A Sea Queens Sailing | Page 5

word to end the
affair. Then Asbiorn, whose face was white and pitying as he looked at
us, gripped his father by the arm and faced him.
"I will not have it thus," he said hoarsely. "The men are brave men, and
it were shame to slay them. Give them to me."
Heidrek laughed at him in a strange way, but the men yelled and made
a rush at us, sword in hand. Whereon Asbiorn swung his round shield
into place from off his shoulder, and gripped his light axe and faced
them. It was the lightness of that axe which had spared me; but the men
knew, and feared it and the skill of the wielder, and they shrank back.
"What, again?" said Heidrek. "I thought we had settled that question.

What would you with them?"
"That is to be seen. Let me have them."
"Pay for them, then," shouted one of the men. "They are over and
above your share of plunder."
"Aye," said Asbiorn at once, "I claim them for my share. Have them
down to the new ship, and set them in the forepeak till I need them."
Then old Heidrek laughed harshly.
"Faith, I thought the lad a fool," he said. "Now I know that he will not
be so short-handed as I thought. Some of you who are his crew will
have an easier time at the oar with these slaves to pull for you."
The men laughed at that, and I knew that the danger was past. I minded
what our man had said at first, how that one might escape from slavery.
And I think that the nearness of death--though, in truth, not one of us
would have shrunk from the steel that was so ready--had taught me
how good a thing life might be even yet.
Most of the men went away, the matter being settled. Heidrek went also,
without another word to his son, and we were left to Asbiorn and a few
men of his own crew. The young chief smiled a little as he looked
again at us, but even Dalfin could not smile back again.
"Now," said Asbiorn, "cast off the lashings from their feet, and let them
walk to the ship. See that they all get there, and set a watch over the
place where they are stowed."
"Are we sailing at once?" a man asked.
"Yes, as usual. The chief has some new plan on foot already."
The end of it was that in a short time we were on board our own ship,
and safely stowed forward, still bound. Heidrek had added her to his
force, and manned her from the other two vessels; but before we
reached the ship I saw that Heidrek's men had piled their slain into an
outhouse, set the fagot stack round it, and fired it to windward. There
was no more honour for their fallen comrades than that.
So I saw the last of my home in Caithness, and before me was the life
of a slave. They had stripped us of our mail and weapons, of course,
and had handled us roughly, but that might be borne. The low door of
the cramped sail room under the fore deck closed, and we were in
darkness, and then Dalfin set into words the thought of us all, with a
sort of dull groan:
"This morning I woke and thought it good to be alive!"

Almost at once the ship was warped out of the haven, and went to sea.
The last hope I had that the Scots might yet gather and fall on these
pirates left me at that time, and a sort of despair fell on me. I think I
swooned, or slept at that time, for thereafter I can remember no more
until the day was almost spent, and a man came and opened the low
door that he might bring us food--oaten loaves, and ale in a great jug.
Asbiorn stood outside.
"You may as well loose the men," he said carelessly; "we can mind
them well enough."
"More likely to have them out on us in some sort of berserk rage," said
the man, growling. "I ken what I would do in their place well enough."
Asbiorn stooped and looked in on us. The light was behind him, and I
could not see his face; but he spoke evenly, and not unkindly.
"Will your men bide quiet if I unbind you all?" he said.
"Aye," I answered. "Why not?"
"Good reason enough why you should," he said.
"Let them loose."
One by one we were unbound, some more men coming forward and
watching us, with their weapons ready, in case we tried to fall on them.
I dare say some old happening of the sort had