The sun rose into the clear sky, warming the back of my neck as I rowed. The river widened. The forested slopes at either side climbed ever steeper until, not long after we had set out, we passed between two towering rocky cliffs. Trees and scrub clung to ledges and clefts in the rock face, and I gazed up in awe of the straight lines of fissures and seams in the rock that were marked by the foliage growing along the otherwise barren rock. These stone sentinels seemed to stand guard at the entrance to the lake of Suldalsvatnet, for beyond them the water opened up into a vast expanse, as wide as some of the fjords we had traversed on our way to Sand.

“Not long now,” said Ingvar.

We heaved on the oars with renewed energy, and as the distance to the lake’s shores grew on either side of us, so the going became easier. Gone was the pull of the current against us, and now the peeling, birch bark-covered sexæringr skimmed across the still surface of Suldalsvatnet. The feeling of the open water, the cloudless sky and our easy passage would normally have been enough to buoy our spirits, but none of us could escape the sight of Sygbald’s pallid features. He was unmoving for the most part, the only sign that he yet lived, the occasional cough. But even the coughing, that the night before had shaken his whole body, was now weak and feeble.

I prayed that God would spare Sygbald, but I fretted that He would not look with favour on what Ingvar had suggested. I saw the same concern when I glanced at Leofstan. Still, there was nothing for it now, so we continued to row as Ingvar steered us ever northward.

“There it is,” Ingvar said, his tone a mixture of relief and anxiety. We had only been on the lake for a short while and I craned my neck around to look at our destination. It was an island, larger than the one we had camped on, but still tiny in the middle of such a body of water. At first I struggled to make out the small, wooded piece of land, for beyond it lofted a jutting mound of forested rock that thrust like a fist into the lake. It was a thin trail of smoke that drew my eye down to the island that Ingvar was pointing at. The feather of smoke was from a small fire, not a conflagration, so it seemed the skipper had been right and the inhabitant of this island had not been slain by Ljósberari and his host of thralls.

“What’s that?” I asked, pointing.

Ingvar squinted. On the water to the north of the island, were two dark shapes.

“Looks like a couple of log boats,” Ingvar said. “Perhaps they are heading towards Sand with ore.”