“Could he have been shipwrecked?” asked Helgi.

“His clothes are dry and unstained,” I said, “nor has he been wandering long, for there’s no stubble on his chin. Yet I’ve heard of no strangers guesting hereabouts.”

We lowered our weapons, and he came up to us and stood gasping. I saw that his coat and the shirt behind was fastened with bonelike buttons rather than laces, and were of heavy weave. About his neck he had fastened a strip of cloth tucked into his coat. These garments were all in brownish hues. His shoes were of a sort new to me, very well cobbled. Here and there on his coat were bits of brass, and he had three broken stripes on each sleeve; also a black band with white letters, the same letters being on his helmet. Those were not runes, but Roman letters—thus: MP. He wore a broad belt, with a small clublike thing of metal in a sheath at the hip and also a real club.

“I think he must be a warlock,” muttered my carle Sigurd. “Why else all those tokens?”

“They may only be ornament, or to ward against witchcraft,” I soothed him. Then, to the stranger. “I hight Ospak Ulfsson of Hillstead. What is your errand?”

He stood with his chest heaving and a wildness in his eyes. He must have run a long way. Then he moaned and sat down and covered his face.

“If he’s sick, best we get him to the house,” said Helgi. His eyes gleamed—we see so few new faces here.

“No…no…” The stranger looked up. “Let me rest a moment—”

He spoke the Norse tongue readily enough, though with a thick accent not easy to follow and with many foreign words I did not understand.

The other carle, Grim, hefted his spear. “Have Vikings landed?” he asked.

“When did Vikings ever come to Iceland?” I snorted. “It’s the other way around.”

The newcomer shook his head, as if it had been struck. He got shakily to his feet. “What happened?” he said. “What happened to the city?”

“What city?” I asked reasonably.

“Reykjavik!” he groaned. “Where is it?”

“Five miles south, the way you came—unless you mean the bay itself,” I said.

“No! There was only a beach, and a few wretched huts, and—”

“Best not let Hjalmar Broadnose hear you call his thorp that,” I counseled.

“But there was a city!” he cried. Wildness lay in his eyes. “I was crossing the street, it was a storm, and there was a crash and then I stood on the beach and the city was gone!”

“He’s mad,” said Sigurd, backing away. “Be careful…if he starts to foam at the mouth, it means he’s going berserk.”

“Who are you?” babbled the stranger. “What are you doing in those clothes? Why the spears?”

“Somehow,” said Helgi, “he does not sound crazed—only frightened and bewildered. Something evil has happened to him.”

“I’m not staying near a man under a curse!” yelped Sigurd, and started to run away.