“That,” said Thorkell, “is just about the attitude towards us heathen of all the Christians I have ever met or heard of. Their idea of peace is unqualified submission or total extermination for us, and complete triumph and unquestioned domination for themselves. Not one will listen to proposals of compromise, accommodation or mutual forbearance. They seem to me opinionated, bigoted, fanatical, overbearing and arrogant. We must fight or perish, there appears to be no other way.” “You speak sensibly, my son, it seems to me,” the old man said. “You have convinced me that you are sincere. Your oath in the temple will convince all my household and all my retainers.” Then he rose and went out. III Again Thorgils and Thorbrand entered the bedroom and helped Thorkill to dress. This time he needed little assistance. And this time they girt him with a sword-belt, and equipped him with a handy belt-knife, a fine dagger and a sword in a decorated scabbard. Out they escorted him, Thorkell now walking easily and unaided. In the open he found awaiting him Thorstein, his three elder sons, Thorfinn, Thorgeir and Thord; a handsome and very blond young giant who was presented to him as “Finnvard Sigurdson, of Faskrudsfiord, my future son-in-law,” Thorstein’s house-skald, Olmod Borkson; and his seneschal, Ari Gormson. There were a score of men-at-arms lounging about. After the presentations they set off towards the temple, Thorstein linking arms with Thorkell and leading the way. “I myself,” he said, “am Gothi of this temple, which my grandfather, Thorleif Vilgerdson, built with timber fetched from Norway.” The temple, Thorkell judged, was a full hundred feet long. Temple fashion the end under the gable which they approached was doorless. The side-wall had two ample doorways, each near an end. They passed in by that nearest them towards the right end of the side-wall, and turned to their left. In behind them straggled the men-at-arms, who had trooped after them. Thorkell could feel the reverential awe with which the great, hulking, burly, truculent spearmen entered the holy place. Midway of the opposite long-wall they passed the High-Seat, between the tall pillars, each with its three consecrated bolts of gilded bronze. They were visible even in the dim light afforded by the small latticed windows, gut-paned, high up in the gable ends. Towards the end of the temple they entered the oval, defined by a ring of thin slabs of stone set on edge. Inside the oval, near the end of it towards the further gable of the building, was an altar of the customary form, a great thick slab of dressed stone, full three ells square, supported by four stone posts, squared, carved with runes, and set deep in the beaten earth floor. The slab of the altar was also carved with runes. On it lay the great holy ring, of solid silver, weighing full thirty pounds.