“Beware. The gods hate traitors.”
“Yes,” answered Solbern at his brother’s shoulder, “this night Wodan fetches you, oathbreaker, and ill is that house to which he will take you.”
More invaders poured through; Liuderis pushed them into ragged ranks. “Onward!” Hathawulf bawled.
Ermanaric had been giving his own orders. His men might mostly lack helmet, byrnie, shield, long weapon. But each bore a knife, at least. Nor did the Teurings have much iron to wear. They were mainly yeomen, who could afford little more than a metal cap and a coat of stiffened leather, and who went to battle only when the king raised a levy. Those whom Ermanaric had gathered were warriors by trade; any of them might have a farm or a ship or the like, but he was first and foremost a warrior. He was well drilled in standing side by side with his fellows.
The king’s troopers snatched at trestles and the boards that had lain on top. These they used to ward themselves. Those that had axes, having retreated before the inroad, chopped cudgels for their fellows out of wainscots and pillars. Besides a knife, a stag’s tine off the wall, the narrow end of a drinking horn, a broken Roman goblet, a brand from the firetrenches made a deadly weapon. As tightly wedged as the struggle became—flesh against flesh, friend in the way of friend, pushing, stumbling, slipping in blood and sweat—sword or ax was of scant more help. Spears and bills were useless, save that from their stance on the benches by the high seat, the armored guards could strike downward.
Thus the fight became formless, blind, a fury as of the Wolf unbound.
Yet Hathawulf, Solbern, and their best men beat a path onward, pushed, rammed, hewed, slashed, stabbed, amidst bellow and shriek, thud and clash, onward, living stormwinds—until at last they came to their mark.
There they set shield against shield, loosed steel upon steel, they and the king’s household troopers. Ermanaric was not in that front line, but he boldly stood above on the seat, before the gaze of all, and wielded a spear. Often did he trade a look with Hathawulf or Solbern, and then each grinned his hatred.
It was old Liuderis who broke through the line. His lifeblood spurted from thigh and forearm, but his ax beat right and left, he won as far as the bench and clove the skull of Sibicho. Dying, he rasped, “One snake the less.”
Hathawulf and Solbern passed over his body. A son of Ermanaric threw himself before his father. Solbern cut the boy down. Hathawulf struck beyond. Ermanaric’s spearshaft cracked across. Hathawulf struck again. The king reeled back against the wall. His right arm dangled half severed. Solbern slashed low, at the left leg, and hamstrung him. He crumpled, still snarling. The brothers moved in for the kill. Their followers strove to keep the last of the royal guard off their backs.
Someone appeared.
A stop to the fighting spread through the hall like the wave when a rock falls in a pool. Men stood agape and agasp. Through the unrestful gloom, made the thicker by their crowding, they barely saw what hovered above the high seat.
On a skeletal horse, whose bones were of metal, sat a tall graybearded man. Hat and cloak hid any real sight of him. In his right hand he bore a spear. Its head, above every other weapon and limned against the night under the roof, caught fire-glow—a comet, a harbinger of woe?
Hathawulf and Solbern let their blades sink. “Forefather,” the elder breathed into the sudden hush. “Have you come to our help?”
The answer rolled forth unhumanly deep, loud, and ruthless: “Brothers, your doom is upon you. Meet it well and your names will live.
“Ermanaric, this is not yet your time. Send your men out the rear and take the Teurings from behind.
“Go, all of you here, to wherever Weard will have you go.”
He was not there.
Hathawulf and Solbern stood stunned.
Crippled, bleeding, Ermanaric could nonetheless shout: “Heed! Stand fast where you’re up against the foe—the rest of you take the hinder door, swing around—heed the word of Wodan!”
His bodyguards were the first to understand. They yelled their glee and fell on their enemies. These lurched back, aghast, into the reborn turmoil. Solbern stayed behind, sprawled under the high seat in a pool of blood.
King’s men streamed through the small postern. They hastened past the building to the front. Most of the Teurings had gotten inside. Greutungs overran those in the yard. Had they no better weapons, they ripped cobblestones out of the earth and cast them. A risen moon gave light enough.
Howling, the warriors next cleared the entry-room. They outfitted themselves and fell on the invaders both fore and aft.
Grim was that battle. Knowing they would die whatever happened, the Teurings fought till they dropped. Hathawulf alone heaped a wall of slain before him. When he fell, few were left to be glad of it.
The king himself would not have been among them, had not folk of his been quick to stanch his wounds. As was, they bore him, barely aware, out of a hall where none but the dead then dwelt.
1935
Laurie, Laurie!
372
Morning brought rain. Driven on a hooting wind, hail-cold, hail-hard, it hid everything but the thorp that huddled beneath it, as if the rest of the world had gone down in wreck. The roar on the roof resounded through hollow Heorot.
Darkness within seemed deepened by emptiness. Fires burned, lamps shone well-nigh for naught amidst the shadows. The air was raw.
Three stood near the middle. That of which they spoke would not let them sit. Breath puffed ghost-white out of their lips.
“Slain?” mumbled Alawin numbly. “Every last one of them?”
The Wanderer nodded. “Yes,” he told them again, “though there will be as much sorrow among Greutungs as Teurings. Ermanaric lives, but maimed and lamed, and poorer by two sons.”
Ulrica gave him a whetted look. “If this happened last night,” she said, “you have ridden no earthly horse to bring us the tale.”
“You know who I am,” he answered.
“Do I?” She lifted fingers toward him that were crooked like talons. Her voice grew shrill. “If you are indeed Wodan, he is a wretched god, who could not or would not help my sons in their need.”
“Hold, hold,” Alawin begged her, while he cast an abashed glance at the Wanderer.
The latter said softly: “I mourn with you. But the will of Weard stands not to be altered. As the story of what happened drifts west, belike you will hear that I was there, and even that it was Ermanaric whom I saved. Know that against time the gods themselves are powerless. I did what I was doomed to do. Remember that in meeting the end that was set for them, Hathawulf and Solbern redeemed the honor of their house, and won a name for themselves that shall abide as long as their race does.”
“But Ermanaric remains above ground,” Ulrica snapped. “Alawin, the duty of vengeance has passed to you.”
“No!” said the Wanderer. “His task is more than that. It is to save the blood of the family, the life of the clan. This is why I have come.”
He turned to the youth, who stared wide-eyed. “Alawin,” he went on, “foreknowledge is mine, and a heavy load that is. Yet I may sometimes use it to fend off harm. Listen well, for this is the last time you will ever hear me.”
“Wanderer, no!” Alawin cried. Breath hissed between Ulrica’s teeth.
The Gray One lifted the hand that did not hold his spear. “Winter will soon be upon you,” he said, “but spring and summer follow. The tree of your kindred stands bereft of leaves, but its roots slumber in strength, and it shall be green anew—if an ax does not hew it down.
“Hasten. Hurt though he is, Ermanaric will seek to make an end, once for all, of your troublesome breed. You cannot raise as much force as he can. If you stay here, you will die.