Gone Viking Read online

  Contents

  Cover

  About the Book

  About the Author

  Title Page

  Author note

  Prologue

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgements

  Copyright

  About the Book

  Two sisters. One Scandi holiday they’ll never forget…

  Frazzled mum Alice Ray likes to think she’s on top of everything – she has FOUR bags-for-life in the boot of her car for heaven’s sake. But after spectacularly embarrassing herself at work, she finally gives in to her sister’s pleas to take a much needed break.

  But this is not the luxury spa holiday Alice hoped for – instead, she finds herself in Denmark, in the middle of nowhere, on a ‘How to be a Viking’ getaway.

  Can the two sisters finally learn to get along or will learning to embrace their inner warrior just make them better at fighting?

  About the Author

  Helen Russell is a British journalist, author and speaker. Helen has previously worked for the Sunday Times, Take a Break, Top Santé and on new launches for Tatler Asia, Grazia India and Sky. She joined Marie Claire as editor of marieclaire.co.uk in 2010 and was BSME-shortlisted in 2011 and 2012.

  Helen now writes for magazines and newspapers around the world, including Stylist, The Times, Grazia, Metro, and The Wall Street Journal. Helen is a columnist for the Telegraph, a correspondent for the Guardian and author of Leap Year. Her first book, The Year of Living Danishly, is now a bestseller.

  Author note

  This is a work of fiction.

  Purists: I have played fast and loose with Viking heritage – from a place of love – to convey the essence of Viking culture in modern-day Scandinavia. Deal with it and put your ‘proud face’ on.

  For everyone else: come on in, the water’s lovely (if cold, see: ‘Scandinavia’) – and get ready to go berserk …

  Prologue

  Twigs snap beneath my feet as I bat away branches and run. Really run. Heart pounding so hard it’s threatening to break free from my chest and outstrip me at any moment. The rain is relentless and I’m wet through. The kind of wet that would normally chafe, but I’m so cold I have no sensation below the waist. What I am conscious of is my brain rattling around in my skull with every bare foot hitting bracken and I’ve been tangled in the limbs of so many trees that I’m carrying a campfire’s-worth of kindling in my hair.

  A mist descends and I hear an eerie noise as I hurtle through the semi-darkness. Crows caw and thunder rumbles. This isn’t the sort of woodland populated by princesses and talking creatures keen to lend a hand. Less Snow White, more Blair Witch Project, I think.

  Then I slip on something brown and slimy.

  Let it be a slug, let it be a slug, please let it be a slug, I beg, but don’t stop to analyse. Must get to the clearing, I think, limbs pumping. I reach peak adrenaline and feel as though I’m – almost – flying. Then I trip on an exposed tree root that sends me crashing down with a thud.

  So this is how I die, I muse, face full of mud. So long, world, it’s been quite a ride.

  I wait for a bit, but nothing happens.

  Damn it, I’m not dead! This means I’ll have to do more running …

  Some ancient self-preservation instinct kicks in and I summon the strength to move. Nothing appears to be broken (apart from, perhaps, my nose …) so I scramble up. Touching my lip, I realise it’s bleeding a vivid red. But that doesn’t matter right now, and I keep moving, towards the flickering light.

  ‘Arghhh!’

  I hear a voice in the distance and redouble my efforts before another wail sounds out.

  ‘Arghhhhh!’

  I stagger on, until the verdant canopy becomes patchy and light dapples a carpet of leaves. Fire-lit torches give off a welcome heat and my clothes start to steam.

  ‘Hello?’ I haven’t spoken for twelve hours and I’m not entirely sure I remember how. I try again, voice like porridge.

  ‘Is anyone there?’

  I hold my arms out, allowing my chest to expand, then shout.

  ‘Arghhh!’

  Two muddied, feral-looking women emerge from behind the foliage and scream back. ‘Arghhhhhh!’ One is short, dark-haired and heavy set. The other is tall, model-esque and offensively young – sporting glossy, caramel-coloured hair that seems to shine, despite the mud.

  We lock eyes and an understanding passes between us: whatever happens next, life is never going to be the same again. After a few seconds of guttural screaming, a third figure limps into view – an older blonde, hair backcombed by bushes, skin the colour of mahogany.

  She gives a half-hearted growl before flopping down and holding on to her knees to steady herself. ‘Oh god, cramp …’ She grasps at a calf, heaving to get more air in her lungs. ‘I need …’ I worry she’s about to say ‘medical attention’ and I’ll be called upon to do something, but then she gasps ‘gin’, and we hear a slow hand clap.

  A barrel-chested man wearing nothing but harem pants deftly descends from a tree. He swings down branches with simian grace, then strides across the clearing. His hair is in a bun and he readjusts an ill-advised fishhook necklace.

  Wanker.

  I have long been distrustful of men sporting buns, placing them in the same category as women who wear bandanas and moan a lot.

  ‘Well run, Vikings,’ Man-bun says now in softly accented English. ‘So, who’s feeling fantastic?’

  My legs are shaking like a shitting dog, I’m pretty sure I’m having a heart attack, and there’s a strange tingling sensation spreading from my scalp.

  I choose not to answer him.

  ‘Oh, you have insects in your hair!’ the younger model-esque woman pipes up, helpfully. ‘Awww, a spider! He thinks it’s a web!’

  ‘Great. Thanks.’

  ‘Let me hear you roar!’ semi-naked man demands.

  Three of us give him a look as though we might wallop him but the model-esque spider-informer obliges.

  ‘Ahhhhh!’ she hollers beatifically.

  ‘Come on, the rest of you!’ Man-bun moves towards me until he’s almost touching my face and bellows, ‘Arghhhh!’

  I wipe spittle off my cheek.

  ‘Taste the freedom!’

  Is ‘freedom’ supposed to taste like mud and pickled mackerel?

  ‘Commune with the ancient forest!’

  I just want to commune with a hot shower right now … I think, looking down at my soiled clothes, bruised limbs and bloodied knees. How did I end up here? Life used to be so … clean. So ordered. So … insect-free, I muse, scratching at my head. And yet …

  I look over at the shorter woman with the scraped-back brown hair, the girl I’ve known forever. Her eyes narrow as she approaches me, dimples on show, betraying just how much she’s loving this. Cheeks flushed, fists clenched, she opens her mouth and lets out a primal wail. Thirty-five years’ worth of primal wail. A wail so loud that I recoil slightly and have to take a moment to compose myself before I can muster the strength to scream back. But then I muster. Hard. And all the tension and fear and pain of the last few days – as well as the past few years – is expelled from my lungs in one, long, warrior cry.

  ‘ARGHHHHH!’

  Man-bun looks impressed. ‘That’s it, go berserk!’

  We carry on until we’re the last two shouting.

  I may not have her lung capacity but I’
ve given birth. Twice. I’ll be damned if I’m letting her win at wailing …

  Her roar morphs into a growl, then a splutter and shoulders heave as she shakes out her arms, spent.

  But I keep going.

  With more roar in me than I’d ever have thought possible, with nearly four decades’ worth of berserk to unleash, I yowl:

  ‘ARGHHHHHHHHHHHH!’

  As I scream into the empty woodland, my vision begins to blur from the periphery.

  ‘ARGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!’

  My head starts to swim and soon it feels as though the top has flipped off my skull like the lid of a boiled egg.

  ‘ARGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!’

  And then I’m floating. Up and up, higher and higher, until I can see our assembled grouping from above. Trees turn into blobs. People: to ants. Until finally … my knees buckle and my head hits the ground with a thud.

  All is black.

  And I pass out.

  One

  Three weeks earlier …

  ‘It’s spelled R-A-Y – “Ray”.’

  A thunderously bored woman scratches the top of her head with a pen as I argue my case and the strip lighting hums. My ‘smart shoes’ are pinching and I can feel my phone vibrating in my pocket (not unpleasant), reminding me with each new pulse that there are important messages I may be missing while wasting literally seconds on this exchange.

  ‘One more time?’ the woman sighs.

  So I go through the problem again, watching her eyes glaze over as I speak.

  ‘This says “Rat”.’ I dangle the laminated rectangle to illustrate. ‘My name is Alice Ray.’

  ‘Not “Rat”?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Huh …’ She scratches again, then inspects the end of her pen for any excavated treasure. ‘Couldn’t you just make do?’

  ‘You want me to walk around for two days wearing a lanyard that says “Alice Rat”?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘At a conference called “How to have a winning smile”?’

  ‘No?’

  ‘No.’

  She adjusts her weight in the plastic chair and then, without looking at me, extends an arm in my direction.

  ‘Thank you.’ I offer up the badge, softening my tone. ‘I don’t want to be difficult; it’s just these are my colleagues – my professional peers – and I’m speaking …’

  My voice trails off as I watch her select a permanent marker from a Tupperware container. She bites off the cap and crosses out the letter ‘t’. Then she adds a ‘y’, followed by :)

  Really? That’s how we’re fixing this?

  ‘Couldn’t I just have a new one?’

  She gives me a look of such hatred that I feel myself repelled as though by a force field. Reluctantly, I back off, but not before retaliating with a death-stare that I hope implies ‘you’re going on my mental list of Total Arseholes who deserve to step in puddles and have doors slam in their faces.’ She scratches her head again. ‘And get nits.’

  ‘Next!’ she barks, and I’m dismissed.

  There’s time to spare before I’m due to join my panel discussion and I swore to myself that I’d make an effort and mingle, rather than looking longingly at the sugar-free biscuit table while mainlining carrot sticks and overpriced Paleo bars, like I’ve done every other year.

  I should network, I tell myself; I should smile at people and appear ‘approachable’. It’s not that I’m scared of interacting with other human beings … it’s just that—

  ‘Oh, hi!’

  Oh, crap.

  ‘Alice?’ A man in glasses squints at the lanyard now grazing my breasts, and I remember reason #142 why I hate conferences: some joker always makes it so that the name badge hangs conveniently at mammary-height. This gives CSPs (‘conference sex pests’ – reason #141) the perfect excuse for a gawp, and, occasionally, a fondle (reason #143fn1). Now, Glasses Man performs a strange sort of squat, bending his knees so that he is on eye-level with my A-cups before looking up at me quizzically. ‘Alice … Rat?’

  ‘It’s “Ray”.’

  ‘Right! Yes! We met last time!’ He extends a hand to shake mine.

  ‘Oh, yes, I remember!’ I don’t.

  After one of those handshakes that last about five minutes, he starts telling me about some new dental floss his company is promoting (‘Flossed in Space was developed by NASA! It’s the future of hygiene filaments!’). I nod politely, before feeling my phone quiver in my pocket and taking it as my cue to escape. ‘I’m so sorry, would you excuse me? I have to take this, then my session’s about to start.’

  In fact, ‘How Do You Solve a Problem like Major Root Canal Surgery?’ isn’t for another half an hour, but there are only so many aspartame-laden Rich Tea biscuits a woman can not eat. Plus I’m a social leper trapped in the body of a dentist.

  ‘You hanging around after? There were rumours they’d got Malala for the keynote but I just saw that magician we had last year so we might be in for Cavity-In-A-Hat 2.0 …’

  The fluorescent tube above my head flickers and the idea of another twenty-four hours in a venue totally lacking in natural light, where delegates subsist purely on processed food and dentistry puns, makes me weary. I promise to try and make his ‘Return of the Plaque’ session, then leave. I’ve missed the phone call, but that’s OK. I don’t like talking on the phone any more than I relish ‘a natter’ in real life.

  I wasn’t always like this. But lately I’ve become worn out. As though I’ve used up all my ‘nice’ in the consultation room or on parenting, until there’s nothing left. That’s what almost eight years of childrearing along with fifteen years at the plaque-face of dentistry can do to a person. Not to mention a life-sentence of marriage …

  ‘Excuse me?’ I ask a large man with an already sweaty moustache guarding the entrance to the hallowed back stage area where, I’ve been assured, privacy, Wi-Fi, and ‘the good coffee’ are located. ‘Can I come in?’

  ‘This is for VIP pass holders only, madam,’ he tells me.

  Jesus, I’m a ‘madam’, now am I? Aka ‘past it’ …

  ‘I’ve got a special blue lanyard …’ I dangle it hopefully.

  ‘Rat?’ He frowns at me and then at an iPad, dabbing at it with fleshy fingers. ‘No “Rat” on my list …’

  ‘It’s Ray.’

  ‘It says “Rat”.’

  ‘I know. But it’s Ray.’

  ‘Sure?’

  ‘I’m pretty sure.’

  He has a long hard stare at my chest, presumably to verify this, then stands aside to let me pass through to the inner sanctum. It smells strongly of sandwiches and the pheromones of several other ‘experts’ enacting various rituals to see them through the next ninety minutes.

  A woman click-clacks past in full, precise make-up and trousers so tight they almost certainly necessitate a cranberry juice drip afterwards.

  ‘Are you … ?’ she asks, then tries to frown through Botoxed brows and points instead at my name badge.

  ‘It’s a typo. I’m Alice Ray. Hi!’

  ‘Oh! Lovely. You’re on the panel I’m chairing.’ She claps her hands together but her fingers don’t touch.

  Weird …

  ‘Oh, great.’ Say more, I tell myself, say something else. Quickly. Do ‘talking’ like normal people. ‘Umm …’ I try to think of something to say. ‘Are those Viennese Whirls over there?’

  There I go again, captivating people with my effortless charm and chat …

  ‘Err, well, yes. Help yourself!’

  ‘Thanks.’ I won’t. I would no sooner eat a Viennese Whirl than I would the plate they’re arranged on.

  You see, officially at least, I don’t eat sugar. Or bread. Or potatoes. Or pasta. Or rice. Or dairy. Or trans fats. Or saturated fat. Or meat. Our canines may have been designed for tearing the flesh of animals from their bones, but I’ve dealt with enough oral cavities to be put off the stench of rotting meat wedged between teeth for life. Mainly though, I kept reading about how it
might be making my gut sluggish – and I haven’t got time to be sluggish. In any department. Of course, there’s the occasional blip. Like last month, with the quarter-pounder … but that was under the cover of darkness and the kids weren’t with me. And if you eat it in your car, with no one watching, it doesn’t count. Everyone knows that. That’s how I like my meal deals: with a side order of shame.

  ‘Right. Well, lovely to meet you,’ Cranberry Pants says, bringing me back from my reverie.

  ‘Lovely,’ I reply with a nod in response.

  She tilts her head to one side and purses her lips, as though I’m a stray cat that’s just dragged something dead into the house. ‘And good luck, OK? We’ve got fifteen more minutes of “The Only Way Is Airflow”, then a loo break before your session.’ She pats my arm and scissors off.

  ‘Lovely …’ I repeat, scanning for the quietest, darkest corner where I won’t have to interact with anyone. I wedge myself between a black curtain and a wall to watch the editor of Dentistry Magazine karate chop the air to get in the zone, while a celebrity hygienist I’ve seen on This Morning hops up and down on a mini trampette. The speakers from ‘New Trends in Sinus Care’ come off the adjacent stage and an ‘alternative oral therapist’ opens his mouth like a baby bird, tilting his head back so that his miniature assistant (Child? Wife? Child-wife?) can dispense a pipette of some magical unction.

  Just another day at the office, I think, keeping my head down and willing my fellow speakers to keep their distance. But in reality, this is an honour. A privilege, I remind myself: I’m representing the surgery – as well as speaking on behalf of grassroots dental practitioners at the gravel pit of oral care. It was a coup to be asked. This is what all the hard work – all those hours overtime and putting myself forward for extra training and more responsibility – has been aiming for. I’m finally being taken seriously in my field, I tell myself.

  Then the theme tune from Frozen starts up.

  I don’t react straight away as my daughter’s game of ‘changing Mum’s ringtone to something different every day’ means that I can’t be sure it’s me who’s blasting out Elsa (last week it was Little Mix). But then the editor stops air-fighting and baby bird pipette man is looking over and I realise that the only person the sound can be coming from is … me.