Glum pulled the three warrior rings from his left arm and put them on his right, then thrust the left out, the muscle in his cheek contorting as he gritted his teeth against the coming pain. He opened and closed his hand over and over, perhaps hoping to remember the sensation, then looked at Bram. Without a word spoken, Bram seemed to understand, for he nodded and stepped forward to grip Glum's wrist. Then Sigurd, son of Harald the Hard, drew his great sword. A shard of moonlight cut across the blade, revealing the smoky, swirling pattern that gave the weapon both beauty and strength. It was a wicked, hungry thing and it lusted for blood.
Sigurd hesitated and for two heartbeats the great sword hung in the darkness. Then it came down in a flash of iron, into Glum's left arm, severing it at the elbow with a wet sound. Bram blinked as blood sprayed across his face and he stood holding the limb, glancing at the silver finger ring that Glum had forgotten to remove. Glum's legs nearly buckled, but somehow he summoned the strength to stand, though he shivered with the pain and his breath came in ragged gulps. But then Black Floki stepped forward and thrust his torch on to the gushing flesh to stop the blood, and Glum could not hold in a cry of pain which soaked the forest. I smelled the meat burning as Floki held the flame to the wound.
'I leave you with one hand to grip sword and tiller,' Sigurd began, looking down at the blackened stump, 'and you'll still get a shield on what's left of that one.' Bram tugged the ring from the dead finger and handed it to Glum who just stared at Sigurd, his face writhing with pain and hatred and disbelief.
Then Sigurd turned to me and I admit I shivered when I looked into those hard eyes. 'You have killed one of my men, Raven. One day, Einar's kin may come to claim the blood price. That is their right. I could do it myself.'
'Yes, lord,' I said, bowing my head.
'But you were avenging your own kin's murder and I would think less of you if you had not.' With that Sigurd turned and set off back towards the glow of the campfires.
Ugly Einar's friends took their long knives and began digging a pit for his body, for they knew they could not risk a Wessex fyrd seeing the light a pyre would cast into the night sky. After Ealdred's hall, the Norsemen harboured a newfound respect for English warriors and did not wish to fight again so soon. Some were hurt still, their cuts tended by Asgot and Olaf who had long experience of battle wounds and the herbs with which to treat them. Thorgils and Thorleik helped Glum back to the camp where they would fill him with ale for the pain. Svein the Red put an arm across my aching shoulders and gave a tired smile.
'Come, Raven,' he said quietly, 'we have entertained the gods enough for one night. It's time to sleep.'
'No, Svein,' I replied, pulling free of his arm and stepping up to press my palm against the oak's massive trunk. It felt hard and strong and enduring and I wondered what magic had been done there that bloody night. 'I'll sleep here,' I said. So I sat beneath the ruined body of a mute old man, and angry tears squeezed my throat because I should have protected him but I had not and now he was gone. If Svein saw my tears he said nothing about it and I did not care anyway. I was more disgusted with myself than any Norseman could have been, for I had repaid an old man's kindness with neglect and betrayal and I feared for what kind of man that made me.
Eventually, the sleep of the dead took me down into nothingness. And Svein stayed with me.
A dark mood lay heavy upon the Fellowship when we set off the next day. The Norsemen had hated burying Ugly Einar in the earth, for they believed it was not for a great warrior to rot amongst the worms. Raging flames would have borne Einar's soul to Valhöll as swiftly as an eagle soars into the clouds. Still, they knew Óðin's maidens would find their friend to fight for the gods in the last battle, for Einar had been a Sword-Norse and he had died with his sword in his hand.
According to Egfrith we were in Mercia now. A steady drizzle was falling, dripping from the trees to soak through our clothes. Ealhstan was gone and I was afraid. The old man had been the last thread tying me to the life I had known before the Norsemen came, his presence the whisper of conscience in a new world. Now the thread had been severed and there was no going back.
I clutched the Óðin amulet hanging at my neck and wondered what the All-Father made of the sacrifice he had been offered the previous night. Could a Christian, even one sacrificed by a godi, gain entry to Valhöll? Ealhstan had not been a warrior, but Sigurd told me Óðin was the lord of words and beauty and knowledge too, and so perhaps, I thought, he would have a use for the old man.