第3章 HIGHTOWN UNDER SUNFELL(2)

But Leif had different moods, for sometimes he would tell tales, and all were hushed in a pleasant awe.The fire on the hearth was suffered to die down, and men drew closer to each other, as Leif told of the tragic love of Helgi and Sigrun, or how Weyland outwitted King Nidad, or how Thor went as bride to Thrym in Giantland, and the old sad tale of how Sigurd Fafnirsbane, noblest of men, went down to death for the love of a queen not less noble.Leif told them well, so that his hearers were held fast with the spell of wonder and then spurred to memories of their own.Tongues would be loosened, and there would be wild recollections of battles among the skerries of the west, of huntings in the hills where strange sights greeted the benighted huntsman, and of voyaging far south into the lands of the sun where the poorest thrall wore linen and the cities were all gold and jewels.Biorn's head would be in such a whirl after a night of story-telling that he could get no sleep for picturing his own deeds when he was man enough to bear a sword and launch his ship.And sometimes in his excitement he would slip outside into the darkness, and hear far up in the frosty sky the whistle of the swans as they flew southward, and fancy them the shield-maids of Odin on their way to some lost battle.

His father, Thorwald Thorwaldson, was king over all the firths and wicks between Coldness in the south and Flatness and the mountain Rauma in the north, and inland over the Uplanders as far as the highest springs of the rivers.He was king by more than blood, for he was the tallest and strongest man in all the land, and the cunningest in battle.He was for ordinary somewhat grave and silent, a dark man with hair and beard the colour of molten iron, whence came his by-name.Yet in a fight no Bearsark could vie with him for fury, and his sword Tyrfing was famed in a thousand songs.On high days the tale of his descent would be sung in the hall--not by Leif, who was low-born and of no account, but by one or other of the chiefs of the Shield-ring.Biorn was happy on such occasions, for he himself came into the songs, since it was right to honour the gentle lady, the Queen.He heard how on the distaff side he was sprung from proud western earls, Thorwolf the Black, and Halfdan and Hallward Skullsplitter.

But on the spear side he was of still loftier kin, for Odin was first in his pedigree, and after him the Volsung chiefs, and Gothfred the Proud, and--that no magnificence might be wanting--one Karlamagnus, whom Biorn had never heard of before, but who seemed from his doings to have been a puissant king.

On such occasions there would follow a braggingmatch among the warriors, for a recital of the past was meant as an augury for the future.The time was towards the close of the Wicking-tide, and the world was becoming hard for simple folk.There were endless bickerings with the Tronds in the north and the men of More in the south, and a certain Shockhead, an upsetting king in Norland, was making trouble with his neighbours.Likewise there was one Kristni, a king of the Romans, who sought to dispute with Odin himself.

This Kristni was a magic-worker, who clad his followers in white linen instead of byrnies, and gave them runes in place of swords, and sprinkled them with witch water.Biorn did not like what he heard of the warlock, and longed for the day when his father Ironbeard would make an end of him.

Each year before the coming of spring there was a lean season in Hightown.

Fish were scarce in the ice-holes, the stock of meal in the meal-ark grew low, and the deep snow made poor hunting in wood or on fell-side.Belts were tightened, and there were hollow cheeks among the thralls.And then one morning the wind would blow from the south, and a strange smell come into the air.The dogs left their lair by the fire and, led by the Garm the old blind patriarch, made a tour of inspection among the outhouses to the edge of the birch woods.Presently would come a rending of the ice on the firth, and patches of inky water would show between the floes.The snow would slip from the fell-side, and leave dripping rock and clammy bent, and the river would break its frosty silence and pour a mighty grey-green flood to the sea.The swans and geese began to fly northward, and the pipits woke among the birches.And at last one day the world put on a new dress, all steel-blue and misty green, and a thousand voices woke of flashing streams and nesting birds and tossing pines, and the dwellers in Hightown knew that spring had fairly come.

Then was Biorn the happy child.All through the long day, and through much of that twilight which is the darkness of a Norland summer, he was abroad on his own errands.With Grim the Hunter he adventured far up on the fells and ate cheese and bannocks in the tents of the wandering Skridfinns, or stalked the cailzie-cock with his arrows in the great pine forest, which in his own mind he called Mirkwood and feared exceedingly.Or he would go fishing with Egil the Fisherman, spearing salmon in the tails of the river pools.But best he loved to go up the firth in the boat which Leif had made him--a finished, clinker-built little model of a war galley, christened the Joy-maker--and catch the big sea fish.Monsters he caught sometimes in the deep water under the cliffs, till he thought he was destined to repeat the exploit of Thor when he went fishing with the giant Hymi, and hooked the Midgard Serpent, the brother of Fenris-wolf, whose coils encircle the earth.

Nor was his education neglected.Arnwulf the Bearsark taught him axe-play and sword-play, and he had a small buckler of his own, not of linden-wood like those of the Wick folk, but of wickerwork after the fashion of his mother's people.He learned to wrestle toughly with the lads of his own age, and to throw a light spear truly at a mark.He was fleet of foot and scoured the fells like a goat, and he could breast the tide in the pool of the great foss up to the very edge of the white water where the trolls lived.