections, and safety meetings. In 865 AD, it required a lot of swearing and men who could lift entire tree trunks without complaining about back pain.
By mid-afternoon, the frames were rising. They looked like skeletons of prehistoric beasts emerging from the sand. The A-frames were lashed together with thick hemp rope and reinforced with the iron bolts Ragnar had forged.
"Lift!" Ragnar commanded.
Bjorn and ten other men heaved on the ropes. The main throwing arm of the first machine rose into the air and settled into the iron axle groove.
"Secure the cap!" Ragnar yelled.
A warrior hammered the iron retaining pin into place.
Ragnar stepped back, wiping sweat and sawdust from his eyes. The first machine was upright. It wasn't pretty but the geometry was perfect.
"It looks like a gallows," Bjorn noted, wiping his hands on his tunic.
"It's a physics stick," Ragnar corrected. "One down. Two to go."
But the universe, Ragnar knew, hated smooth sailing.
From over the ridge, the sounds of the King's raid had been drifting down all day screams, clashing steel, the roar of fire. But now, the sound was changing. It was getting closer.
"Riders!" a lookout shouted from the top of the dune.
Cresting the hill wasn't the King's army. It was a group of Saxon horsemen about thirty of them. They weren't the main force; they looked like a flanking unit that had escaped the village and circled back to hit the Vikings' rear.
They saw the ships. They saw the half-built machines. And they saw only fifty men guarding them.
The Saxon leader, a man in polished chainmail, raised his sword.
"Heathens!" he shouted. "Burn their ships!"
"Oh, come on," Ragnar groaned, grabbing his spear. "Can't a man build a siege engine in peace?!"
Bjorn grabbed his shield and axe, his face lighting up with a terrifying joy. "Finally! I was getting bored of lifting wood!"
"Shield wall!" Ragnar ordered. "Protect the machines!"
The fifty builders dropped their saws and hammers and snatched up their shields. They formed a tight line in front of the construction site.
The Saxon cavalry charged.
The ground shook. Thirty horses thundering down a sand dune was a terrifying sight. They were gaining speed, aiming to smash through the thin Viking line and torch the fleet.
"Hold!" Ragnar yelled, his heart hammering against his ribs. "Brace!"
The horses hit the shield wall.
Bjorn roared, slamming the edge of his shield into a horse's nose, stopping the beast in its tracks. The rider flew over the horse's head, landing in the sand where Bjorn's axe met him.
"For Oakhaven!" Bjorn screamed, swinging like a windmill.
Ragnar thrust his spear through a gap in the shields, catching a Saxon rider in the thigh. The man howled and fell.
Dust, blood, and sand filled the air. The Saxons were on horses, giving them the height advantage, but the Vikings were fighting with the desperation of men who had nowhere to run.
"They're circling!" Ragnar noticed.
Five Saxon riders had peeled off, riding around the flank of the shield wall. They were heading straight for the Sea-Wolf.
"No!" Ragnar shouted. "My ship!"
He broke from the line. It was a stupid move, but instinct took over. That ship was his masterpiece.
"Ragnar!" Bjorn shouted, trying to follow, but he was engaged with two swordsmen.
Ragnar ran toward the ship. The Saxon riders saw him and turned. The leader grinned, lowering his lance.
Ragnar skidded to a halt. He was out in the open. He had a spear. The rider had a horse and a lance.
He looked around. He was standing next to the second trebuchet. It was unfinished just the frame and the arm lying on the ground, attached by the rope tackle they were using to hoist it.
The heavy counterweight box was already attached to the short end of the arm, resting on a stack of barrels, waiting to be lifted.
The rope holding the arm down was tied to a stake near Ragnar's feet.
"Die, heathen!"
Ragnar looked at the rider, then at the rope.
He waited. The hooves pounded the sand. The lance tip steadied on Ragnar's chest.
Twenty meters... Ten meters...
"Now!" Ragnar screamed.
He swung his axe, not at the rider, but at the rope stake!
The tension released instantly. The heavy counterweight box on the stack of barrels dropped three feet to the ground.
This caused the long end of the oak arm to jerk upward violently as the machine tried to find its equilibrium.
It wasn't a full swing, just a sudden, violent kick of a two-ton log.
The heavy oak beam shot up from the sand just as the Saxon horse galloped over it.
The beam caught the horse in the chest. It was like hitting a fly with a baseball bat.
The horse stopped instantly. The rider didn't. He was catapulted through the air, sailing over Ragnar's head and landing face-first in a pile of sawdust.
Ragnar stood there, panting, the vibration of the impact still humming in the air.
The other four riders, seeing their leader taken out by a jumping log, hesitated.
A roar came from the ridge.
"Odin owns you all!"
Hundreds of Vikings poured over the dune, covered in soot and blood, carrying sacks of grain and cages of chickens.
Ulf was at the front. He saw the Saxons attacking his sons and let out a howl that would have scared a bear.
The remaining Saxons panicked. They turned their horses to flee, but they were trapped between the shield wall and the returning army.
Ragnar leaned against the frame of the trebuchet, his legs shaking. The adrenaline was fading, leaving him feeling lightheaded.
Ulf ran up to him, grabbing his shoulders. "Are you hurt? I saw the horse charge you!"
"I'm fine," Ragnar said, pointing a trembling finger at the dead horse and the rider in the sawdust. "I used the machine."
King Horik walked up, wiping his sword on a piece of cloth. He looked at the carnage on the beach the dead Saxons, the sweating builders, and the three massive wooden structures rising from the sand.
He looked at the dead horse, then at the trebuchet arm that had smashed it.
"You killed a cavalryman with a pile of wood?" the King asked, impressed.
"It was a field test," Ragnar lied smoothly.
The King laughed, a loud, booming sound. He kicked the dead Saxon.
"You are a strange warrior, Ragnar," Horik said. "But you kept your word. The machines are standing."
He gestured to the army behind him. They were laden with spoils cows, pigs, sacks of flour.
"We have food!" the King announced. "We have the beach! And now..." He looked up at the towering trebuchets. "Now we have the hammers!"
Bjorn walked over, limping slightly but grinning. He was covered in blood, none of it his own.
"Did you see that?" Bjorn asked the King excitedly. "Ragnar made the log jump!"