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Updated: May 31, 2025
But in the thick of the fight Earl Erik Hakonson, with a throng of men, boarded the galley of Bui the Thick, and in the first onslaught Bui received a sword cut across his lips and chin. He did not flinch, but tried to pass off his injury with a jest. "The pretty women in Borgund holm will not now be so fond of kissing me," said he.
"Ay, if the gods are with us," answered Estein. "I am trying to read the stars. Methinks they are unfavourable." Helgi laughed. "What know you of the stars?" he said, "and what does Estein Hakonson want with white magic? Will it make his life one day longer? Will it make mine, if I too read the stars?" "Not one day, Helgi, not one instant of time. We are in the hands of the gods.
And now it must be told how Earl Erik Hakonson fared in that fight.
Only the four vessels bound together Estein's, Thorkel's, Liot's, Osmund's swept in an unresisting cluster towards the rocks. Liot too saw the danger, and raised his voice in a great shout: "Let not man of mine touch an oar till Estein Hakonson lie dead on yonder deck. We have yet time to slay them. Forward, Liot's men!" There was a wild and furious rush of men towards the poop.
Estein spoke with difficulty, and his right hand had closed on something in his belt. "Both are dead. They died heathens, and their souls are as hopelessly lost as the soul of Olaf Hakonson. I am the last of the burners." The voice of Thord the Tall died away. Estein bent forward, his hand left his side, and something in it gleamed in the firelight. Suddenly the hermit started. "Osla!
As he went down the hillside he talked again aloud to himself: "Ay, this then is the meaning of my warning dreams danger in the south lands, danger on the seas. Little heed will Estein Hakonson pay to the words of an old man, yet I am fain to see the youth again, and what the gods reveal to me I must speak."
On the decked poop of an open boat, sailing over an ocean unknown to him, towards countries of whose whereabouts he was only vaguely informed, Estein Hakonson stood lost in stirring fancies. He was the only surviving son of the King of Sogn. Three brothers had fallen in battle, one had perished at sea, and another, the eldest, had died beneath a burning roof-tree.
"Do you remember me, Liot?" asked his captor. "Ay, Estein. You, methinks, are one of the bairns I thought I had slain. Well was it for you that the Orkney tides run strong. But the luck has changed, I see; and you were a bold man, Estein Hakonson, to change it as you did. Why did you not burn us out?" "Because I wanted you alone." "Ay, torture is a pleasant game for the torturers.
Spare not, Estein; fire and sword in England, sword and fire in Valland!" The group had broken up, and Estein was about to go on board when he heard himself hailed by name. He looked round, and saw the same old man who had accosted Ketill coming down the pier after him. "Hail, Estein Hakonson!" he cried; "I have come far to see thee."
At that instant the figure turned a shrouded face on him, and said sternly, and so clearly that the words were ringing in his ears when he woke, "What doest THOU here, Estein Hakonson?" He came to himself with a start, the sweat standing on his forehead. It was the second time he had heard the voice.
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