“I am he!” cried Hadding.
“By birth, yes, or so my father always held. Still, you’d better go slowly and warily till you’ve gathered a strong following. How you may do that, I can’t guess, and I must say between us that your friend does not strike me as a lucky sort.”
“We will go on anyhow and spy things out for ourselves,” Hadding said.
First he made his host send word around the neighborhood of a feast he would give. He bought kine and pigs for it, but foremost a horse, which he slaughtered at Braki’s howe. Hardgreip dipped twigs in the blood and sprinkled it on the folk, then scattered the twigs and read the runes on them where they lay. “I see only a strangeness,” she said, “naught that I can understand.” ‘Even so, after the holy meat was cooked men ate heartily of it and spoke well of the dead man and his deeds. Hadding took that for a good enough sign, though mostly this had been his way of thanking the chieftain.
Braki’s son gave him and Hardgreip horses, on which they rode away southward. Farmsteads yonder often lay far apart, with stretches of marsh or wildwood between. That night the wanderers must camp in the open. It was welcome. While Hardgreip was passing herself off as a youth, they could not bed together. “Foolishness,” she grumbled after their first bout, as they rested under the moon. “Why should anyone care what we do with ourselves?”
“Braki taught me that such is the law of the Aesir,” Hadding answered. “Men must heed it lest those gods forsake them.”
Her fist smote the earth. “Their law is not mine!”
But he saw by the wan, shadowful light how she grew troubled. She shivered as if the chill of the dew that gleamed around them had seeped into her. “What’s wrong?” he asked.
“There have been too many warnings and forebodings,” she mumbled. She turned to him and caught him tightly against her. “Make me forget it for this night.”
Next day brought clouds, a wrack like smoke flying low. Rain-showers slashed. They made mud of a road that had become a mere track. It wound among fields gone back to weeds. Wind skirled through scattered hursts, tossing their leaves like beggars’ rags. Twice the wayfarers spied burnt-out farmsteads in the offing. War, a feud, or robbers from the hinterland had passed through here. Hadding and Hardgreip clutched their spears and spurred their horses onward.
They were glad when, late in the day, they came on an untouched dwelling. It was poor: a small house and barn huddled under their turf roofs with no other home in sight. Plowland still lay bare. Meadow slanted rank down to the reeds along a mere. Behind that water gloomed more wild-wood. Lifetime by lifetime, men had been gnawing farms out of such wastes, felling and draining, but it was hard, slow work and they lived in fear of revengeful land-wights.
Two hounds bounded forth, barking and growling. Hadding swung his spearshaft to drive them off. He gave Hardgreip the bow and quiver. “String this and nock an arrow, then stay mounted at my back,” he bade her. Braki had taught him that strangers were not always to be trusted. They rode to the door. He got down and knocked.
A half-grown boy opened it. The ax in his hand would not help him much. Hadding smiled. “Greeting,” he said. “We are passersby who’d be happy if we got shelter for the night.” He leaned his spear against the wall to show he meant nothing worse.
Oftenest folk at a garth made guests welcome. In return for food, drink, a place to sleep, maybe the loan of a woman if the householder felt so minded, they saw new faces, heard new voices, and got word of happenings elsewhere. Besides, it was a luck-bringing thing to do.
This lad, however, only stood there in his shabby wadmal with drooping head. Streaks on the sooty skin showed where he had wiped his eyes. “Come in if you like,” he said dully, “but know that my father lies dead.”
“Sad tidings,” Hadding answered. “We’ll not trouble you in your grief. Belike we can make do in your barn.”
“No,” Hardgreip said from the saddle. Her voice shuddered. “Let us into the house.” Hadding looked over his shoulder and saw her sitting, taut as her bowstring, against the windy gray sky.
The boy saw too. The sight overawed him. “Come under our roof,” he quavered. “I’ll take care of your horses.”
Hardgreip close behind, Hadding trod into the single low room. A peat fire burning blue on the hearthstone gave I little warmth. More came from a few kine stalled at the far end, along with smells of them and their dung. He heard them stir, champ their feed, and breathe, but they were shadows to behold. A clay lamp and four rushlights sent flickerings through smoke and the murk that already hung thick. A roughly made bedstead stood at either wall. Otherwise there were only three stools, a wooden chest, and household tools. Food hung from the crossbeams, a haunch of meat above the fire. Withal, this was a well-kempt home, rushes on the floor, a stone-weighted loom in one corner.
A woman met the newcomers. The braids of her hair shone yellow in the dimness, but toil had gnarled her hands and most of her teeth were gone. A toddler clung to her skirts. Two older children hung back, their eyeballs white in the gloom. “We cannot give you good guesting, but a bite to eat and a place to lie down you may have,” she said, as wearily as her son. “I am Gerd, the housewife here. This day my man Skuli Svertingsson died. Tomorrow we’ll bury him as best we can.”
Hadding named himself only, not his father nor his fellow,
