A Sea Queens Sailing | Page 2

others of our men, captives also. Thence I must watch all that went on, helplessly, and after the roof fell I cared no more what should be done with me, for I was alone and desolate.
Nor did I know who these foemen were, or why they had fallen on us. In the gray of the morning they had come from inland, and were round the hall while we broke our fast. We had snatched our weapons as best we might, and done what we could, but the numbers against us were too great from the first.
They had come from inland, but they were not Scots. We were at peace with all the Caithness folk, and had been so for years, though we had few dealings with them. My father had won a place for himself and his men here on the Caithness shore in the days when Harald Harfager had set all Norway under him, for he was one of those jarls who would not bow to him, and left that old Norse land which I had never seen. Presently, he handselled peace for himself here by marriage with my mother, the daughter of a great Scots lord of the lands; and thereafter had built the hall, and made the haven, and won a few fields from the once barren hillside. And now we had been well to do, till this foe came and ended all.
They were not Norsemen either. The Orkney jarls were our friends, and for us Harald cared not. Norsemen on the Viking path we knew and welcomed, and being of that brotherhood ourselves, we had nothing to fear from them. It is true that we owned no king or overlord, but if the Scots king asked for scatt we paid it, grumbling, for the sake of peace. My father was wont to call it rent for the hillsides we tilled.
Yet it would have been better to be swept out of the land by the Scots we won it from, than to be ruined thus for no reason but that of wanton savagery and lust of plunder, as it seemed. At least they would have given us fair warning that they meant to end our stay among them, and take the place we had made into their own hands.
Well, no doubt, I should find out more presently. Meanwhile, as I have said, I cared for naught, lying still without a word. Then the men from out of the hall were brought and set with us; for, blinded as they were with the smoke, it had been easy to take them. That one who was set down next me was black from head to foot and scorched with the burning, but he tried to laugh as his eyes met mine. It was Dalfin of Maghera, the Irish guest who was with us. He had taken a passage in a Norse ship from Belfast, meaning to see lands across the sea, and had bided here when he found that we could show him hunting such as he had never heard of. The mighty aurochs still fed on our hills, and we told tales in hall when guests wondered at the great heads that were on the walls, of how this one and that had been won. The ship had put in here to wait for wind, and of course we were glad to see her crew and hear what news they had of the greater world.
"Friend," I said, "it is hard that you should be brought to this pass."
"It has been the best fight I ever knew," he answered. "The only pity is that it has gone the wrong way. But yonder is a grand funeral pile for the brave men who have fallen. Surely the smoke will bring down the whole countryside on these ruffians?"
I shook my head. What happened to us was the affair of no Scot. Rather they would be setting their own places in order in case their turn came next.
"Well," said Dalfin, "whom are we fighting, then?"
One of our men answered him. He was a Norseman, named Sidroc.
"Red hand, wandering Vikings. Wastrels from every land, and no man's men. Most of them are Danes, but I have heard the tongues of Frisian and Finn and Northumbrian amongst them. We are in evil case, for slavery is the least we have to fear."
"Nay," said Dalfin; "death is a lesser evil than that."
"A man may make shift to escape from slavery," answered the other, and both were silent.
Then for a moment I had half a hope that help was at hand for us, if too late. Round the westward point crept two longships under their broad, brown sails, making for our haven. But a second glance told me that they were the ships belonging to this