The Path of the King

s a chamber which the thralls used of a morning-a place which smelt of hams and meal and good provender. There a bed had been made for him when he forsook his cot in the women's quarte

nd stand for a moment with his small body bathed in the radiance. The game was not to come back at once, but to foray into the farther darkness before

e. Sometimes the man was permitted to sleep there

rkness with but an instant of light between. You are born for high deeds, princeling. Many would

for he detected praise, though

he was a fair woman out of the Western Isles, all brown and golden as it seemed to him, and her voice was softer than the hard ringing speech of the Wick folk. She told him island stories about gentle fairies and good-humoured elves who lived in a green windy country by sum

old one, a boat

oars and a brig

ld and a thrall

the wind at the

was rude stuff, and the Queen h

ho were the spear-head in all the forays. At the great feasts of Yule-tide he was soon sent packing, for there were wild scenes when the ale flowed freely, though his father, King Ironbeard, ruled his hall with a strong hand. From the speech of his elders Biorn made his picture of the world beyond the firths. It was a world of gloom and terror, yet shot with a str

t for the company, he had respect from them, for he was wise in many things, a skilled leech, a maker of runes, and a crafty builder of ships. He was a master hand at riddles, and for hours the housecarles would puzzle their wits over his efforts. This was the manner of them. "Who," Leif would ask, "are the merry maids that glide above the land to the joy of their father;

not less noble. Leif told them well, so that his hearers were held fast with the spell of wonder and then spurred to memories of their own. Tongues would be loosened, and there would be wild recollections of battles among the skerries of the west, of huntings in the hills where strange sights greeted the benighted huntsman, and of voyaging far south into the lands of the sun where the poorest thrall wore linen and the cities were

f molten iron, whence came his by-name. Yet in a fight no Bearsark could vie with him for fury, and his sword Tyrfing was famed in a thousand songs. On high days the tale of his descent would be sung in the hall-not by Leif, who was low-born and of no account, but by one or other of the chiefs of the Shield-ring. Biorn was happy on such occasions, for he himself came into the songs, since it was right to honour the gentle lady, the Qu

th the Tronds in the north and the men of More in the south, and a certain Shockhead, an upsetting king in Norland, was making trouble with his neighbours. Likewise there was one Kristni, a king of the Romans, who sought to dispute with Odin himself. This Kristni was a m

. The dogs left their lair by the fire and, led by the Garm the old blind patriarch, made a tour of inspection among the outhouses to the edge of the birch woods. Presently would come a rending of the ice on the firth, and patches of inky water would show between the floes. The snow would slip from the fell-side, and leave dripping rock and clammy bent, and the river would bre

with his arrows in the great pine forest, which in his own mind he called Mirkwood and feared exceedingly. Or he would go fishing with Egil the Fisherman, spearing salmon in the tails of the river pools. But best he loved to go up the firth in the boat which Leif had made him-a finished, clinker-built little model of a w

olk, but of wickerwork after the fashion of his mother's people. He learned to wrestle toughly with the lads of his own age, and to throw a light spear truly at a mark. He

kes and sour milk, and passed the news of the coast, Leif would fall to probing her craft and get but surly answers. To the boy's question she was kinder. "Let the dead things be, prince," she said. "There's small profit from foreknowledge.

ddled on the floor, her hand shading her eyes as if she were looking to a far horizon. Her body shook with gusts of passion, and the voice that came from her was not her own. Never so long as he lived did Biorn forget the terrible hour when that voice from beyond the world spoke things he could

if asking the fortune of th

t yet. The shears of the Norns are still bl

syllables. "His thread runs westward-beyond the Far Isles... not he but the seed of his loins shall

e next Biorn knew was that Leif had fetche

h other on the matter. But the boy thought much, and from that night he had a new purpose. It seemed that he was fated to travel far, and his fa

s, who would sail in the summer time on trading ventures and pushed farther than any galleys of war. The old sailor, Othere Cranesfoot, was but now back from a voyage which had taken him to Snowland, or, as we say, Iceland. He could tell of the Curdled Sea, like milk set apart for cheese-making, which flowed as fast as a river, and brought down ghoulish beasts and great dragons in its tide. He told, too, of the Sea-walls which were the end of the world, waves higher than any moun

west, there was the goal to seek. He would find the happy country and reign over it. But Leif shook his head, for he had heard the story before. "To get t

re sought for far and near, and spells and runes were prepared by all who had skill of them, her life ebbed fast and ere Yule she was laid in the Howe of the Dead. The loss of her made Thorwald grimmer and more sil

spring tarried famine drew very near. Such a spring no man living remembered. The snow lay deep on the shore till far into May. And when the winds broke they were cold sunless gales which nipped the young life in the earth. The ploughing was backward, and the seed-time was a month too late. The new-born lambs died on the fells an

re had been but a single remedy. Food and wealth must be won from a foray overseas. It was years since Ironbeard had ridden Egir's road to the rich lowlands, and the Bearsarks were growing soft f

two parties in the hall, one urging Ironbeard to follow the old track of his kin westward, another looking south to the Frankish shore. The King himself, after the sacrifice of a black heifer, cast the sacred twigs, and they seemed to point to Frankland. Old Arnwulf was deputed on a certain day to hallow three ravens and take their guidance, but, though he said three times the Ravens' spell, he got no clear counsel from the wise birds. Last of all, the weird-wife Katla came from Sigg, and for the space of three days sat in the ha

se are times when manhood must come fast," he said. "He can bide within the Shield-ring when blows ar

, and likewise a great boar for Frey. The blood was caught up in the sacred bowls, from which the people were sprinkled, and smeared on the altar of blackened fir. Then came the oath-taking, when Ironbeard and his Bearsarks swore brotherhood in battle upon the ship's bulwarks, and the shield's rim, and the horse's shoulder, and the brand's

e was presented to the High

a torque of rough gold, which he mu

ld it will be his part to lead the launchings and the seafarings and

Biorn's heart was lifted with pride, but out of a corner of his eye he

tongues off Siggness, and speaking ill words, said the fishermen who saw the beast. A white reindeer had appeared on Sunfell, and the hunter who followed it had not been seen again. By day, too, there was a brooding of hawks on the tide's edge, which was strange at that season. Worst portent of all, the floods of August were followed by high

ront of the dark company of the sky a white cloud was scudding, tinged with the pal

nes of ma

rides be

e maid

manes the s

the dee

n the hi

ride to choose those whom we slay.

rland, and it is our folk they go to choose. I f

eels slid blood-stained into the sea. This was the 'roller-reddening,' a custom bequeathed from their forefathers, though the old men of the place muttered darkly

spear. Last came Ironbeard, stern as ever, and Biorn with his heart torn between eagerness and regret. Only the children, the women, and the old men were left in Hightown, and they stood on the shingle watching till the last galley had passed out of sight beyond Siggness, a

landward trees and cliffs, but never a human face. Once there was an alarm of another fleet, and the shields were slung outboard, but it proved to be only a wedding-party passing from wick to wick, and they gave it greeting and sailed on. Thes

ere hoisted on the short masts, oars were shipped and lashed under the bulwarks, and the thralls clustered in the prows to rest their weary limbs and dice with knucklebones. The spirits of all lightened, and there was loud talk in the sterns among the Bearsarks. In the night the wind

prophesied. "I smell ri

rs and the voices of the well-born fell low again. These were ghoulish days for Biorn, who had been accustomed to the clear lights and t

"I cannot steer a course except under clean skies. We ran well with the wind aback, but now I am blind and th

ese very seas. The result of his meditations was that he swung more to the south, and events proved him wise. For on the fifteenth day came a lift in the fog and with it t

led me," he cried. "We enter the Frankish

re always conscious of land. Because of the strength of the tides the rowers made slow progress, and it was not till the late afternoon of the seventeenth day that Leif approached Ironbeard wi

ted across the sandbar, Leif in the foremost peering ahead and shouting every now and then an order. It was fine weather for a surprise landing. Biorn saw only low s

pilot's stand and rushed to the stern where the King stood. Flinging hims

where, but not this place. I see blood in the stream and blood on the strand. Our

said gravely. "We abide by our purpose and will take what

d fired their blood. Leif sat huddled by the bulwarks, with a wh

forest and built them a stockade. The dying sun flushed water and wood with angry crimson, and Biorn observed that the me

outs brought back word of a desert country, no men

id King Ironbeard grimly. He did not love t

, a palace of King Kristni, where much gold was to be had for the lifting. By midday they were among pleasant meadows, but the raiders had been there, for the houses were fired and the

inders. Half the guard were dead, and old Arnwulf, the captain, lay blood-eagled on the e

said Ironbeard. "We are in

y the stream and defend it against all comers, till suc

er his breath. He walked now like a man who w

ests Fate met them. There was barely time to form the Shield-ring ere their enemies were upon them-a mass of w

but chiefly he heard the beating of his own heart. The ring swayed and moved as it gave before the onset or pressed to an attack of its own, and Biorn found himself

men of Hightown were fighting one to eight, and these are odds that cannot last. Sometimes it would waver, a

oy's heart. Behind in the sky clouds were banking, dark clouds like horses, with one ahead white and moontipped, the very riders he had watched with Leif from the firth shore. The Walkyries were come for

ll the last hope of Hightown and the famished clan under Sunfell. The Shield-ring was no more. Biorn found himself swept back as the press of numbers overbore

allen and the end of the world had come. The noise of the battle died, as the two pushed through the undergrowth and came into the open spaces of the wood. It was

s.... You are the heir of Thorwald Thorwaldson and you will not die.... I see a long road, but at the end a grea

his horn from a woodland pool

in were slain. Rain blew from the south-west and beat in his face, the brambles tore his legs, but he was dead to all things. Would that the

g a pin-point of ligh

e that of enemy or outcast. He staggered to the door and beat on it

e. And now his knocking grew feebler,

in the midst of it. An old woman sat by it with a bowl in her hand, and an oldish man with a cudgel

, "and my father was

indoors, and their voices were kindly. Nodding with exhaustion, he was given a stool to sit on and a bowl of c

o the boy like the clanging of iron gates on his old happy world. For a moment h

aid aloud, "and my

d smiled. They thought his w