From the south, the hills and cave-riddled shores of Cornwall and Wales, came some of the most ancient elves in the island: mail-clad horsemen and charioteers whose banners told of forgotten glories; green-haired, white-skinned sea folk, who kept a grey veil of salt-smelling fog about them for the sake of dampness on land; a few rustic half-gods whom the Romans had brought and afterwards abandoned; shy, flitting forest elves, clan by clan.
The lands of Angle and Saxon did not hold so many since most of the beings who once dwelt there had fled or been exorcised; but such as still remained heeded the call. Nor were these elves, poor and backward though they often were, to be scorned in war, for no few among them could trace descent to Wayland or to Odin himself. They were the master smiths of the earldom, having some dwarf blood, and many chose to fight with their great hammers.
But the mightiest and proudest were those who dwelt around Elfheugh. Not alone in ancestry, but in beauty and wisdom and wealth, the lords whom Imric had gathered about him outshone all others. Fiery they were, going to battle as gaily clad as to a wedding and kissing their spears like brides; skilled they were, casting terrible spells for the undoing of their foes and the warding of their friends. The newcome elves stood in awe of them, though not thereby hindered in enjoying the food and drink they sent out to the camps or the women who followed in search of sport.
Freda was much taken with watching that host gather. The sight of those unhuman warriors gliding noiselessly through dusk and night, their visages half hidden to her eyes and thus made the more eerie, sent waves of shock and delight, fear and pride, through her. By holding high rank among them, Skafloc, her man, wielded more power than any mortal king.
But his lordship was over the soulless. And she remembered the bear strength of the trolls. What if he should fall before them?
The same thought came to him. “Maybe I ought to take you to what friends you have in the lands of men,” he said slowly. “It may be, though I do not believe it, that the elves will lose. True it is that every omen we took was not good. And if that should happen, this would be no place for you.”
“No-no—” She regarded him briefly with frightened grey eyes, then hid her face on his breast. “I will not leave you. I cannot.”
He ruffled her shining hair. “I would come back for you later,” he said. “No ... It might happen that someone there, somehow, talked me over or forced me to stay-I know not who that could be, save perhaps a priest, but I have heard of such things—” She recalled the lovely elf women and their way of looking at Skafloc. He felt her stiffen in his arms. Her voice came firm: “Anyhow, I will not leave you. I stay.” He hugged her in gladness.
Now word came that the trolls were putting out to sea. On the last night before their own sailing, the elves held feast in Elfheugh.
Vast was Imric’s drinking hall. Freda, sitting by Skafloc near the earl’s high seat, could not make out the further walls or get more than a glimpse of the vine-carved rafters. The cool blue twilight loved of the elves seemed to drift like smoke through the hall, though the air itself was pure and smelled of flowers. Light came from countless tapers in heavy bronze sconces, whose flames burned silvery and unwavering. It flashed back off shields hung on the walls and panels of intricately etched gold. All of precious metals and studded with gems were the trenchers and bowls and cups on the snowy tablecloths. And though she had grown used to delicate eating in Elfheugh, Freda’s head swam at the many kinds of meat, fowl, fish, fruits, spices, confections, the ales and meads and wines, that came forth this evening.
Richly clad were the elves. Skafloc wore a tunic of white silk over linen breeches, a doublet whose colourfully embroidered pattern led the eye in a trackless maze, a gold-worked belt with a jewelled dagger in an electrum sheath, shoes of unicorn leather, and a short ermine-trimmed cape whose scarlet was like a rush of blood from his shoulders. Freda had on a filmy dress of spider silk, across which played colours in a rainbow ripple; a necklace of diamonds fell over her firm small breasts, a heavy golden girdle was locked about her waist, golden rings weighted her bare arms, and she was shod in velvet. Both of them wore gemmed coronets, as befitting a lord of Alfheim and his lady of the hour. The great elves were no less splendid, and even the poorer chieftains from elsewhere shone with raw gold.
There was music, not alone the eldritch melodies that Imric favoured, but the harping of the Sidhe and the piping of the west country folk. There was talk, the quick cruel brilliant discourse of the elves, subtle mockery and thrust and parry with words, and sweet laughter went up and down the tables.
But when these had been cleared away and the jesters should have skipped forth, the cry went for a sword dance instead. Imric scowled, not liking to make omens plain to all, but since most of his guests wanted it, he could not well refuse.
The elves moved out on to the floor, men stripping off their more cumbersome garments and women everything; and thralls fetched for each man a sword. “What are they doing?” asked Freda.
“ ’Tis the old war-dance,” Skafloc told her. “I must be skald to it, I suppose, because no human could tread it unscathed even if he knew in full the measures. They dance to ninety and nine verses which the skald must make up as he goes alone, and if no one is hurt ’tis a great omen for victory; but if someone be slain it means defeat and ruin, and even a slash bodes ill. I like this not.”
Soon the elf men stood in a wide double row, facing each other and crossing swords on high; and behind every man stood a woman, crouched and taut. The rows reached far into the dimness of the hall, an aisle with a roof of gleaming blades. Skafloc stood before the earl’s seat.
“Hai, go!” shouted Imric so that it rang.
Skafloc chanted:
Swiftly goes the sword-play, sweeping foemen backward to the beach where tumult talks with voice of metaclass="underline" belling of the brazen beaks of cleaving axes, smoking blood, where sea kings sing the mass of lances.
As he called it out, the men danced forward, and a din of clashing swords lifted in time to the stave. The women likewise danced lithely ahead, and each man’s left hand seized a woman’s right and whirled her into the narrowing aisle where the words flashed and clanged.
Skafloc called:
Swiftly goes the sword-play, stormlike in its madness: shields are bloody shimmers, shining moons of redness; winds of arrows wailing, wicked spearhead-lightning lads will smite who lately lay by lovely sweethearts.
Through and between the whirring, flickering blades wove the elf women in a measure swift and supple and tangled as the foamstreaks on a wave. The men danced to each other, beyond, and wheeled about, and everyone threw his sword in a glittering arc to the one across from him, just missing a lithe white body, and caught the weapon thrown at him. Quoth Skafloc:
Swiftly goes the sword-play! Swinging bloodied weapons, shields and helms to shatter, shout the men their war-cry. While the angry, whining, whirring blades are sparking, howl the wolves their hunger, hawks stoop low for feasting.
Round and about, swifter than mortal eye could follow, whirled the dance; and leaping and shrieking between the women went the swords. Now blades hummed low, and as two clashed points above the floor, an elf lady sprang over them; the keen edges came up just behind her. Now the dancing men each seized a partner and wove a glitter of metal about her spinning body. Now they fenced again in the dance, and the women sprang and capered between the fencers in those bare instants when the weapons were drawn back. Skafloc’s verses spilled out unbroken:
Swiftly goes the sword-play! Song of metal raises din of blades for dancing (death for eager partner). Lur horns bray their laughter, lads, and call to hosting. Sweeter game was sleeping softly with your leman.