Someone swore, savagely, breaking the mood. Athelbert. He strode angrily away up the strand. Stones there, some grass, grazing horses, light glittering on the water. It would be dark in the woods, and they stretched all the way to the Cyngael lands, and no one went through them. Ceinion closed his eyes. It was growing cooler, late in the day, edge of the sea, the sun going down.

He would die in there, Owyn's younger son.

I am too old, Ceinion thought again. He was remembering—so vividly—the father as a young man, equally reckless, even more impulsive. And now that man was an aging prince, and his son was about to find his own end trying to go through the untracked woods carrying a warning all the long way home. A desperate, glorious folly. The way of the Cyngael.

Bern backed down on hands and knees from the ridge when he saw the Anglcyn archers begin to shoot. There was a disaster happening, crisp and bright in the sunlight: blue river, green grass, deeper green of trees beyond, the many-coloured horses, the arrows caught by light as they flew. He felt ill, watching.

You didn't abandon shipmates, but he knew what he was seeing. His task was to get back to the coast alive with his warning and these tidings of catastrophe. The Anglcyn were riding for the sea.

Breathing deeply, struggling to calm himself, he led Gyllir away from the battle, to the very edge of the forest. Even in daylight the trees felt oppressive, menacing. Spirits and powers, not to mention hunting cats and wolves and wild boars were in such woods. The volurs who put themselves into trances to see along the dark pathways of the dead said that there were animals that housed the spirits of the old gods, and wanted blood.

Looking at the darkness on his right, he could half believe in such creatures. But for all that, a more certain death lay in the other direction with the fyrd. They'd ridden at least as fast as he had to get to this place, which was unsettling. Back home, the old women said, An Erling on a horse of the sea, an Anglcyn on a horse… still, he'd not have thought Gyllir could be matched.

Aeldred's riders were here, though. He couldn't linger. Waiting would bring them across the river.

Bern used the trees as a backdrop, riding right alongside them, so as not to appear clearly against the sky. Even so, in the moments when he passed up and then down along the ridge and had to be in view, his heart felt painful and loud, as if his chest were a drum. He leaned low over Gyllir's neck and he whispered a prayer to Ingavin, who knew the ways of secrecy.

No cry went up. Just as Bern Thorkellson crested that ridge, an agitated party of merchants from Al-Rassan was hailing the Fyrd, coming towards them, loud with indignation. They saved his life, for the outriders turned to see.

It happens this way. Small things, accidents of timing and congruence: and then all that flows in our lives from such moments owes its unfolding course, for good or ill, to them. We walk (or stumble) along paths laid down by events of which we remain forever ignorant. The road someone else never took, or travelled too late, or soon, means an encounter, a piece of information, a memorable night, or death, or life.

Bern stayed low in the saddle, his neck hairs prickling, till he was sure he was out of sight. Only then did he straighten and give Gyllir his head, galloping towards the sea. He saw gentle, rolling country, rich land. The sort of soil that made a soft, easy people. Not like Vinmark, where cliffs crashed jaggedly down in places where the sea gouged the land like a blade. Where rock-strewn slopes and icebound winters made farming a wounding aspiration on farms never large enough. Where younger sons took to the sea roads with helm and blade, or starved.

The Erlings were hard with cause, reasons deep and cold as the black, still waters knifing between cliffs. These people over here, with their loamy, generous soil and their god of light, were… well, in fact, these people were smashing the best raiders Vinmark had right now. The story didn't seem to hold. Not any more.

The shape and balance of the world had changed. His father (he didn't want to think about his father) had said that more than once on the isle, after he'd decided his raiding days were over.

Thorkell really shouldn't be here, Bern thought. Riding south at speed, he felt too young to sort it through, but not too young to be aware that the changes were happening, had already happened.

There was a distance still to go, but not so much now, as he finally began to recognize where he was. Gyllir was labouring, but so, surely, would be the mounts of Aeldred's fyrd behind him. They'd be coming, he knew it. And—sudden thought—they'd see his tracks and realize he was ahead of them. He had to outrace them to the water with enough time to get the ships offshore. He was dripping with sweat in the sunlight, could smell his own fear.

When he saw the valley he remembered it. Gave thanks for that. He followed it south-east and, almost as soon as he did, smelled salt on the wind. The valley opened out. He saw their strand. Only two ships still anchored; the other three already out in the straits beyond.

He began to shout as he galloped up, continued shouting as he leaped from Gyllir's back, stumbling into the midst of the encampment. He tried to be coherent, wasn't sure if he succeeded.

These were Jormsvik men, however. They moved with a speed he'd not have believed possible before he'd joined them. The camp was struck, and the last two ships (undermanned, but no help for that) had oars in place and were pulling to sea before the sun had swung much farther west. This was their life, salt and hardship, dragon-prows. An Erling on a horse of the sea…

Brand's own ship was last. They were rowing after the others when someone called out to them from shore. Another of those moments when so much may turn one way or another, for they might have been just a little quicker from shore, and so too far out to hear. Bern did hear it, though, looked back from where he stood beside the one-eyed leader of their raid.

"Who is it?" Brand Leofson rasped, squinting.

A rider in the water, waving one arm, forcing a reluctant horse into the sea after them.

"Leave him," said Bern, whose eyes were very good. "Let him be killed by Aeldred. He lied to us. From the start. Ecca kept saying so." He felt fear, and a cold anger.

"Where is Ecca?" Brand asked, turning his good eye to Bern. "Killed in Esferth. Their king was there. Hundreds of men.

There's an accursed fair going on. I told you—Ragnarson lied." The man beside him, captain, raid leader, veteran of half a hundred battles across the world, chewed one side of his moustache. "That's him in the water?" Brand said.

Bern nodded.

"I want to talk to that misbegotten bastard," Brand said. "If he's to die, I'll do it myself and report it at home. Back oars!" he cried. "Ramp out! Sling for the horse!"

Precise movements began. This is a mistake, Bern was thinking. Couldn't escape the thought as he watched the strange, deadly man on a magnificent, inexplicable horse come closer through the waves. It seemed to him, feeling helpless as a child, that this was a moment in which his life—and not only his own—might be hanging, as in a merchant's balance.

In the afternoon light, under swift, indifferent clouds, Ivarr Ragnarson was taken aboard.

"That," said Brand One-eye, gazing into the sea, "is an Asharite horse."

Bern had no idea if this was true or not, couldn't see why it mattered. The horse was pulled up, a sling drawn under its belly by a man who knew how to swim. They all threw their weight to the far side, to keep the ship in balance as it happened. A difficult exercise, done with ease.