For The White Christ Part 62

WHETTING OF GUDRUN.

Bitterly was Olvir to regret that he had bent to the subtle taunt of the witch's daughter. Had he taken Rothada before her father in the first flush of his wedding joy, Karl could have refused them nothing. But he had let himself be lured away to the fen-lands, far from king and court; while the new queen was ever at the side of the world-ruler, free at all times to whisper her guileful words into his willing ear. Olvir had no need of Liutrad's gloomy letters to tell him of the evil spell which the witch's daughter had laid on the great Frank. Before the year was out, it was commonly known, even in Frisia, how the king's bride, who never smiled, had driven Count Hardrat and others of her countrymen from the court with scoffs and biting jests, had poisoned the king's mind with evil thoughts of his most devoted liegemen, and had hardened his heart to bloodshed and cruelty.

After many dreary months of waiting, it was with a feeling almost of joy that Olvir received the curt command which bade him join young Karl and Gerold at the Sigiburg. The king had gone north to hunt out the wary Engern and Eastphalians, and had left the Frankish hors.e.m.e.n under the nominal command of his st.u.r.dy son, to meet the mounted forces of the Westphalians.

Even war was preferable to the torment of inaction, and in the great battle of hors.e.m.e.n which was fought on the Lippe, Olvir proved that if he had lost his old-time zest for fighting, he had by no means lost his daring and quickness. The Saxons were defeated with great slaughter, though not until Olvir had twice saved the life of young Karl.

For such a service, Olvir might well have looked for some special mark of the king's favor. But the queen had gone north with the court, to join Karl on the Weser, and not even a word of praise came from the gay camp near Sunthal, where Karl lingered until after Yuletide.

Then came the command signed by Angilram, the new Keeper of the Seal, saying that young Karl should join his father at the Eresburg, leaving the hors.e.m.e.n under Gerold's charge; while Count Olvir should march into Thuringia, to give aid to Rudulf, Count of the Sorb Mark.

The tidings of Abbot Fulrad's death were very grievous to Olvir; for the kindly old councillor had been his strongest friend at court. And to this cup of sorrow was added the gall of Teutoric's reinstatement as Count of the Frisian Mark. This, however, Karl himself sought to excuse by a scroll in his own rude, bold handwriting. Teutoric had at last recovered from his long illness, and had asked for his old counts.h.i.+p.

In giving it to him again, he, Karl, had meant nothing against his Dane hawk, but thought to honor him by sending him into the Sorb Mark, where there was need of his sword. Sometime in the spring, if the Sorbs had become quiet, he should call his bright falcon to him.

Filled with renewed hope by this promise, Olvir bade Gerold farewell, and marched swiftly across Westphalia with his vikings. At the Eresburg, he left young Karl to await his father, who had stopped at Paderborn; but he himself marched on with his vikings, over the Fulda and Werra, into the great forest of the Thuringians.

Not until they reached the banks of the Saale did the vikings come upon the Grey Wolf's lair,--a great fenced camp on the farthermost border of the Sorb Mark. But if their journey was long, their welcome was hearty enough to make amends. Morose and savage as was his nature, old Rudulf greeted Olvir with the open friendliness of one fearless man for another. He had long since put away the grudge which he had once cherished against the Northman, and now he could even speak of the spurning of his daughter without bitterness. Half jestingly, he called to mind that all but forgotten event, and pointed out how that which had seemed so ill a happening had, in the end, turned out well omened for all. Was not his daughter the king's wedded wife, and Olvir plighted to the king's daughter?

But Rudulf had other cause than his admiration for the Northman to give warmth to his greetings. When alone with Olvir, he complained that, for the first time in a score of years, the young men of his folk showed a lack of willingness to respond to the king's bode. This was all the more marked, he said, because of the spirit of unrest which moved through the forests. Men sat uneasily at the hearthside, their thoughts clouded with forebodings of evil. It was not that the Sorbs were astir and threatened a harrying of the mark. That should have brought the wild forest warriors with a rush to join the banner of their old-time leader. Yet his war-ring was all but empty. Those who should have crowded the hedges loitered about their farmstedes.

The coming of Olvir and his sea-wolves was, therefore, a very welcome event to the grim old Count of the mark. Though time and war had lessened the number of the vikings to a scant four hundred, they were picked warriors, mailed like chiefs, and trained as no band had been trained since the days of the Romans. With such men at his call, the Grey Wolf lay at ease in his lair, confident that should the Sorbs dare raid his mark, they would ride back across the Saale far faster than they came. It would seem that the crafty heathen were themselves aware of this; for the arrival of the vikings was followed by signs that the menacing Slavs had thought better of their purpose. All along the border the account of how the giant Danes of Karl the Frank had turned the Saxon Wittikind's victories into b.l.o.o.d.y disaster was now a well-known tale.

So the Slav folk kept across the Saale, biding a fairer season for their raid; while the warriors, whose presence had put the curb on their l.u.s.t for blood and loot, lay about the Thuringian camp, grumbling at the lack of merry sword-play. It was in vain that on the accustomed day for the spring sacrifice they honored Odin with many choice victims. Neither Floki, nor such others of their number as were skilled in signs and omens, could foretell anything from the casting of the blood-chips. At the least, no war was to be read in the boding, and the Sorbs did not give the lie to the omens.

May came and went, and then June, and Olvir was beginning to doubt the king's faith, when word was brought to the forest fastness,--another scroll in Karl's rough handwriting,--saying that he had gone north to invade the land beyond the Elbe, but had not forgotten his Dane hawk.

With this a.s.surance of the king's troth, Olvir rested fairly content.

Yet it was no easy task to wait through the long summer-time.

Autumn was already at hand when the vikings began to talk of a weird apparition, in appearance like a dead woman swathed in her shroud, which wandered through their camp in the darkness. The manner in which the Thuringians scoffed at the "grey walker" of their heathen fellows soon convinced Olvir that the fancied wraith was none other than old Rudulf's Wend wife. To test the matter, he expressed to the count his wonder that the dame should see fit to act so mysteriously.

The next night, as he sat by the Grey Wolf's hearth listening to a grim tale of life in the mark, the Wend woman glided into the hut, and sat down opposite the two men. Rudulf nodded carelessly to his wife, and would have gone on with his tale. But Olvir turned to greet her.

"Welcome, dame," he said. "I did not think to see you again in this life, when at our last meeting you fared out into the storm and night."

"And what if I am not now in the flesh-life, son of Thorbiorn?" asked the witch, in a hollow voice.

"The heartier should be my welcome, dame," rejoined Olvir. "I 've ever longed to meet a farer from Hel's Land. But though I have seen many go that journey, I have never seen one come again."

"Not so the daughter of the Snake, bold mocker. In the midnight, when the wolves feasted upon the bodies of the slain, I have walked on the battlefield, gathering the death-dew for my spells, and my eyes have seen the blood-reddened souls rising from the mangled flesh."

"Your souls were going hence, daughter of the Snake; they as yet knew only the earth-life. I spoke of those who have crossed over the glittering way, and then come again to Manheim. Hel holds with a firm grip those who go to her. Not many fare back who have set foot beyond the wall of Loki's daughter."

"The son of Thorbiorn would have his hostess tell of deeds forbidden under the laws of Karl. Does not the Christian king doom to the mire-death those who practise spells? _Ai!_ not all have forgotten my hut in the Moselle Wood, and the curse which I put upon those whom I left behind."

"By the fiend Odin!" broke in Rudulf; "that was an ill-doing, wife. Yet if the good queen has gone hence, and Pepin Crookback become a witling, our guest will tell you that young Karl bids fair to fill his father's sword-belt, and our daughter, the queen, goes clad in silk and gold."

"Your daughter,--the false trull,--not mine!" hissed the woman. "As to her luck, good or ill, have you forgotten my boding when this bright gerfalcon flew out of the South to seek our leave for his wooing? 'A king, grey of eye,' was my foretelling, and so it has chanced. But again I gave my boding, as I fared from the hut into the storm, and again my word has come true. The queen your daughter sits in her silken bower, and her heart lies as a stone in her breast. With a touch she bends the iron Karl to her bidding; yet power and wealth are become as ashes in her mouth. There is wormwood in her drink, and gall in her dainty fare. Do I speak truth, gerfalcon?"

"I would say nothing against the dame of my lord," answered Olvir.

"Yet she has brought you little else than sorrow and evil."

"She has not turned the king's heart against me. I hold his pledge.

Each day I look for his bidding to come to him."

"You have not heard, son of Thorbiorn! Your ears are duller than I thought. Karl went north from Paderborn, not Rhineward. He is now upon the Elbe bank."

"I have heard, dame. It seems that my wait is to be a little longer."

"You take the ill tidings calmly, hero. Will you laugh in joy when I tell you that Karl is minded to break his pledge to you?"

"That is not true," said Olvir, staring intently at the grey-shrouded figure of the woman.

"The hero talks foolishly. She who was my daughter lies in the king's arms; Count Olvir lies on the Saale bank."

"It is easy to speak bold words when the face is hidden," rejoined Olvir.

At the taunt, the witch flung back her cloak, exposing fully to the red firelight the ghastly adder mark upon her cheek and the weasels nestling in her bosom. Roused by the movement, the little beasts crawled upon her shoulders, and stared, fiery-eyed, at the stranger.

"Now I see the face of the alruna," said Olvir, quietly. "Let her speak."

"What more should I say, Dane hawk? Go through the Frank's realm; ask of the king's men if their lord keeps troth with them; ask of the harried Saxons whose is the bitter tongue that is ever inflaming the king's mind to bloodshed."

"Enough of ill talk, wife," growled Rudulf. "King Karl will do right by our guest-friend."

"Well said, old Grey Dog!" rejoined the woman, scoffingly. "Your teeth have worn blunt on the bones of Karl's foemen, and now you 'd whine and lick your master's foot, lest he beat you from the kennel."

"Your tongue is keen, wife, but your speech dull," replied Rudulf, unmoved. "There's little wit to be found in your jeering talk."

"It may prove a biting jest when the queen's hound comes to lie in the kennel of the king's dog. _Ai_, my Grey Wolf! your ears are keen for the footfall of sword-foes, but you do not hear the tread of those who come creeping from the king's hall."

"How, then; what charges--"

"Does the Count of the mark ask that, when he who should be most zealous of all in doing the king's will harbors in his very bed one accused of heathen witchery,--one who has put her curse upon the king himself and upon his hearth-kin?"

"A hero so great as Karl has little to fear from the curse of a Wend woman. He will not think it ill that I cherish my wife, the mother of his queen."

"No mother--nor father, Grey Wolf! It is the king's bed-mate who stirs him to strike those who gave her life."

"That I do not believe."

"Come, then, and hear it from one who can swear to the tale. Many are to meet at Hardrat's hall, to talk of this, among other matters. Would it not be well for Count Olvir and yourself to join them?"

"That is a half-day's ride to the north, wife."

"The Sorbs lie quiet, and you need take none of your followers from the war-ring. It will be no council, calling for a show of henchmen; so, unless you fear treachery from your own folk--"

"Silence, woman! I 've had enough of jeering. Neither the Dane hawk nor the Grey Wolf fears to roam alone in the forest. When does the beer-sot look for his guests?"