"Many brave warriors are dying in yonder woods. it pains me to desert them thus, though they are our foes and would have put me to death."
Cormac shrugged his shoulders. "I, too, would have aided them had I seen a way. But we could have accomplished naught by remaining and dying with them. By the blood of the gods, what a night this has been! Golara is rid of her Vikings, but the Picts paid a red price! All of Thorwald's four hundred are dead now or soon will be, but not less than a thousand Picts have died outright in the steading and the gods only know how many more in the forest."
Wulfhere glanced at Hrut where he stood on the poop, outstretched hand on the sword whose reddened point rested on the deal planking. Unkempt, bloodstained, tattered, wounded, yet still his kingly carriage was unabated.
"And now that you have rescued me so boldly against incredible odds," said he, "what would you have of me besides my eternal gratitude, which you already have?"
Wulfhere did not reply; turning to the men who rested on their oars to gaze eagerly and expectantly up at the group on the poop, the Viking chief lifted his red axe and bellowed: "Skoal, wolves! Yell hail for Thorfinn Eaglecrest, king of Dane-mark!"
A thunderous roar went up to the blue of the morning skies that startled the wheeling sea gulls. The tattered king gasped in amazement, glancing quickly from one to the other, not yet certain of his status.
"And now that you have recognized me," said he, "am I guest or prisoner?"
Cormac grinned. "We traced you from Skagen, whence you fled in a single ship to Helgoland, and learned there that Thorwald Shield-hewer had taken captive a Dane with the bearing of a king. Knowing you would conceal your identity, we did not expect him to know that he had a king of the Danes in his hands.
"Well, King Thorfinn, this ship and our swords are yours. We be outlaws, both from our own lands. You cannot alter my status in Erin, but you can inlaw Wulfhere and make Danish ports free to us."
"Gladly would I do this, my friends," said Thorfinn, deeply moved. "But how can I aid my friends, who cannot aid myself? I, too, am an outcast, and my cousin Eric rules the Danes."
"Only until we set foot on Danish soil!" exclaimed Cormac. "Oh, Thorfinn, you fled too soon, but who can foresee the future? Even as you put to sea like a hunted pirate, the throne was rocking under Eric's feet. While you lay captive on Thorwald's dragon ship, Jarl Anlaf fell in battle with the Jutes and Eric lost his greatest supporter. Without Anlaf, his rule will crumble overnight and hosts will flock to your banner!"
Thorfinn's eyes lighted with a wondrous gleam. He threw his head back as a lion throws back his mane and flung up his reddened sword into the eye of the rising sun.
"Skoal!" he cried. "Head for Dane-mark, my friends, and may Thor fill our sail!"
"Aim her prow eastward, carles," roared Wulfhere to the men at the sweeps. "We go to set a new king on the throne of Dane-mark!"
THE TEMPLE OF ABOMINATION
"Easy all," grunted Wulfhere Hausakliufr. "I see the glimmer of a stone building through the trees… Thor's blood, Cormac! are you leading us into a trap?"
The tall Gael shook his head, a frown darkening his sinister, scarred face.
"I never heard of a castle in these parts; the British tribes hereabouts don't build in stone. It may be an old Roman ruin-"
Wulfhere hesitated, glancing back at the compact lines of bearded, horn-helmeted warriors. "Maybe we'd best send out a scout."
Cormac Mac Art laughed jeeringly. "Alaric led his Goths through the Forum over eighty years ago, yet you barbarians still start at the name of Rome. Fear not; there are no legions in Britain. I think this is a Druidic temple. We have nothing to fear from them-more especially as we are moving against their hereditary enemies."
"And Cerdic's brood will howl like wolves when we strike them from the west instead of the south or east," said the Skull-splitter with a grin. "It was a crafty idea of yours, Cormac, to hide our dragon-ship on the west coast and march straight through British country to fall on the Saxons. But it's mad, too."
"There's method in my madness," responded the Gael. "I know that there are few warriors hereabouts; most of the chiefs are gathering about Arthur Pendragon for a great concerted drive. Pendragon-ha! He's no more Uther Pendragon's son than you are. Uther was a black-bearded madman-more Roman than Briton and more Gaul than Roman. Arthur is as fair as Eric there. And he's pure Celt-a waif from one of the wild western tribes that never bowed to Rome. It was Lancelot who put it into his head to make himself king-else he had still been no more than a wild chief raiding the borders."
"Has he become smooth and polished like the Romans were?"
"Arthur? Ha! One of your Danes might seem a gentlewoman beside him. He's a shock-headed savage with a love for battle." Cormac grinned ferociously and touched his scars. "By the blood of the gods, he has a hungry sword! It's little gain we reivers from Erin have gotten on his coasts!"
"Would I could cross steel with him," grunted Wulfhere, thumbing the flaring edge of his great axe. "What of Lancelot?"
"A renegade Gallo-Roman who has made an art of throat-cutting. He varies reading Petronius with plotting and intriguing. Gawaine is a pure-blooded Briton like Arthur, but he has Romanish leanings. You'd laugh to see him aping Lancelot-but he fights like a blood-hungry devil. Without these two, Arthur would have been no more than a bandit chief. He can neither read nor write."
"What of that?" rumbled the Dane. "Neither can I… Look-there's the temple.
They had entered the tall grove in whose shadows crouched the broad, squat building that seemed to leer out at them from behind a screening row of columns.
"This can be no temple of the Britons," growled Wulfhere. "I thought they were mostly of a sickly new sect called Christians."
"The Roman-British mongrels are," said Cormac. "The pure Celts hold to the old gods, as do we of Erin. By the blood of the gods, we Gaels will never turn Christian while one Druid lives!"
"What do these Christians?" asked Wulfhere curiously.
"They eat babies during their ceremonies, it is said."
"But 'tis also said the Druids burn men in cages of green wood."
"A lie spread by Caesar and believed by fools!" rasped Cormac impatiently. "I laud not the Druids especially, but wisdom of the elements and ages is not denied to them. These Christians teach meekness and the bowing of the neck to the blow."
"What say you?" The great Viking was sincerely amazed. "Is it truly their creed to take blows like slaves?"
"Aye-to return good for evil and to forgive their oppressors."
The giant meditated on this statement for a moment. "That is not a creed, but cowardice," he decided finally. "These Christians be all madmen. Cormac, if you recognize one of that breed, point him out and I will try his faith." He lifted his axe meaningfully. "For look you," he said, "that is an insidious and dangerous teaching which may spread like rust on the wheat and undermine the manhood of men if it be not stamped out like a young serpent under heel."
"Let me but see one of these madmen," said Cormac grimly, "and I will begin the stamping. But let us see to this temple. Wait here-I'm of the same belief as these Britons, if I am of a different race. These Druids will bless our raid against the Saxons. Much is mummery, but their friendship at least is desirable."
The Gael strode between the columns and vanished. The Hausakliufr leaned on his axe; it seemed to him that from within came a faint rattle-like the hoofs of a goat on a marble floor.
"This is an evil place," muttered Osric Jarl's-bane. "I thought I saw a strange face peering about the top of the column a moment agone."
"It was a fungus vine grown and twisted about," Black Hrothgar contradicted him. "See how the fungus springs up all about the temple-how it twists and writhes like souls in torment-how human-like is its appearance-"