Gudorm saw it afar, a darkness in the dusk, and wakened Hadding. The king peered with a sailor’s eye. “Yes, they’re after us sooner than I’d hoped,” he said calmly.

Gudorm’s fist thudded on the rail. “We should have gone ashore and struck inland ere now.”

“I thought of that, but we’d have been close to where we set out, and too weary to cover our tracks. That takes time and care, I can tell you. Now, at least, we have some strength and wit again.”

“They’ll be on us before we can make shore.”

“Not unless they see us. As yet, to them we’re very low in the water, a blob, if they’ve spied us at all. Nor will they likely spy two swimmers, if we’re not noisy.”

Gudorm stared. “Do you mean, lord, we should go overboard?”

“Yes, before they’re sure what we are and what we do.”

The guardsman’s broad shoulders slumped. “I can’t swim,” he said. The boat rocked a little. Wavelets lapped and glimmered under the dim sky.

Hadding tugged his chin. “Hm. That’s a bother.”

Gudorm straightened. “Save yourself, my king,” he said, not altogether steadily. “I’ll put my mail back on, and when they find me, maybe I’ll take a few of them with me to the deeps.”

Hadding half smiled. “So must a housecarle speak,” he answered. “But it’s wrong. You would not die at my feet as you should, you’d die while I ran off.”

Gudorm stared at him. “What else could happen?”

Hadding laughed. “I’ve a trick or two left in me yet. If this one saves us, the tale will live long after us. If not, maybe the gods will tell it in their halls. But quickly, before they get closer and see clearly.”

Gudorm shivered to hear. This man, he remembered, had been raised beyond the world of men.

Hadding knotted a short length of mooring line about the waist of his guard and hitched it to a thwart. Springing to and fro, they capsized the boat. Hadding slipped underneath and laid hold of the thwart himself. There was an air space under the planks. In darkness, in sea, the two hung waiting.

Tosti’s ship drew nigh. “Overturned,” he snarled.

“How might that be, in this calm?” wondered a sailor.

“Who knows?” said another. “A riptide, a skerry, a whale—a kraken, a drow—Let’s away.”

“Someday,” said Tosti, “I may catch a fish that ate Hadding, and eat it. How I wish I could know. Well, we can take this boat back with us.”

“That’d be troublesome,” warned a crewman, “and the thing might be unlucky by now”

The crew muttered agreement. “As you like,” snapped Tosti.

Under the boat, king and guardsman listened to the oars stride off.