One King's Way

Chapter Eleven

Inside the great boat-shaped hall, the priests of the Way had formed their holy circle. White cords marked it off from the outside world, with the sacred rowan-berries hanging from them—berries faded now, with the spring coming on, from their autumn scarlet. Inside the circle, more than forty priests sat together, the largest conclave any of them had ever known, drawn for the most part from Norway, where the Way was strong, but also from Denmark, from Sweden, with a few scattered converts or missionaries even from the isles of the Atlantic, from Ireland, or from Frisia where the Way had been born almost two centuries before. One even, Hund the leech, from England, accepted formally at the sponsorship of his master Ingulf the week before.

At one end of the circle stood the silver spear of Othin, at the other the burning bale-fire of Loki. By tradition, this fire, once the conclave had begun, could not be refueled: nor could conclave continue once the fire was so far dimmed that no spark could be seen in the ash.

Valgrim the Wise stood by the spear of Othin, not touching it, for no man had the right to claim it for himself, but reminding them that he was the only priest among them who dared take to himself the dangerous service of Othin. He served the God of the Hanged, Betrayer of Warriors, rather than the homelier or friendlier gods like Thor, the farmers' help, or Frey, bringer of fertility to men and animals. Ten paces behind him, almost hidden in the shadows of the shuttered hall, there stood a great chair of carved wood, with built-up sides and a canopy covered in a design of interlacing dragons. A pale face looked out from the deep shadow, the gold circle on its brow catching ruddy gleams from the Loki-fire: King Olaf, host and protector of the Way, there by invitation to observe and if need be advise, but not to vote, or speak without express request.

The shuffling of stools and muttered conversation slowly died. Valgrim let it die away, waiting for his moment: he had opposition, he knew, and needed every advantage to overbear it. The only man standing, he looked round, waited till all eyes were on him.

“The Way has come to a turning-point,” he said suddenly. He waited again. “We have our first false prophet.”

That is what we are here to determine, thought Thorvin. But he let Valgrim continue. Better to have the issue out in the open.

“For a hundred and fifty years the Way has spread. At first slowly, and only here in the North where the words of Duke Radbod took root. Now we begin to have followers in many places. Even followers of alien blood and language. Even followers baptized in infancy to the Christ-god. And who can doubt that this is good?

“For we must remember our aim and our purpose. Aye, and our vision. Duke Radbod saw that we who worship the true gods would be brushed aside by the Christ-god, if we did not do as his followers do: preach a word, say a message, bring news of where our spirits go to, and where they come from. And do one thing they do not do: allow all words and all messages to be spoken, not say like the Christ-priests that those who do not obey them in every respect must be tormented for ever for no sin other than disobedience.

“That was our first aim. To preserve ourselves and our peoples and our teaching against men who would destroy them all utterly. But after the aim there came the vision. I have not seen it, but there are others in this hall who have. Different men”—Valgrim looked round the circle, nodding at this face and that, showing the others that he knew exactly who he meant and that they were present to deny him if they did not agree—“different men who yet saw the same vision.

“And that vision is of another world than this one. A world where every land we know, ours among them, obeys the Christian god. But where men live like beasts on a slave's holding, so crowded that they cannot breathe, ruled by rulers they never see, sent to war like pigs to the slaughter-place. And worse things than that. Our wise men and seers call this the Skuld-world: the world that shall be—unless we stop it.

“Yet stop it we can! There is another world wise ones have seen. Aye, and this one I have seen myself”—Valgrim's gray bush of a beard nodded as he stared round. “A world so strange we see it only in fragments, and cannot understand all of those. I have seen men floating in the black of an airless sea, somewhere between the worlds, and thought at first they were the most wretched of all sinners, cast out from all the worlds because even Nithhögg could not bear to gnaw their bones. But then I saw their faces and saw that they were like men on some great adventure: and some of them men of our own blood and language, world-farers so great that any skipper alive today would be no more than a child to them. I do not know how this came about, or will come about, but I know that is the true path for true men: not the path of the Christ-fearers. So all my days I have sought new knowledge.

“One more thing I know, and that is why we must take this path besides the desire for knowledge and power and glory. That is because we are not alone.”

Valgrim looked round again, trying to impress these last words, his own conviction, on men who might have agreed with everything he said so far.

“All men know that around us there are the Hidden Folk. Not dangerous to us here down in the settlements, dangerous only, it may be, to the hunters in the mountains and the children playing by the water-side. But they are not the only Hidden Folk. Somewhere out there, we know, are creatures with power to match the gods, not trolls or nixes, but the iötnar themselves, foes of god and man. And the Loki-brood as well, those who are not of one skin, those who walk in different shapes, half-human, half-dragon, or half-whale.

“In the end, we believe, the great day will come when gods and men on one side will battle the giants and the Hidden Folk on the other—and on that other side too there will be many men, the Christ-worshipers, the deserters. Those who have been misled. That is why Othin takes the warriors to him, to form the host that will march out from Valhalla on that day of Ragnarök. Other hosts there will be too, from Thruthvangar for Thor and Himinbiorg for Heimdall, and from all the others, sailors and ski-runners and leeches and bowmen. But Othin's host will be the greatest and the hardiest, and most hope of victory lies in it.

“We dare not divide our hosts. The battle is not yet certain. If the Way takes the wrong path now, we will be divided and lost. I say that the one-eyed Englishman who carries the Othin-spear and yet does no homage to Othin, I say that he is the false prophet leading us on the false path. We must reject him now to fulfill our true destiny: which is to hail the One King, the One King whom our prophecies say will come to us from the North. The One King who will change the world and bring victory instead of defeat on the day of Ragnarök.”

Valgrim ceased, and settled the spear-pendant firmly on his broad chest. He waited for the denial he knew would come.

It came from a quarter he had hoped would support him. Vigleik of the many visions stirred on his stool, looked down at the unusual emblem he bore, the bowl of Suttung the mead-guardian, bringer of inspiration, and spoke.

“What you say of visions may be true, Valgrim, but while what we see is one thing, what we understand of it is another. Now I have said this to you before, and if you cannot deny it you must tell me what it means. We know our brother Farman saw the one-eyed Englishman—saw him when he had two eyes. Saw him in vision in Asgarth, home of the gods, and set in the place of Völund, lame smith of the gods. And Farman saw All-Father speak to him. None of us has seen this of any other mortal man. So why should I not think that this man has a divine destiny?”

Valgrim nodded. “I know your visions are true, Vigleik, and Farman's also. You saw the death of the tyrants last month, and news has come through on the trade-ships since, that you saw the truth. So the one-eye may have been seen as Völund. But just as you say, seeing is one thing and understanding is another. Now what does the story of Völund tell us?”

He looked round again, sure his audience was with him, all keenly interested in the story of their sacred myths. “We all know that Völund's wife was a swan-maiden, but that after she left him he was taken by Nithhad, king of the Njar-folk. Nithhad desired his craft as a smith, but feared his escape, so he cut his hamstrings with a knife and set him to work in the smithy at Saevarstath. And there what did Völund do?”

Valgrim's voice fell into the deep chant of the Way-priests:

“He made him fine bracelets and necklaces of gold and gems. He made him bowls for his ale and cunning runners for his sledges. He made him swords that would cut linen by sharpness and anvils by strength. But when Nithhad's two young boys came to see the marvels, what did he do? He lured them into his smithy, promised to show them fine things, showed them a chest.”

Again Valgrim's voice turned to the chant:

“He killed them, he buried their bodies under the forge, of their teeth he made necklaces, goblets of their skulls, brooches of their shining eyeballs. Gave them all to Nithhad. And when Nithhad's daughter came to him to mend a ring, what did he do? Stupefied her with beer, raped her, thrust her out.

“She told her father, weeping. He came to Völund to take his head. And Völund, his hamstrings severed—he put on the wings he had made in the smithy, and flew away. What was the cunning thing he had made for Nithhad? It was his revenge. For that is his name, Völund. From the cunning thing, vel.”

The conclave sat silent, pondering the story they all knew. “Now I ask you,” said Valgrim, “who is the hero of this story? Völund for his cunning, as we are told? Or Nithhad for his attempt to restrain it? I tell you, Vigleik, where this Englishman is concerned, he is Völund, right enough. And we are Nithhad! He will kill our sons and rape our daughters. That is to say, he will deny us our own issue and turn us into creatures to breed his getting for him. Nithhad made only one mistake, which was to try to use Völund's skill and think he was safe when he was only lamed. He should have killed him and made sure work! For men like Völund or the Englishman are not safe when they are crippled. For they are like Völund's wife, the swan-maiden: they are not men of one skin. But it is not a swan that the Englishman turns into, on the other side. Rather, a dragon, or a mound-dweller, a mold-man. Hagbarth, I ask you: did you not report that he said he had been in a mound before!”

The hall stirred with excitement and appreciation at Valgrim's unexpected explanation. They saw Hagbarth nod slowly, reluctantly confirming what Valgrim had said.

Thorvin broke out in reply, as Valgrim had known he would. “This is all well enough, Valgrim, but you are only twisting words. Of course the lad had been in a mound before—he took the old king's treasure from it. He dug his way in with a mattock and fought his way out, like a hero. He did not live in one. If Viga-Brand were here he would mock you for saying he should have left the money in the ground. I ask all here, look beyond words. Look at actions. Shef Sigvarthsson, give him his proper name, he turned a whole country to the Way. He drove out the Christ-church. If he let Christ-priests stay, it was only as if they were any of us, made to pay their own way and work for their own believers. He killed Ivar Ragnarsson. And is there any doubt that he is a seeker for knowledge, who will give up anything for that knowledge?”

Thorvin raised his hand for silence. “If you do not believe me, listen.”

Outside, not far away, the priests could hear a familiar sound, but not one they had expected to hear with all of them in conclave. Across the precincts of the college, across the old, much-trodden snow, there came the clink-clink of the heavy hammer, dimly over it the roaring of forced draught from a bellows. Men working at the forge.

At the forge, Shef had just completed the careful reforging and re-tempering of the sword he had given Karli. Now it was set aside to cool, before reassembly of blade, guard, hilt and pommel. Now Udd had taken over. The little man was conducting a demonstration. He stood to one side of the fire, directing, while Shef, stripped to his breeches and a protective leather overall, handled the pieces of iron and steel with tongs. Cwicca crouched on one knee, pumping the leather bellows that fed the draught to the charcoal-glowing forge. The rest of the English catapulteers, seven of them, Hama, Osmod and the others, with Karli making an eighth, squatted on their heels along the wall, enjoying the warmth and adding their comments.

“Right,” said Udd. “They're all red-hot. Take the first spike and lay it down to one side.”

Shef took a red-hot iron spike, the raw material for a dagger or spear-head, and laid it carefully across the mouth of a pottery bowl, not letting it touch the still-frozen earth of the floor.

“Take the next one and put it straight away into the snow-water.”

Shef lifted it with the tongs and plunged the red-hot metal into a leather bucket full of barely-melted snow, gathered a few minutes before from outside. A cloud of steam rose with violent hissings.

“When the metal's cold, take it out and bend it between your hands.”

Shef waited a minute or two, plucked the spike out, felt it gingerly to make sure there was no residual heat. Bent it between his hands. He had a good idea of what would happen, but was content to let Udd make his demonstration his own way. As the muscles stood out on Shef's forearm, the metal spike suddenly snapped in two.

“Now try the other one.”

Shef handled this one, still warm even in the chilly air, with rags. This time he needed no force. The metal bent in his hands like wire, remained bent without any sign of springing even after he let it go.

“Same metal,” lectured Udd. “If you quench it, it gets hard and brittle—takes a good edge, but no strength. But if you just cool it, it bends. Neither hard nor strong.”

“As much use as an old man's dick,” said a catapulteer companionably.

“More use than yours,” retorted Karli.

“Shut up,” said Udd, bold only in the making of steel. “Now, Shef, my lord that is to say. Take the bent one. Bend it straight again. Put it back in the fire and heat it red-hot once more.

“Now, quench it.” Again the hissing and the cloud of steam. “Return it to the fire. But this time, don't let it get red-hot. Heat it gently—slow down on the bellows there, Cwicca. Let it get to the color of straw.”

Udd peered over with near-sighted anxiety. “Now, that's enough. Take that out and let it cool slowly.”

Shef followed instructions, this time more unsure of what would happen. As a working smith, he knew well the virtues of quenching and the dangers of annealing. His way of combining the qualities of strength, hardness and suppleness, however, had always been to work different grades of metal together in strips. The thought of going back to a strip once annealed had never occurred to him. Nor did he see the significance of the third gentle heating. As the metal cooled he looked with satisfaction at the returning blisters on his hands. They had got too soft while he had played at being a king.

“All right,” said Udd. “Now try it.”

Shef picked up the iron spike and bent it in his hands. It flexed powerfully, giving but then striving to regain its shape.

“This is how you made the crossbow strips,” he remarked.

“In a way, lord, yes. But this is different.” Udd's voice dropped with a kind of reverence. “This iron is the best I have ever seen. The ore it comes from takes half—a quarter—of the working we are used to. How long does it take a forge to make ten pounds of iron in England?”

“Two days,” suggested Shef.

“Here you would get forty in the same time for the same labor. That is one reason the Vikings are so well-armed, I think. Their iron is better. It costs far less time and charcoal to make. So every man can have iron tools and weapons, not just the rich. The iron comes from Jarnberaland, far to the east across the mountains. The Way-folk say they have a mine there and men to run it.

“But there is still more we have discovered, lord.”

In the heart of the forge there lay a pile of what appeared to be ash. Using long tongs, Udd hauled it out, dragged it onto the earthen floor, briskly swept away the covering cinders to reveal a metal plate.

“This has been in the fire for hours, since last night. I have kept the fire going all that time, while the rest of you were snoring.”

“Karli wasn't snoring, he was out after women.”

“Shut up, Fritha. It is a plate made like the spike, by cooling, and then quenching, and reheating, so it was strong and springy. Then I heated it again and kept it in the fire. And all the time it was in the fire, I kept piling the charcoal round it. Now lord, when it has cooled, I want you to thrust it with your spear, with the great spear you took from the Snake-eye.”

Shef raised an eyebrow. The ‘Gungnir’ spear's massive head was made of the best steel he had ever seen. The plate Udd had been working on was perhaps an eighth of an inch thick, the thickness of the metal guard that protected a warrior's hand in the center of a shield. Much thicker and the shield would be too heavy to move easily. But Shef had no doubt the steel spear-head would punch straight through.

As the plate cooled, Udd set it up directly against the wooden logs of the forge wall. “Strike now, master.”

Shef stepped back, balanced the shaft, imagined he had in front of him a deadly enemy. He stepped forward onto the left foot, swung body, arm and shoulder, trying to strike through plate and wall to a space a foot behind both, as Brand had often taught him.

The shaft jarred in his hands, sprang back. Incredulously, Shef looked at the thin plate. Unmarked. Undented. He looked again at the needle-point of ‘Gungnir’. For half an inch the triangular point had been punched flat.

“That's hardened steel,” said Udd flatly. “I thought it would be good stuff for mail. But I found you can't work it. It's unbendable. But if you made the mail, and then hardened it…”

“Or if you made thin plates like this and then just sewed them on…”

In the considering silence one of the catapulteers remarked, “What I don't see is how it all comes from the same stuff. Some's hard and brittle, some's soft and bendy, some's springy, some's so hard you can't scratch it. What makes the difference? Is it something in the water?”

“Some of the Vikings think that,” said Udd: “They believe it's best to use a slave's blood for the final temper.”

The ex-slaves looked at each other, reflecting on fates they had missed.

“Or some try oil. There may be some sense in that. All this steam. You've seen sweat jump off a hot blade? Well, water tries to get away from hot metal, and when you're quenching you don't want it to get away. So oil might be better.

“But I don't think it's that. It's the heating and cooling that do it. And I think it's something to do with the charcoal as well. If you can keep the metal touching the coal, something passes between them. That's my belief.”

Shef walked to the door, stared out across the snow to the fjord and the islands lying in it, still trapped in thick ice. Out there on one of the furthest islands, he knew, was the queen he had seen on his first arrival, Queen Ragnhild, with her son, her husband away seeing to his taxes in the Eastfold. Out there on the island they called Drottningsholm, Queen Island. He watched his breath condensing in the frosty air, and wondered about sweat on iron, iron sizzling in the water-bucket, men blowing on their hands to warm them, steam rising from hot bodies in cold air. What was steam, he wondered?

Two men were carrying a bucket towards him across the snow, slung between them on a pole. There was something strange about that. You would expect slaves to be given a task of that kind, but those men were not slaves: too tall, too well-dressed, swords at their belts. Behind him Shef could hear Cwicca ordering Karli to the bellows and taking a turn at following Udd's instructions. Through the inexpert beating of the hammer he could hear the faint squeak of leather shoes on snow.

The men reached the forge door, set their bucket down carefully. Shef found himself, as so often with these Norwegians, looking up to meet their eyes.

“I am Stein, of the guard of Queen Ragnhild,” said one of them.

“I did not know guards carried buckets,” observed Shef.

Stein scowled. The noise at the forge had ceased as the men inside heard conversation, and Shef knew they were crowding into the doorway, ready to support their leader if needed.

“This is a special bucket,” said Stein, mastering his temper. “A gift from the queen to you, the Ivarsbane. It is winter-ale. Do you know what that is, southerner? We brew our strongest ale, and then in the hardest of the frost we set our vats outside. The water in the ale freezes, we break the ice off the top and throw it away. The longer you do it, the more water the ale loses, and the stronger is what remains. It is a drink for heroes—like you, if you are the slayer of Ivar.”

Stein's expression showed doubt, increasing as Cwicca and the others jostled their way out to peer into the tawny liquid. Not one of the Englishmen was less than head and shoulders shorter than the two Norsemen, and even the stocky Karli was dwarfed.

Stein fumbled at his belt. “The queen told me also to say this. The drink is for you and your men, as you choose. But the queen said you came ashore with nothing, so she sent you a cup. The cup is for you alone. For you alone.”

He freed what he had been carrying and passed it over. Shef turned it over in his hands, surprised. From the way Stein talked he had expected a goblet of gold or silver, something precious. Instead it was a plain mug of hollowed beechwood, such as any churl might drink from. As he turned it over he saw marks on the bottom. Runes. A message.

His errand done, Stein turned away with his companion, not waiting for thanks. Shef recovered himself, called to his own companions. “All right, let's get that inside where it's warm. Fritha, run down to the hut and get your mugs and a ladle if you can find one. Let's at least have a drink. And Udd, heat up a couple of spikes, we can mull this ale and see what it's like hot. Just the thing for this country. Hama, get on the bellows for him, Osmod, get some more fuel for the fire.”

As the ex-slaves bustled round, Shef stepped into the cool bright sunlight to read the scratched runes. They were in the Norse style he had learned from Thorvin, but unfamiliar in some ways. Slowly he puzzled out their sense.

“Bru er varthat, en iss er thykkr,” they read. “The bridge is guarded, but the ice is thick.”

What bridge? Shef looked out again over the fjord. Out there the islands lay in the dense ice. Now he looked for them, he could see thin strips running from one island to the next: long lines of logs, set in the water each autumn and allowed to freeze there. The furthest island out was Drottningsholm. She had said he would come to her when she called him. And now she had. Shef realized Karli was watching him with a raised eyebrow. For him alone, she had said. But if he were to go prowling like a tomcat, it might be best to take an experienced companion.

In the hall of conclave, tempers were running high. The higher because everyone there knew they would soon have to make a final decision. The bale-fire had long since fallen from a blaze to a glow, and now in the darkening hall only a few embers shone out. The fire might not be refueled, nor the conclave continue once no spark could be seen.

“So what is it you propose?” said Valgrim to Thorvin. As the debate had gone on, the two men had emerged as leaders of factions, increasingly speaking against each other. With Thorvin were the majority of the priests of Thor, of Njörth and of Ithun, practical men with clear skills to which they were devoted, smithcraft, seamanship and shipbuilding, medicine and surgery. These men appreciated the advances and the experiments that Shef's Way-kingdom had made, and were eager to continue on that path. Thorvin's followers also included the alien priests, the Frisians, those whose native language was not Norse. Against him were Valgrim, the one priest of Othin, and the majority of the priests of Frey, along with those of Ull, Heimdall, Tyr and the lesser gods. Devotion to them was strongest in Norway itself, and among the least-traveled or most-isolated of the followers of the Way.

“Let the lad return to England,” said Thorvin promptly. “Take as many of us as we can with him. Make his kingdom there the strongest in the North, a place where we can recruit wealth and followers. From it, set up our challenge to the Christ-god. Never before have we taken followers from him, always his priests have crept into our lands to steal followers from us. Let us support this, the first true success we have had.

“And what is your proposal, Valgrim?”

The big man replied as promptly. “Hang him on a tree as a sacrifice to Othin. Fit out the greatest fleet we can, with the assistance of King Halvdan and King Olaf, and go down to take over his kingdom before the English know what has become of him. Then do as you say, Thorvin. Only with the priests of the Way in charge, not some unknown foundling.”

“If you hang him on a tree you reject the messenger of the gods!”

“He cannot be the messenger of the gods. He is not a Norseman, not even a Dane. Most of all, Thorvin, even you have admitted it. He may wear a pendant, he may see visions, but he has no belief. He is not a true believer!”

“You talk like a Christian!”

Valgrim's face purpled, and he started to stride towards Thorvin, who slipped his hand down the haft of his ceremonial hammer. As the other priests started to rise from their stools, to come between the two men, another voice cut through the chill air, one that had not spoken during the angry debate: that of Vigleik of the visions.

“You spoke of fitting out a fleet, Valgrim, and you of setting up a kingdom, Thorvin. Maybe it is time, before the bale-fire goes out, to call on the advice of a king and a commander. You have heard our words, King Olaf Elf-of-Geirstath. What wisdom do you have for us?”

The figure in the carved chair rose to his feet and walked forward to the very perimeter of the corded circle. His face was grave, lined with care. In it there was something of the air of majesty: none, though, of the air of instant decision seen in every Viking jarl or skipper, let alone king. His eyes seemed to look through what was in front of them, to some event or chance beyond.

“Have I leave to speak?” asked Olaf. He waited for the growled assent of the conclave. “Then I have this to say, having heard all that has been said here on both sides.

“All of you know, I think, though you may not wish to say it to my face, that I am a man who has lost his luck. The luck of his family. I can tell you that I did not lose it, nor give it away. I only knew that it would go, and then that it had gone. I am different from other men only that I knew it, instead of finding out much later, or never. I know a great deal about luck.

“Some men will tell you that the luck of a family, the hamingja as we say, is like a giant-woman fully-armed, that the lucky can see as they see the spirits of the land. There are stories of men who saw their guardian-spirit leave them and go to another. They may be true. But that is not what I saw. Truly I saw nothing—except the dream of the great tree of which you have doubtless heard.

“What I felt was like the feeling in the air before the lightning-flash. I knew the flash would come, I knew it would go from me to another. I knew that that other was of the line of my brother. When I was young I thought it was my brother Halvdan. Now I know it was not. Till a few days ago I thought it was my brother's son Harald, whom they call Fairhair.

“Now I am not sure again. For again I have the feeling, the feeling before the flash. It comes to me that luck is going to shift again, to pass out of my line altogether—and maybe to the young man Shef.”

The listeners stirred, and Valgrim's faction eyed each other doubtfully.

“Yet I was wrong before, over Halvdan. Maybe I am wrong again. But not, I think, wholly. As I grow old it seems to me more and more that luck is not a thing that one has or has not, like youth or strength. It is more like light, where a lesser light remains what it was, but cannot be seen any longer when a greater light outshines it. Like a candle still burning in a sunlit room. Except that maybe the greater light steals light from the lesser even, even puts it out.

“I have heard the history of the young man Shef. He brought bad luck to his own king Jatmund. He did not quail before the luck of Ivar. He was rescued, they tell me, by one of the god-born, the king Alfred, descended from Othin. Soon after the rescue that king was a beggar, to be rescued in his turn. I think this young man draws the luck from others. Where he comes, luck goes. He may take it even from my own blood, where I thought the luck of Norway rested—where it did rest, till you brought him here to challenge it.”

“All this is mere talk,” rumbled Valgrim. “We must have proof.”

“Proof comes from a test. Let us test his luck against the luck of Harald and Halvdan, against the queens Asa and Ragnhild.”

“How do we do that?”

“Agree to the test and I will tell you. But agree quickly, before the bale-fire goes out.”

The forty priests looked at the tiny glowing spark that was all that was left, muttered together. Then, slowly, both Thorvin and Valgrim nodded their agreement. As a Tyr-priest knelt down and blew gently on the last remaining ember, King Olaf began to speak. Before he had finished, Valgrim was already shaking his head in dissatisfaction.

“Too unsure,” he growled. “I need a clearer sign.”

“You may get a clearer sign than you wish, Valgrim. I spoke of light and luck. There is another way to see it. Some of you believe that all our lives are spun by the three spinners, Urth, Verthandi and Skuld. But they spin not single threads, rather a great web, the threads crossing over each other. Where the threads cross each other, they fray! Beware the man with a strong life-thread, Valgrim. Especially if that thread crosses yours.”

Vigleik stirred himself to speak. “I have seen the Spinners,” he said. “Their loom-weights are skulls, their shuttles are swords and spears, their web is human gut.”

“That is in the Skuld-world,” said Thorvin flatly. “That is what we mean to change.”