There was no hope of sending a host to kill him as he drew nigh. Nowhere for miles around could it lie hidden. Jarnskegg was a hunter, with all a hunter’s wariness.

Hadding too was a hunter.

He left with his small following as soon as they had packed food and gear. The horses were rather stiff after their time in the knorr, but quickly grew limber. They were the best from his stable at the Soundside hall. He rode them the hardest they could bear, changing gait or halting no oftener than was unforgoable. In the short, wan summer night his band would stop to eat, roll up in their saddle blankets, and sleep. Sunrise found them already again on the road.

At first the way was easy and quick, south down the broad green dale, among ripening grainfields and meadows full of grazing livestock, past farmsteads and hamlets where folk dropped their work to stare at these warriors hurrying by. Then the land began to climb, steeper and steeper. Woods became mostly birch, with settlement sparse. The riders passed clearings where stood oily charred wreckage and bones lay strewn in the grass.

Thorfinn led them onto a narrow track that twisted off westward and upward. The woods thinned out until they fated amidst tussocks, bearberry, moss, and lichen. Streamlets clinked through wastes of scree. Wind whittered chill. Blue-gray bulks, streaked with snow, shouldered into heaven. Soon there was no more trail. Thorfinn took his bearings from the peaks he saw.

At the end of four days and nights, he raised an arm and drew rein. “I think this is as far as the others had better go,” he told Hadding. “If they stay in yonder cleft, fireless, they should be unseen. You and I have about half a day ahead of us on foot.”

“I like this not,” growled Gunnar, “cowering like a marmot while my lord fares to battle.”

“You knew beforehand you must wait,” Hadding answered, “and I know that can be the hardest of tasks.”

“If you fall, no housecarle of yours will rest till we’ve avenged you.”

“Well, some should go home to help the next king of Denmark. They’ll find fighting aplenty. But settle that among yourselves. Now let me rest.”

Hadding lay down and slept. His men kept wakeful, holding a stockade of spears around him.

At dawn he and Thorfinn left them. The Norseman was a good waymate, big, a full ruddy beard reaching nearly to his broad chest, withal long-legged and nimble as a goat.