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Updated: May 9, 2025
And all the while Werbode had his eyes on Erling, whose gaunt form was clear against the sky as he sat still on his horse and watched the heath for the trolls to return on us. Behind him the two hounds sat, careless. "She is coming round," said the thane, with a sigh of relief.
I followed him to the great hall, and thence went to the stables, and so met with Werbode and Erling, and rode hawking with them all that afternoon. And when we came back we heard that tomorrow was the day for the meeting of the Witan, to hear and see what King Carl had to say and had sent. Now, of all that wonderful gathering in the hall at Thetford I need say little.
There was not so much as a bustard on the heath, which a moment before had been full of fleeting figures. "They are trolls, thane!" cried Erling from beside me. He, too, had seen the moorland and the men who had gone. Then Werbode rode up to me, and he looked and gasped. "They went over this hill! I would swear it!" he said. "Where are they?"
But if the seer will go near them, all is gone. And mostly thereafter he dies." "Not many trolls could get under those mounds we saw," I said. "See, there are more here; they are too small for dwellings." There was indeed one of the heaps of earth close at hand to us, and Werbode rode toward it to see that none of the wild men lurked in its shelter.
Werbode said that he was an unsafe beast to go chicken stealing on, for he would be too well known on a dark night; and the others said that they supposed that men would know that I had come home now. But that sort of jest one gets used to in camp life, and I cared not.
I told him as we went on of the pit we had seen, and how Werbode thought it was a trap. Whereon the housecarl laughed a little, and said that it was but an ancient flint working. The men who had fallen on the party were the descendants of those who had made it. The flints had been worked here from time untold even till now, and those who worked them today had all the craft of their forebears.
"From your dress I take it that you are one of the Frankish paladins we were on the way to see. But do they always talk good Wessex at the court of King Carl?" "No," laughed Werbode. "Sometimes they talk old Saxon as I do." The thane bowed, and let that matter rest. Then he looked ruefully at the two crippled horses, and set his arm round the lady, who had risen and was leaning on him.
"However, that will not matter. Here is game enough for us and to spare." "And no ale to wash it down withal," said Werbode and Erling in a breath. "Why, then, we will find the best water we can," I answered; and we rode on our way looking for a clear pool. And then the first sound which told us that any one was near came to us.
Come with me at once." "There is Werbode," I said. "Let him wait," said Ethelbert. "It is the thane on the great pied horse whom she will thank." I wondered whether it was the steed or myself she remembered best, which was not courteous of me. Ethelbert laughed and told me so, adding that he thought after all that the horse would be noticed first.
There were three or four of his assailants lying where they had been round him as I came. "Many thanks, sirs," he said. "It was going hard with us when you came up. Now is no time for ceremony, or I would say more. I do not know if my daughter lives yet." I dismounted, and Werbode held my horse while I went to the side of the thane and looked at his charge.
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