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Updated: June 21, 2025
All along our East Anglian shores men had watched for long, and now word had come from Ulfkytel, our earl, that the great fleet of Swein, the Danish king, had been sighted off the Dunwich cliffs, and once again the fear of the Danes was on our land.
Then I saw an armed man coming towards us, and Thrand, who walked at my shoulder, closed up to me, for the warrior had a drawn sword in his hand. And when we came face to face I knew that I looked once more on Ulfkytel our earl, and a great fear fell on me, for he lay with his men in the mound where he fell, and Egil and I had raised it over him. Then I must speak.
And he asked forgiveness also, for there had been a deadly feud concerning this between him and my people, so that but for Eadmund the King there would have been fighting. Yet when one told Ulfkytel that men held that my father's heart broke at my loss, the great earl had made haste to come and see him, and to say these things. So they made peace at last.
Many a time men have asked me why I slew him not, or cast him not overboard, thus being troubled no more with him. Most surely I would have slain him when we fought, in the white heat of anger and well would it have been if Ulfkytel had doomed him to death, as judge. But against this helpless, cringing wretch, whose punishment was even now falling on him, how could I lift hand?
For when a force that is hard pressed knows that safety is close behind them there is an ever-present reason for giving way. "We can drive this host to the ships, lord earl," I said to Ulfkytel. "Aye, surely," he answered. "They know that the ships wait for them, and so will give back." Now came Eadmund, and behind him our men marched steadily, and at his side was Edric Streone.
"No, Lord Earl," I said; "that were to confess guilt, which would be a lie." Then Beorn cried: "I pray you, Wulfric, let us pay and have done!" But I turned from him in loathing. "Ho, Master Falconer," said Ulfkytel, "the man is an outlander! To whom will you pay it? To Wulfric who saved his life?"
Therefore he left us, and would go northwards from Dunmow, taking the towns from thence to Thetford and Norwich, and he should go to Ipswich and maybe to Dunwich after this. So would all East Anglia submit. And all went well with Ulfkytel until the time came when he must turn back in haste, as I must tell presently.
Then the thought crossed my mind that what he had taught me of her was like to be my safety now; but my mind was dazed by all the strange things that came into it, and I tried not to think. Only I wondered if Ulfkytel had got the boat without a struggle with our people. The earl was there with a few more thanes and many more guards, and they waited by the waterside.
"How came he into the forest?" asked Hubba, for he saw that there was more than he knew yet under Beorn's utter terror. "Let me tell you that story from end to end," I answered. And he nodded, so that I did so, from the time when I left the jarl until Ulfkytel sentenced us, giving all the words of the witnesses as nearly as I could. Then I said that I would leave them to judge, for I could not.
With him, too, was the great earl, and he begged my forgiveness for his doubt of me, though he was proud that his strange manner of finding truth was justified. Good friends were Ulfkytel and I after that, though he knew not that in my mind was the thought of Osritha, to whom he had, as it were, sent me. Now every day brought fear to me that Ingvar's host was on its way overseas to fall on us.
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