The Sorrow of Odin the Goth

366–372

Tharasmund led his men back to Heorot. There they disbanded and sought their own homes. The Wanderer bade farewell. “Do not rush into action,” was his counsel. “Bide your time. Who knows what may happen?”

“I think you do,” said Tharasmund.

“I am no god.”

“You have told me that more than once, but naught else. What are you, then?”

“I may not unhood it. But if this house owes me anything for what I have done over the years, I claim the debt now, and lay upon you that you gang slowly and warily.”

Tharasmund nodded. “I would in any case. It will take time and skill to bring enough men into a brotherhood that Ermanaric cannot stand against. After all, most would rather sit on their farms and hope trouble passes them by, whoever else it may strike. Meanwhile, the king will likeliest not risk an open breach before he feels he is ready. I must keep ahead of him, but I know full well that a man can walk farther than he can run.”

The Wanderer took his hand, made as if to speak, but blinked hard, wheeled, strode off. The last sight Tharasmund had of him was his hat, cloak, and spear, away down the winter road.

Randwar settled into Heorot, a living remembrance of wrongs. Yet he was too young and full of life to brood very long. Soon he, Hathawulf, and Solbern were fast friends, together in hunt, sports, games, every kind of merriment. He likewise saw much of their sister Swanhild.

Equinox brought melting ice, bud, blossom, and leaf. During the cold season Tharasmund had gone widely around among the Teurings and beyond, to speak in private with leading men. In spring he stayed home and busied himself with work upon his lands; and every night he and Erelieva had joy of each other.

The day came when he cried cheerily: “We’ve plowed and sown, cleaned and rebuilt, midwifed our kine and sent them to pasture. Let’s be free for a while! Tomorrow we hunt.”

On that dawn he kissed Erelieva in front of all the men who were going with him, before he sprang to the saddle and led them off. Hounds bayed, horses whinnied, hoofs thudded, horns lowed. At the edge of sight, where the road swung around a shaw, he turned about to wave at her.

She saw him again that eventide, but then he was a reddened lich.

The men who bore him indoors, on a litter made of a cloak lashed to two spearshafts, told in dulled voices what had happened. Entering the forest that began several miles hence, they found the trace of a wild boar and set off after it. Long was the chase before they caught up to the beast. It was a mighty one, silvery-bristled, tusks like curved daggerblades. Tharasmund roared his glee. But the heart in this swine was as great as its body. It did not stand while some hunters got down and others goaded it to charge. At once it attacked. Tharasmund’s horse screamed, knocked off its feet, belly gashed open. The chief fell heavily. The boar saw, and was upon him. Tusks ripped, amidst monstrous grunts. Blood spurted.

Though the men did soon kill the brute, they muttered that it might well have been a demon, or bewitched—a sending of Ermanaric’s, or of his cunning counselor Sibicho? However that was, Tharasmund’s wounds were too deep to stanch. He had barely time to reach up and take the hands of his sons.

Women keened in the hall and the lesser houses—save for Ulrica, who kept stony, and Erelieva, who went off to weep alone.

While the first of them washed and laid out the corpse, as was her wifely right, friends of the second hustled her elsewhere. Not much later they got her married off to a yeoman, a widower whose children needed a stepmother and who dwelt well away from Heorot. Although only ten years of age, her son Alawin did the manly thing and stayed. Hathawulf, Solbern, and Swanhild fended the worst of their mother’s spite off him, thereby winning his utter love.

Meanwhile the news of their father’s death had flown widely about. Folk had flocked to the hall, where Ulrica did her man and herself honor. The body was brought forth from an icehouse where it had rested, richly attired. Liuderis led those warriors who laid it down in a grave-chamber of logs, together with sword, spear, shield, helm, ring-byrnie, treasures of gold, silver, amber, glass, and Roman coins. Hathawulf, son of the house, killed the horse and the hounds that would follow Tharasmund down hell-road. A fire roared at the shrine of Wodan as men heaped earth over the tomb until the howe stood high. Thereafter they rode around and around it, clanging blade on shield and howling the wolf-howl.

An arval followed that went for three days. On the last of these, the Wanderer appeared.

Hathawulf yielded the high seat to him. Ulrica brought him wine. In a hush that had fallen through the whole glimmering dimness, he drank to the ghost, to Mother Frija, and to the well-being of the house. Else he said little. Presently he beckoned Ulrica to him and whispered. They two left the hall and sought the women’s bower.

Dusk was closing in, blue-gray in the open windows, murky in the room. Coolness bore smells of leaf and soil, trill of nightingale, but those seemed distant, not quite real, to Ulrica. She stared a while at the half-finished cloth in the loom. “What next does Weard weave?” she asked low.

“A shroud,” said the Wanderer, “unless you send the shuttle on a new path.”

She turned to face him and replied, almost as if in mockery, “I? But I am only a woman. It is my son Hathawulf who steers the Teurings.”

“Your son. He is young, and has seen less of the world than his father had at that age. You, Ulrica, Athanaric’s daughter, Tharasmund’s wife, have both knowledge and strength, as well as the patience that women must learn. You can give Hathawulf wise redes if you choose. And… he is used to listening to you.”

“What if I marry again? His pride will raise a wall between us.”

“Somehow I do not think you will.”

Ulrica gazed out at the gloaming. “It is not my wish, no. I’ve had my fill of that.” She turned back to the shadowy countenance. “You bid me stay here and keep whatever sway I have over him and his brother. Well, what shall I tell them, Wanderer?”

“Speak wisdom. Hard will it be for you to swallow your own pride and not pursue vengeance on Ermanaric. Harder still will it be for Hathawulf. Yet surely you understand, Ulrica, that without Tharasmund to lead, the feud can have only one end. Make your sons see that unless they come to terms with the king, this family is doomed.”

Ulrica was long mute. At last she said, “You are right, and I will try.” Anew her eyes sought his through the deepening dark. “But it will be out of need, not wish. If ever the chance should come for us to work Ermanaric harm, I will be the first to urge that we take it. And never will we bow down to that troll, nor meekly suffer fresh ills at his hands.” Her words struck like a stooping hawk: “You know that. Your blood is in my sons.”

“I have said what I must,” the Wanderer sighed. “Now do what you can.”

They returned to the feast. In the morning he departed.

Ulrica took his counsel to heart, however bitterly. She had no light task, making Hathawulf and Solbern agree. They yelled about honor and their good names. She told them that boldness was not the same as foolishness. Young, untried, without skill in leadership, they simply had no hope of talking enough Goths into rebellion. Liuderis, whom she called in, unwillingly bore her out. Ulrica told her sons that they had no right to bring down destruction upon the house of their father.

Instead let them bargain, she urged. Let them bring the case before the Great Moot, and abide by its decision if the king did too. Those who had been wronged were no very close kin; the heirs could better use the weregild that had been offered than they could use somebody else’s revenge; many a chief and yeoman would be glad that Tharasmund’s sons had held back from splitting the realm, and in years to come would heed them with respect.

“But you recall what Father feared,” Hathawulf said. “If we give way to him, Ermanaric will but press us the harder.”

Ulrica’s lips tightened. “I did not say you should allow that,” she answered. “No, if he tries, then by the Wolf that Tiwaz bound, he’ll know he was in a fight! But my hope is that he’s too shrewd. He’ll hold off.”

“Until he has the might to overwhelm us.”

“Oh, that will take time, and meanwhile, of course, we shall be quietly building our own strength. Remember, you are young. If naught else happens, you will outlive him. But it may well be you need not wait that long. As he grows older-”

Thus day by day, week by week, Ulrica wore her sons down, until they yielded to her wishes.

Randwar raged at them for treacherous cravens. It well-nigh came to blows. Swanhild cast herself between her brothers and him. “You are friends!” she cried. They could not but grumble their way toward a kind of calm.

Later Swanhild soothed Randwar the more. She and he walked together down a lane where blackberries grew, trees soughed and caught sunlight, birds sang. Her hair flowed golden, her eyes were big and heaven-blue in the fine-boned face, she moved like a deer. “Need you always mourn?” she asked. “This day is too lovely for it.”

“But they who, who fostered me,” he stammered, “they lie unavenged.”

“Surely they know you’ll see about that as soon as you can, and are patient. They have till the end of the world, don’t they? You’re going to win a name that will make theirs remembered too; just you wait and see—Look, look! Those butterflies! A sunset come alive!”

Though Randwar never again told Hathawulf and Solbern everything that was in his heart, he grew easy enough with them. After all, they were Swanhild’s brothers.

Men who knew how to speak softly went between Heorot and the king. Ermanaric surprised them by granting more than hitherto. It was as if he felt, once his opponent Tharasmund was gone, he could afford a little mildness. He would not pay double weregild, because that would be to admit wrongdoing. However, he said, if those who knew where the treasure lay hidden would bring it to the next Great Moot, he would let the assembly settle its ownership.

Thus was agreement made. But while the chaffering went on, Hathawulf, guided by Ulrica, had other men going around; and he himself spoke to many householders. This kept on until the gathering after autumnal equinox.

There the king set forth his claim to the hoard. It was usage from of old, he said, that whatever of high value a handfast man might gain while fighting in the service of his lord should go to that lord, who would deal the booty out as gifts to those who deserved it or whose goodwill he needed. Else warfare would become each trooper for himself; the strength of the host would be blunted, since greed counted for more than glory; quarrels over loot would rive the ranks. Embrica and Fritla knew this well, but chose not to heed the law.

Thereupon spokesmen whom Ulrica had picked took the word, to the king’s astonishment. He had not expected such a number of them. In their different ways, they brought the same thought forward. Yes, the Huns and their Alanic vassals were foemen to the Goths. But Ermanaric had not been fighting them that year. The raid was a deed that Embrica and Fritla carried out by and for themselves, as they would have a trading venture. They had fairly won the treasure and it was theirs.

Long and heated went the wrangling, both in council and around the booths set up at the field. Here was more than a question of law; it was a matter of whose will should prevail. Ulrica’s words, in the mouths of her sons and their messengers, had convinced enough men that even though Tharasmund was gone—yes, because Tharasmund was gone—best for them would be if the king was chastened.

Not everybody agreed, or dared admit he agreed. Hence the Goths finally voted to split the hoard in three equal shares, one for Ermanaric, one each for the sons of Embrica and Fritla. The king’s men having slain those, the two-thirds fell to Randwar the fosterling. Overnight he became wealthy.

Ermanaric rode livid and mum from the meeting. It was long before anyone got the courage to speak to him. Sibicho was the first. He drew him aside and they talked for hours. What they said, nobody else heard; but thereafter Ermanaric was in a better mood.

When word of this reached Heorot, Randwar muttered that if yonder weasel was happy, it boded ill for all birds. Yet the rest of the year passed quietly.

A strange thing happened in the following summer, which had also been peaceful. The Wanderer appeared on the road from the west, as ever he did. Liuderis led men forth to welcome and escort him. “How fare Tharasmund and his kin?” the newcomer hailed.

“What?” replied Liuderis, astounded. “Tharasmund is dead, lord. Have you forgotten? You yourself were at the grave-ale.”

The Gray One stood leaning on his spear like a man stunned. Suddenly, to the others, the day felt less warm and sunny than before. “Indeed,” he said at last, well-nigh too low to be heard. “I misspoke me.” He shook his shoulders, looked up at the horsemen, and went on louder, faster: “There has been much on my mind. Forgive me, but I find I cannot guest you this time after all. Give them my greetings. I will see you later.” He swung around and strode back the way he had come.

Men stared, wondered, drew signs against evil. A while afterward, a cowherd came home and told that the Wanderer had met him in a meadow and asked him at length about Tharasmund’s death. Nobody knew what any of this portended, though a Christian serving-woman at the hall said it showed how the old gods were failing and fading.

Nonetheless, the sons of Tharasmund received the Wanderer with deference when he returned in the autumn. They did not venture to ask what had been the trouble earlier. For his part, he was more outgoing than erstwhile, and instead of a day or two, he stayed a pair of weeks. Folk marked how much heed he paid to the younger siblings, Swanhild and Alawin.

Of course, it was with Hathawulf and Solbern that he talked in earnest. He urged that either or both fare west next year, as their father had done in his youth. “It will pay you well to get to know the Roman countries, and to cultivate friendship with your kin among the Visigoths,” he said. “I myself can be along to guide, counsel, and interpret.”

“I fear we cannot,” Hathawulf answered heavily. “Not as yet. The Huns wax ever stronger and bolder. They’ve begun reaving our marches again. Little though we like him, we must agree that King Ermanaric is right when he calls for war, come summer; and Solbern and I would not be laggards therein.”

“No,” said his brother, “and not only for honor’s sake. Thus far the king has stayed his hand, but it’s no secret that he loves us not. If we get the name of cowards or sluggards, and then a threat arises, who will dare or care to stand beside us?”

The Wanderer seemed more grieved by this than might have been awaited. Finally he said, “Well, Alawin will be twelve—too young to go with you, but old enough to go with me. Let him.”

They allowed that, and Alawin went wild for joy. Watching him cartwheel over the ground, the Wanderer shook his head and murmured, “How like Jorith he still looks. But then, his descent on both sides is close to her.” Sharply, to Hathawulf: “How well do you and Solbern and he get along?”

“Why, very well indeed,” said the chieftain, taken aback. “He’s a good lad.”

“There is never a quarrel between you and him?”

“Oh, no more than his brashness brings on every once in a while.” Hathawulf stroked his youthfully silky beard. “Yes, our mother has ill will toward him. She was ever one for nursing grudges. But regardless of what some fools babble, she keeps no bridle on her sons. If her rede seems wise to us, we follow it. If not, then not.”

“Cleave fast to the kindness you have for each other.” The Wanderer seemed to plead, rather than advise or command. “Such is all too rare in this world.”

—True to his word, he came back in spring. Hathawulf had furnished Alawin a proper outfit, horses, followers, gold as well as furs to trade. The Wanderer showed forth the precious gifts he carried, which should help win good understanding abroad. Taking his leave, he hugged both brothers and their sister to him.

They stood long watching the caravan trek off. Alawin seemed so small, and his fluttering hair so bright, against the gray and blue that rode at his side. They did not utter the thought that was in them: how yonder sight recalled that Wodan was the god who led away the souls of the dead.

—Yet after a whole year everyone returned safely. Alawin’s limbs were lengthened, his voice deepened, he himself ablaze with what he had seen and heard and done.

Hathawulf and Solbern bore news less heartening. The war against the Huns had not gone well last summer. Always made terrible mounted fighters by their skill and stirrups, the plainsmen had now learned to move under the taut control of canny leadership. They had not overrun the Goths in any of the pitched battles that took place, but they had inflicted heavy losses, and one could not say they had suffered defeat. Gnawed down by sneak attacks, hungry, bootyless, Ermanaric’s host must at length trudge home over the endless grasslands. He would not try afresh this year; he could not.

It was thus a relief to listen to Alawin, evening after evening when folk were gathered over drink. The fabled realms of Rome awakened dreams. Nonetheless, some of what he told brought a frown to the brows of Hathawulf and Solbern, puzzlement to Randwar and Swanhild, an angry sneer to Ulrica. Why had the Wanderer fared as he did?

He had not taken his band first by sea to Constantinople, as with Tharasmund. Instead, he brought them overland to the Visigoths, where they abode for months. They paid their respects to heathen Athanaric, but were more at the court of Christian Frithigern. True, the latter was not only younger but by now had greater numbers at his beck than did the former, even though Athanaric still harried Christians in the parts over which he ruled.

When at last the Wanderer got leave to enter the Empire and crossed the Danube into Moesia, again he lingered among Christian Goths, Ulfilas’ settlement, and encouraged Alawin to make friends here too. Later the group did visit Constantinople, but not for very long. The Wanderer spent much of that time explaining Roman ways to the youth. They went north again late in the autumn, and wintered at Frithigern’s court. The Visigoth wanted them to take baptism, and Alawin might have done so, after the churches and other majesties he had seen along the Golden Horn. In the end he refused, but politely, explaining that he must not set himself at odds with his brothers. Frithigern took that well enough, saying merely, “Let the day be soon when things are otherwise for you.” Come spring, mire having dried in the roads, the Wanderer brought the youngster and their men home. He did not remain there.

That summer Hathawulf married Anslaug, daughter of the Taifal chief. Ermanaric had tried to forestall this linking.

Shortly after, Randwar sought Hathawulf out and asked if they two could talk alone. They saddled horses and went for a ride through the pastures. It was a windy day, aboom and aripple across miles of tawny grass. Clouds scudded dazzling white through the deeps above; their shadows raced over the world. Cattle grazed ruddy, in far-scattered herds. Game birds burst from underfoot, and high overhead a hawk was at hover. The coolness of the wind was veined with a smell of sun-baked earth and of growth.

“I can guess what you want,” Hathawulf said shrewdly.

Randwar passed a hand through his red mane. “Yes. Swanhild for my wife.”

“Hm. She does seem glad of your nearness.”

“We will have each other!” Randwar cried. He checked himself. “It would be well for you. I am rich; and broad acres lie fallow, awaiting me, in the Greutung land.”

Hathawulf scowled. “That’s rather far hence. Here we can stand together.”

“Plenty of yeomen there will welcome me. You’ll not lose a comrade, you’ll gain an ally.”

Still Hathawulf hung back, until Randwar blurted: “It’ll happen regardless. Our hearts will have it so. Best you go along with Weard.”

“You’ve ever been rash,” said the chieftain, not unkindly though trouble weighted his tones. “Your belief that mere feelings between man and woman are enough to make a sound marriage—it speaks ill of your judgment. Left to yourself, what might you undertake of unwisdom?”

Rand war gasped—Before he had time to grow angry, Hathawulf laid a hand on his shoulder and went on, smiling a bit sadly: “I meant no insult there. I only want to make you think twice. That’s not your wont, I know, but I ask that you try. For Swanhild.”

Randwar showed he could hold his tongue.

When they came back, Swanhild sped into the courtyard. She caught her brother’s knee. Her eagerness tumbled upward: “Oh, Hathawulf, it’s all right, isn’t it? You said yes, I know you did. Never have you made me happier.”

The upshot was that a huge wedding feast swirled and shouted through Heorot that autumn. For Swanhild there was but one shadow upon it, that the Wanderer was elsewhere. She had taken it for given that he would hallow her and her man. Was he not the Watcher over this family?

In the meantime Randwar had sent men east to his holdings. They raised a new home where Embrica’s had been and staffed it well. The young couple journeyed thither in a splendid company, Swanhild carried over the threshold those evergreen boughs that called on Frija’s blessing, Randwar gave a feast for the neighborhood, and there they were.

Soon, however, much though he loved his bride, he was often away for days on end. He rode around the Greutung countryside, getting to know the dwellers. When a man seemed of the right mind, Randwar would take him aside and they would talk about other matters than kine, trade, or even the Huns.

On a dark day before solstice, when a few snowflakes drifted down onto frozen earth, hounds barked outside the hall. Randwar took a spear at the doorway and stepped forth to see what this was. Two burly farmhands came after, likewise armed. But when he spied the tall form that strode into his courtyard, Randwar grounded his weapon and cried, “Hail! Welcome!”

Hearing that no danger threatened, Swanhild hurried out too. Her eyes and hair, beneath a wife’s kerchief, and the white gown that hugged her litheness were the only things bright, anywhere around. Joy lilted from her: “Oh, Wanderer, dear Wanderer, yes, welcome!”

He trod nigh until she could see beneath the shadowing hat. She raised hand to parted lips. “But you are full of woe,” she breathed. “Are you not? What’s wrong?”

“I am sorry,” he answered in words that fell like stones. “Some things must stay secret. I kept away from your wedding because I would not cast gloom over it. Now—Well, Randwar, I have traveled a troublous road. Let me rest before we speak of this. Let us drink something hot and remember earlier times.”

A little of his olden interest kindled that eventide, when a man chanted a lay about the last campaign into Hunland. In return he told new stories, though in less lively wise than of yore, as if he must flog himself to do it. Swanhild sighed happily. “I cannot wait till my children sit and hear you,” she said, albeit she did not yet have any on the way. She was the least bit frightened to see him flinch.

Next day he led Rand war off. They spent hours by themselves. Later the Greutung told his woman:

“He warned me over and over of what hatred Ermanaric bears us. Here we are in the king’s own tribal country, he said, our strength not firm while our wealth is a glittering lure. He wanted us to pull up stakes and move away—far away, clear to West Gothland—soon. Of course I would have none of that. Whatever the Wanderer is, right and honor are mightier. Then he said he knew I’d already been sounding men out about getting together against the king, to withstand his overbearingness and, if need be, fight. The Wanderer said I could not hope to keep this hidden, and it was madness.”

“What did you answer to that?” she asked half fearfully.

“Why, I said free Goths have the right to open their minds to each other. And I said my foster parents never have been avenged. If the gods will not do justice, men must.”

“You should hearken to him. He knows more than we ever will.”

“Well, I’m not about to try anything reckless. I’ll watch for my chance. More may not be needful. Men often die untimely; if good men like Tharasmund, why not evil ones like Ermanaric? No, my darling, never will we skulk off from these our lands, that belong to our unborn sons. Therefore we must make ready to defend them; true?” Randwar drew Swanhild to him. “Come,” he laughed, “let’s begin by doing something about those children.”

The Wanderer could not move him, and after a few more days said farewell. “When will we see you again?” Swanhild asked as they stood in the doorway.

“I think-” he faltered. “I can’t—Oh, girl who is like Jorith!” He embraced her, kissed her, let her go, and hurried off. Shocked, folk heard him weeping.

Yet back among the Teurings he was steely. Much was he there in the months that followed, both at Heorot and widely among yeomen, chapmen, or common fieldhands, workers, sailors.

Even coming from him, that which he urged upon them was naught they were quick to agree to. He wanted them to make closer ties with the West. They did not merely stand to gain from heightened trade. If woe came upon them here—carried, say, by the Huns—then they would have a place to go. Next summer, let them send men and goods to Frithigern, who would safeguard those; and let them keep ships, wagons, gear, food standing by; and let many of them learn about the lands in between and how to get through unharmed.

The Ostrogoths wondered and muttered. They were doubtful about a fast growth of trade across such distances, therefore unwilling to gamble work or wealth. As for leaving their homes, that was unthinkable. Did the Wanderer speak sooth? What was he, anyhow? He was often called a god, and did seem to have been around for a very long time; but he made no claims for himself. He might be a troll, a black wizard, or—said the Christians—a devil sent to lure men astray. Or he might simply be getting foolish at his high age.

The Wanderer kept on. Some who listened found his words worth further thought; and some, young, he kindled. Foremost among the latter was Alawin at Heorot—though Hathawulf grew wistful, while Solbern hung back.

To and fro the Wanderer went on earth, talking, scheming, ordering. By autumnal equinox he had gotten a skeleton of what he wanted. Gold, goods, men to attend these were now at Frithigern’s seat in the West; Alawin would go there the following year to push for more trade, regardless of how young he was; at Heorot and numerous other households, dwellers could depart on short notice, should the need arise.

“You have worn yourself out for us,” Hathawulf said to him at the end of his last stay in the hall. “If you are of the Anses, then they are not tireless.”

“No,” sighed the Wanderer. “They too shall perish in the wreck of the world.”

“But that is far off in time, surely.”

“World after world has gone down in ruin erenow, my son, and will in the years and thousands of years to come. I have done for you what I was able.”

Hathawulf’s wife Anslaug entered, to say her own farewell. At her breast she suckled their first-born. The Wanderer gazed long upon the babe. “There lies tomorrow,” he whispered. Nobody understood what he meant. Soon he was walking off, he and his spear-staff, down a road where lately fallen leaves flew on a chill blast.

And soon after that, the terrible news came to Heorot.

Ermanaric the king had given out that he intended a foray into Hunland. This would not be an outright war, such as had failed before. Hence he did not call up a levy, but only his full troop of guards, several hundred warriors well-known and faithful to him. The Huns had been wasting the borders again. He would punish them. A swift, hard strike should at the least kill off many of their cattle. With luck, it might surprise a camp or three of theirs. Goths nodded when that word reached their steadings. Fatten ravens in the East, and the filthy landloupers of the steppe might slouch back to wherever their forebears had spawned them.

But when his troop had gathered, Ermanaric did not lead it so far. Suddenly, there it was at Randwar’s hall, while the homes of Randwar’s friends stood afire from horizon to horizon.

Scant was the fighting, as great a strength as the king had brought against an unwarned young man. Shoved along, hands tied behind his back, Randwar stumbled forth into his courtyard. Blood trickled and clotted over his scalp. He had killed three of those who set on him, but their orders were to take him alive, and they wielded clubs and spearbutts until he sank.

This was a bleak evening, where wind shrilled. Tatters of smoke mingled with scudding wrack. Sunset smoldered. A few slain defenders sprawled on the cobbles. Swanhild stood dumb in the grip of two warriors, near Ermanaric on his horse. It was as if she did not understand what had happened, as if nothing was real save the child that bulged her belly.

The king’s men brought Randwar before him. He peered downward at the prisoner. “Well,” he greeted, “what have to say for yourself?”

Randwar spoke thickly, though he held his battered head aloft: “That I did not fall by stealth on one who had done me no wrong.”

“Well, now.” Ermanaric’s fingers combed a beard turning white. “Well, now. Is it right to plot against your lord? Is it right to slink about heelbiting?”

“I… did none of that.… I would but ward the honor and freedom… of the Goths—” Rand-war’s dried throat could get no more out.

“Traitor!” screamed Ermanaric, and launched into a long tirade. Randwar stood, hunched, belike not hearing much of it.

When he saw that, Ermanaric stopped. “Enough,” he said. “Hang him by the neck and leave him for the crows, like any thief.”

Swanhild shrieked and struggled. Randwar threw her a blurred look before he turned it on the king and answered, “If you hang me, I go to Wodan my forefather. He… will avenge—”

Ermanaric shot forth a foot and kicked Randwar in the mouth. “Up with him!”

A haylift beam jutted from a barn. Men had already thrown a rope over it. They put the noose about Randwar’s neck, hauled him aloft, and made the rope fast. He struggled long before he swung free in the wind.

“Yes, the Wanderer will have you, Ermanaric!” Swanhild yelled. “I lay the widow’s curse on you, murderer, and I call Wodan against you! Wanderer, lead him down to the coldest cave in hell!”

Greutungs shuddered, drew signs or clutched at talismans. Ermanaric himself showed unease. Sibicho, perched on horseback beside him, yelped: “She calls on her witchy ancestor? Suffer her not to live! Let earth purify itself of that blood she bears!”

“Aye,” Ermanaric said in an uprush of will. He rapped forth his command.

Fear more than aught else gave haste to the men. Those who had held Swanhild cuffed her till she staggered, and booted her out into the middle of the yard. She lay stunned on the stones. Riders crowded around, forcing their horses, which neighed and reared. When they withdrew, nothing was left but red mush and white splinters. Night fell. Ermanaric led his troop into Rand-war’s hall for a victory feast. In the morning they found the treasure and took it back with them. The rope creaked where Randwar swung above that which had been Swanhild.

Such was the news that men bore to Heorot. They had hastily buried the dead. Most dared do no more than that, but a few Greutungs felt vengeful, as did all Teurings.

Rage and grief overwhelmed the brothers of Swanhild. Ulrica was colder, locked into herself. Yet when they wondered what they could do, even though tribesmen of theirs had swarmed to them from widely about… she drew her sons aside, and they talked until the restless darkness fell.

Those three entered the hall. They said they had decided. Best to strike back at once. True, the king would be wary of that, and keep his guard on hand for a while. However, by the accounts of witnesses who had seen it ride past, it was hardly larger than the band which crowded this building tonight. A surprise onslaught by brave men could vanquish it. To wait would give Ermanaric time he needed and was doubtless counting on—time to crush every last East Goth who would be free.

Men bellowed their willingness. Young Alawin joined them. But suddenly the door opened, and there was the Wanderer. Sternly, he bade Tharasmund’s last-born son abide here, before he went back into the night and the wind.

Undaunted, Hathawulf, Solbern, and their men rode forth at dawn.