Читать книгу Ulric the Jarl: A Story of the Penitent Thief - Stoddard William Osborn - Страница 4

The morning of the day of Tiw dawned mistily across the cold North Sea. Everywhere, as the sun looked in through the floating curtains of fog, he could see steel-blue waves wrestling foamily with the masses of ice. Who in this place would imagine that in some other, far away, the same sun had found the bright flowers and green leaves of the fully opened spring?

The wind increased with the coming of the sunshine, as if the additional warmth brought to it better strength wherewith to blow away the mists. One mound of white vapor had been thicker and higher than its neighbors. It had gathered over something that it was hiding, but the breeze blew now a short, sharp gust and the mound was gone. So was uncovered the good ship The Sword, and her crew could discern what things might be around them.

Ulric the Jarl was standing in full armor on the fore deck. He had been waiting for this clearing, and now he put his horn to his lips. He blew it lustily, and all who heard him raised a shout, for they knew that no land was in sight and that their voyage had begun.

"We have gone far in the night," said a large man standing near the jarl. "But there is much ice. We can do little more than drift, but we can use the oars somewhat."

"We shall go but little faster than doth the ice," replied Ulric. "But, O Knud the Bear, thou wilt off with that black shirt of thine when this sun is higher."

There was loud laughing at that, for Knud was clad in the warm skins of the bears he had slain. Even upon his head was that which had covered the skull of the largest of them. Good clothing it was for winter time, but it was likely to prove heavy gear for southern wearing.

The jarl gazed southward, hoping to see open water, but only ice fields lay between him and the horizon. The mist was fast disappearing, nevertheless, and those who were watching were seeing further; but now a great cry arose from the stern, where Wulf the Skater was taking his turn at the helm.

"O jarl!" he shouted. "Mark! Seest thou how we are pursued? Come hither!"

Down from the fore deck and quickly along the ship to the after deck went Ulric and those who were with him, and there was no need for any man to point with his hand as Wulf was pointing.

"The ice king!" he said, shivering. "I told thee how I saw him anchor off the North Cape when the leaves fell, and the first freezing put ice around him over the calm waters. He came down from his own place that far last summer. He seemeth to me to be as tall as ever, and he hath many strong floes with him."

Ulric looked, and so did they all, saying nothing at first, for the sight was rare. Not often did any mountain of ice float into that water; and here was a mighty one. His peak arose, they could not tell how high, and the sun was glittering gorgeously among his crags.

"He is moving faster than we are!" exclaimed Tostig the Red. "He will strive to overtake us. He could crush us like a nutshell with one of his crags."

"We will keep out of his path if we may," responded Ulric. "But how is it that he saileth along so well against the wind without oars? There is no tide. If there were any current, it would be with us as much as with him."

"Aye," said Tostig the Red. "But did not Hilda ever tell thee? I have heard her speak of these ice kings. The gods that walk on the bottom of the sea push him along that he may go south and die, for his time hath nearly come. Never, I think, was anything like him seen below the fiords until this day."

Vast, truly, was this ice mountain which was nearing them, propelled by some unseen hand. If there had been a strong undercurrent it would have moved the wonder from the north in precisely this manner. Nevertheless all Northmen of the sea knew that any peak of ice above the surface must rest upon a mass of ice seven times greater.

All the vikings upon The Sword watched earnestly for the next sign of whatever was to come, but Ulric took the helm and sent the rowers to the long oars, two men to each oar. Well and vigorously did they row, and the ship was deftly steered into and through one after another of the open channels between the small floes around her. Much distance was gained, but at last the ice fields beyond began to close tightly and the rowing ceased.

"Son of Brander!" shouted Knud the Bear from the fore deck. "Mark! The floes are lifting!"

All saw that it was true. Under all the nearer ice-pack a hidden field, the forefoot of the iceberg, was slipping steadily on unseen until those floes rested upon it. And now there came a grating sound along the keel of The Sword, and she too was lifted. The ice arose with her, so that she sat firmly in a great cleft of it, remaining upright, indeed, but as completely out of water as she had been upon the strand before her launching.

Silent and stern stood Ulric, facing the ice king and asking of himself, "My voyage hath but begun, and is it ended? Was my ship built for this?"

Not so was it with the mind of Knud the Bear, for he gazed long and joyously upon the untellable beauty and majesty of the ice king, and then with a great laugh he shouted:

"Sons of the Northland, the gods are with us. They have sent him. Nothing can stay him. He will carry us fast and far. There will be no toilsome rowing, and we need not care for the direction of the wind. The gods of the frozen sea come with him. They would send us south that they may go and fight the gods of the islands where there is no ice, for they hate them."

"So be it!" replied Ulric, gloomily, but he looked again and he said to Knud, "I know not the ice gods, but I think there are friends of thine yonder. Seest thou?"

Every man was gazing, for there was naught else left to do. Around the pinnacles and the cliffs of the ice king there were sea birds flying and screaming. On the snow-packed levels there were brant and geese and ducks and other fowl that should have been at the south by this time, and that would soon, no doubt, be going.

"Odin the Strong!" exclaimed Knud, "I see what thou meanest. I had seen a white fox, I thought, but yonder are the bears of the night country. They are white, that they may see one another in the dark, and there is nothing else that is so fierce as they are."

"Hilda sayeth," replied Ulric, "that all the world north and east of us must forever belong to the sign of the bear. Hast thou ever slain one of these white ones?"

"Never," said Knud. "I have not hunted to the northward so far as to know much of them. Wulf the Skater hath met them oft enough on the north coast, but they go back into the night, for they hate the sun. If it would not anger the ice king, I would go out and slay one even now. But he brought them with him."

So thought others of the vikings, as if the crew of white monsters now clambering nearer over the rugged ridges of the ice were as his own cattle to the mighty gnome who had builded this frozen tower for his castle.

"As many they are," said Tostig, "as the fingers of a hand. I have heard that they have no fear of men."

If the bears had no fear, they at least had much curiosity, and they were coming to inquire what this might be that lay upon the ice with so many men walking around within it.

Ulric went into the after cabin for a heavier spear than was the light weapon he had with him, saying to Knud, "White bear have I never slain. This chance is mine, but the second fight belongeth to thee. I do not rob thee of thy hunt."

"Thine by right, O jarl, is yonder great one," replied Knud. "No man may go before thee unless thou wert hurt or dead. But I warn thee that the long claw, over there, were he to grapple thee, is worse to meet than might be three Romans."

"I would face more than three Romans," laughed Ulric. "But thy pale friend on the floe is a king of bears."

He returned speedily, armed and armored for battle. The spear he brought was long and strong, with a steel crossguard at the heel of its broad blade. It was very sharp, but its weight would have been unwieldly for a slight man.

Twenty fathoms from the stern of the ship stood the great bear growling, and the others walked around at a greater distance. He was a fathom and a half in length and his paws were tremendous, with claws like reaping hooks. No man ever faced any beast more terrible in aspect than was that angry monster from the darkness which broodeth over the forever frozen sea.

Down stepped Ulric, and when he was a few yards from the ship some of the men followed with Knud, but not too near, lest any should seem to help and so should spoil the honor of the fight.

The surface of the ice was broken and there were chasms in it, but it was as firm to stand upon as the dry land. Moreover, The Sword was now lying not far away from the mighty perpendicular front of the ice king. None knew yet what might be his aspect looking northward, and there were those among the vikings on the ship who shook their heads doubtfully, considering this matter of the bears.

Stone still stood this bear, growling at intervals, until the jarl drew within six paces, holding his spear leveled. Then, with a loud roar and a clashing of his teeth, the huge beast made his rush, rising upon his hind feet and spreading his enormous arms to close with Ulric. Had he done so his hug would have been speedy death, but the point of the spear met him firmly, with a thrust which buried the blade to the crossguard midway between his shoulders.

"That would slay anything else that liveth," said Knud to Tostig, "but the white ones die hard. Mark! the jarl! The son of Brander! It is grand!"

His comrades answered with a shout and then they were still, and so were all the vikings, who crowded the decks and bulwarks of the ship, looking on.

Horrible was now the roaring of the bear as he struggled against the spear of Ulric, striving to plunge nearer. What tenacity of life must have been his, to fight on with the spear blade in him so deeply! Around swung Ulric on the slippery ice and his whole frame was strained to its uttermost endurance by the swift changes of that wrestling, but the plunges of the bear forced him backward a fathom at a time. His face was now but an arm's length from that of his vast antagonist, and they were looking each other eye to eye. Red and yet full of green fire were the eyes of the bear, and his teeth glistened awfully in their ranges as his wide jaws opened to gnash them. But that the descendant of Odin was many times stronger than other men the combat might here have ended.

"Slip not now!" shouted Knud. "Son of Brander, there is a chasm behind thee. Stand fast, if thou canst! Thou art beyond our help!"

Only his own length from him was the cleft in the ice floe, and it went down to deep water. If he should fall into it in his heavy armor, none might hope to see him again.

Roar – roar – roar – in dreadful wrath and pain struggled the bear, for this was his death throe; but Ulric's foot found a brace – a break in the ice – and he gathered his last strength, the strength of the sons of Odin, the hero might of the old gods.

Snap! The tough ashen shaft of the spear broke at the guard, and both bear and hero fell heavily, but Ulric arose with his seax in his hand. The claws of the bear wrenched away his shield as if it had been a piece of oaken bark, but the seax was driven in to the hilt, and as it came flashing out the life of the bear came with it. Over he rolled with a loud shriek, that was echoed back from the face of the ice king. Then he stretched himself at full length upon the ice and lay still, while Ulric stepped forward to cut off his forepaws for a token.

"Hael!" shouted every voice among the vikings, as the white one rolled over. "Hael to Ulric the Jarl, the son of Brander! The son of Odin! Hael to the first good death and to the long cruise of The Sword!"