Horned Helmet by Henry Treece

Author:Henry Treece
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Tags: Fiction
Published: 1963-07-15T00:00:00+00:00

9 Two Vikings and a Log

Beorn felt himself being carried along roughly, like a captured bear on a stick. Distantly he heard the three blasts on the horn, as Jarl Skallagrim had promised; then he lost his senses again.

It was dawn when he woke. He was sitting on the ground in a cleared space between the grey huts of Howestead, and his feet were lashed to a long thick oak-log. On one side of him sat Starkad, and on the other, Gauk. They were both rubbing their eyes, and groaning when they touched their heads where the stones had struck. But, worn as they were, and weary, they were laughing. Starkad said, ‘We thought you would never wake, Beorn! What a thing it is to be young and carefree!’

On the other side of the oak trunk Beorn could see the two swords and the horned helmet, lying together, as though they were witnesses of the theft. He said, ‘Jarl Skallagrim will have gone with Reindeer, now, Starkad. What shall we do?’

Starkad said, ‘Never think that you are the first to ask yourself that question, lad. Gauk and I have been chewing it over for an hour, while you were snoring your head off in your warm bed! ’

Gauk said, ‘Do not worry, Beorn lad. I have a feeling that we shall go on many journeys together after all this is over. Look, when their’headman comes, I will talk to him and make him see sense. We will give back what we have stolen, and a few other things besides, and so all will be well.’

But Beorn was not sure of this, and, as it turned out, he was right. For an hour later, when the sun was up and about, warming the ground, the headman came out with ten spearmen and a big fellow carrying a double-handed axe. The headman stood beside the helmet and swords and said, ‘This is a bad business, wanderers. Little joy lies in putting an end to such as you, but what is a man to do if he wants to keep the respect of his folk?’

Gauk answered, ‘From your speech, headman, you are a Danishman, out of Roeskilde, I would guess. And we are vikings out of Jomsburg - so, it is like a family gathering, no more.’

The headman put on a sorrowful face and said, ‘You and I are Danishmen, true enough, but my folic here are not. They are stubborn Caledonians, and will not forgive you for stripping their old king.’

Starkad laughed and said, ‘ Come, come, friend, we did not strip him! He still wears his byrnie and leggings. We only took what you see. Why, we even left him his spear and his buckler. I could have brought those up, too.’

The headman said, ‘ Little good would it have done you, Jomsviking. They would have lain before you now as witnesses, just as the swords and helmet do. So, why argue? ’

Beorn had never heard men in such a plight talking like this before.

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