Beowulf by Rosemary Sutcliff

Author:Rosemary Sutcliff [Rosemary Sutcliff]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781446404614
Publisher: RHCP
Published: 1992-02-20T05:00:00+00:00

To this place Grendel’s blood trail led the Geatish and Danish warriors, and on the cliff edge above it, lying abandoned like some fragment of a mouse that a great cat has dropped from its jaws, they found Aschere’s head, where Grendel’s Dam had torn it off before she plunged down to her lair.

Dismounting, the thanes gathered about it in silence. Hrothgar in their midst knelt stiffly beside the last dreadful relic of his dead sword-brother, and put back the tangle of blood-soaked hair with hands as gentle as a woman’s; but he spoke no word—there was no word to speak. In a short while he rose, saying to the thanes about him, ‘Hobble the horses; from here we must go on foot.’

One by one, following the old King and the young hero, they dropped over the edge out of the morning sunlight, and began the long climb down through the rocks and tree roots of the dark gorge to the foot of the cliffs. As they went, it seemed to every man that a cold murk, a shadow that was more than the headlands cutting off the light of day, rose about them, deadening heart and spirit; a shadow that grew chiller and more deadly with every downward step they took.

At last the gorge widened, the stream sprang out over a ledge and plunged down to join the churning waters of the sea-hole, and following it they came scrambling out from a world of trees into a world of spray-lashed rocks. On the rock ledges the great tusked seals and walruses lay basking, another menace to be outfaced; and all among the rocks the water was fouled with murky crimson as slow gouts of blood still came welling up from below. The roar of the water was in their ears, but under the roar, like the still depths far down beneath the fret and turmoil of the surface waves, was a great silence. No sea birds cried in this place, and the silence, like the shadow, pressed upon the heart.

One of the Danes had brought a war-horn with him, and in a gesture of defiance he put the silver mouthpiece to his lips and set the dim gorge and the gloom beneath the trees echoing with the eager battle-music. The echoes flung back and forth along the base of the cliffs, splintering on the sheer rock faces, and the sea beasts, roused from their sleep, plunged roaring and bellowing into the water.

Beowulf snatched a bow from the Geat who stood nearest to him. ‘An arrow—quick, an arrow, Scaef,’ and when the other gave it to him he notched it to the bowstring and drew and loosed in one swift movement. The arrow sped out into the midst of the threshing herd, and stood quivering in the neck of a huge bull walrus. The men with him set up a shout, and some began to scramble out along the weed-slippery rocks; a dozen spears and sharp walrus hooks were in

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