Olaf the Glorious: A Story of the Viking Age by Robert Leighton (rocket ebook reader .TXT) 📖

the last to enter the straits.

Earl Sigvaldi still held on in advance. But it was noticed that when he came abreast of the cape whereon the three chiefs had stood, he lowered his sails and steered his ships nearer inshore. The Norsemen suspecting nothing, followed his example, and very soon King Olaf's fleet gathered closer together. But when Thorkel the Wheedler came up with the Crane he shouted aloud to Sigvaldi, asking him why he did not sail. The earl replied that he intended to lie to until King Olaf should rejoin him. So Thorkel struck sail also. But the ships had still some way on them and the current was with them. They drifted on until they came to a curve in the channel which opened out into the bay where the host of King Sweyn and his allies waited in ambush.

Now by this time the Short Serpent had come alongside of Sigvaldi, and her captain, espying some of the enemy's fleet, questioned the earl concerning them.

"Strangers they all are to me," answered Sigvaldi with an evil look in his eyes. "But whoever they be, it seems that they are not altogether friendly to us. I see their red war shields from where I stand, and it looks very much as though a battle awaited us."

Then Thorkel Nefja had his oars brought out, and he steered the Short Serpent round against the stream and went back with all speed to meet the king.

"What do I see?" cried King Olaf. "Why have the ships struck sail? And what is the meaning of your coming back?"

"It is because a great host of war galleys are lying in the farther bay," answered Thorkel. "It is the host of King Sweyn of Denmark, for I saw the banner on one of the longships, and it was like unto the banners that Sweyn Fork Beard carried at the time when we were with him in England. Turn back, I implore you, O king! Turn back by the way we have come! For our fleet numbers but eleven keels, while our foes have fully two score of dragons!"

The king stood on the lypting of the Long Serpent as he heard these tidings. He turned to his mariners.

"Down with the sails! Out with the oars!" he cried with a loud voice that could be clearly heard across the waters; and the men quickly obeyed.

Still holding the tiller, Olaf kept his ship's prow ahead as before.

"Never yet have I fled from a battle," he called out to Thorkel Nefja. "And although Sweyn Fork Beard had thrice two score of warships, I would rather fight him than turn tail like a coward hound. God rules over the lives of all Christian men, and why should we fear to encounter King Sweyn and all his heathens? Let our cry be 'Onward, Christ men; onward, Cross men!'"

Now when the Long Serpent, sweeping quickly along with all oars at work, came nigh to her companions, Olaf saw that Earl Sigvaldi and his vikings had passed on beyond the cape, while his own captains had turned their prows about and were rowing back against the current.

"Why do ye take to flight?" roared Olaf in an angry voice of thunder. "Never will I fly from any earthly enemy. He is no worthy king who shuns his foes because of fear. Reverse your ships and follow the Long Serpent, be it to glory or to death!"

And now, taking the lead, he arrayed his ships in order, with the Short Serpent and the Crane together in his immediate wake, and his eight other longships following close behind. Proudly, and with all his banners flying, he sailed into the bay. Before him, at about a mile's distance, he saw the seventy warships of his foes. Their vast number and their compact battle array might well have struck fear into the heart of one who had but eleven galleys at his back. But not for an instant did Olaf Triggvison shrink from the unequal encounter. He brought his vessels to a halt, but it was not from hesitation. It was only that, taken wholly unawares, he had need to prepare for the coming battle. Taking down his great war horn from the mast, he blew a resounding blast. His warriors understood the call, and they hastily donned their armour, brought their arrows and spears on deck and stood at their stations with a readiness which showed how well their royal master had trained them.

Olaf himself went below into his cabin. He knelt for a time before the crucifix in silent prayer, and then, with his stout heart well prepared for all that might happen to him, put on his finest armour and returned to the deck.

As he stood beside his fluttering banner--a snow white banner with its blood red cross--he could easily be distinguished from all who were near him. His tall majestic figure was crowned with a crested helmet of pure gold. Over his well wrought coat of mail he wore a short tunic of scarlet silk. His shield, with its jewelled image of the crucified Christ shone in the sunlight and could be distinctly seen by his awaiting foes.

Some of his companions warned him of the danger of thus exposing himself and making himself a mark for his enemies. But he answered proudly that he wished all men, both friends and foes, to see that he shunned no danger.

"The more I am seen," he said, "and the less fear I show in the battle, the more shall I inspire my brave friends with confidence and my foes with fear and terror."

As he spoke, he saw that King Sweyn with his ships was rowing slowly out into the mid bay to meet him, leaving two detachments in his rear. There was no sign of haste on board of any one of the ships, for all men knew that there was a long day's fight before them, and that it was well to make all their preparations with slow caution.

For some time after he had come on deck King Olaf was more intent upon observing his enemies than in arraying his own small armament. He had seen from the first that it would be his place to assume the defensive, and he had given the order for his ships to be drawn up in line, broadside to broadside.

This order was being carried out as he now stood watching the advance of his enemy's battle.

"Who is the captain of the host now drawing up against us?" he asked of Bersi the Strong, one of his chieftains who stood near him. "By the standard on his prow methinks I should know him well."

"King Sweyn of the Forkedbeard it is, with his forces from Denmark," was Bersi's answer.

"That is even as I thought," returned Olaf. "But we are not afraid of those cowards, for no more courage is there in Danes than in wood goats. Never yet were Danes victorious over Norsemen, and they will not vanquish us today. But what chief flies the standards to the right?"

"Those, lord, are the standards of Olaf the Swede King."

"The son of Queen Sigrid the Haughty stands in need of a little practice in warfare," said Olaf. "But for the harm that he can do us, he might well have stayed at home. And his heathen Sweden, I think, would find it more agreeable to sit at the fireside and lick their sacrificial bowls than to board the Long Serpent under the rain of our weapons. We need not fear the horse eating Swedes. But who owns those fine ships to the left of the Danes? A gallant man he must be, for his men are far better arrayed than the rest and much bolder of aspect in all ways."

"Earl Erik Hakonson is the owner of them," answered Bersi.

"He is the noblest champion who will fight against us today," said Olaf, "and from him and the high born men that I see upon his decks we may expect a hard battle. Earl Erik has just cause for attacking us, and we must not forget that he and his crews are Norsemen like ourselves. Now let us make ready!"

Then the king turned to his own ships. The eleven dragons had been ranged side by side as he had ordered, with the Long Serpent in the middle and the Crane and the Short Serpent at either side of her. To right and to left of each of these four ships were placed. This was a very small force, compared with the overwhelming numbers of the enemy, and as Olaf glanced along his line he sorely missed the fifty of his fleet that had gone out to seaward. Nevertheless he did not allow his men to see that he was in any way anxious.

The seamen were now lashing the ships together stem by stem. Olaf saw that they were tying the beak of the Long Serpent on a level with the other prows, so that her poop stood out far behind. He called out loudly to Ketil the Tall:

"Bring forward the large ship. Let her prow and not her stern stand out. I will not lie behind my men when the battle begins!"

Then Wolf the Red, his standard bearer, whose station was forward in the bow, mumbled a complaint:

"If the Serpent shall lie as far forward as she is longer than your other ships, then there will be windy weather today in her bows."

The King answered: "I had the Serpent built longer than other ships, so that she might be put forward more boldly in battle, and be well known in fighting as in sailing. But when I chose her crew, I did not know that I was appointing a stem defender who was both red and adread."

This playful taunt ruffled Red Wolf, who replied insolently: "There need be nothing said, lord, if you will guard the poop as well as I shall guard the forecastle."

The king had a bow in his hand. He laid an arrow on the string and turned it on Wolf, who cried:

"Shoot another way, king, and not at me but at your foes, for what I win in the fight I win for Norway, and maybe you will find that you have not over many men before the evening comes."

The king lowered the arrow and did not shoot. When the men had finished lashing the ships together he again took his war horn and blew a loud blast upon it that echoed and re-echoed along the rocky shores of the island. As he turned to put the horn aside he saw that Queen Thyra, alarmed by the growing tumult, had come up on deck.

She looked out upon the bay, and seeing the enormous hostile fleet that was closing in upon Olaf's diminished force she burst into tears.

Olaf went to her side and laid his hand on her shoulder.

"You must not weep," he said gently. "Come, dry your tears; for now you have gotten what was due to you in Wendland; and today I mean to demand of your brother Sweyn the tooth gift which you have so often asked me for."

CHAPTER XXI: THE BATTLE IN SVOLD SOUND.

King Olaf stood on the poop deck of the Long Serpent, a conspicuous figure among his fighting men, with his gold wrought helm towering high above the others' heads. From this position he could survey the movements of his foes, command the actions of his own shipmen, and direct the defence. From this place also he could fire his arrows and fling his spears over the heads of his Norsemen. His quivers were filled with picked arrows, and he had near him many racks of javelins. The larger number of his chosen