The House of the Wolfings: A Tale of the House of the Wolfings and All the Kindreds of the Mark Written in Prose and in VerseMorris, William
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The House of the Wolfings: A Tale of the House of the Wolfings and All the Kindreds of the Mark Written in Prose and in Verse
Morris, William
Fantasy fiction
Now rose up a mighty shout when Thiodolf came back to the battle of the
kindreds, for many thought he had been slain; and they gathered round
about him, and cried out to him joyously out of their hearts of
good-fellowship, and the old man who had rebuked Thiodolf, and who was
Jorund of the Wolfings, came up to him and reached out to him the
Hauberk, and he did it on scarce heeding; for all his heart and soul was
turned toward the battle of the Romans and what they were a-doing; and he
saw that they were falling back in good order, as men out-numbered, but
undismayed. So he gathered all his men together and ordered them afresh;
for they were somewhat disarrayed with the fray and the chase: and now he
no longer ordered them in the wedge array, but in a line here three deep,
here five deep, or more, for the foes were hard at hand, and outnumbered,
and so far overcome, that he and all men deemed it a little matter to
give these their last overthrow, and then onward to Wolf-stead to storm
on what was left there and purge the house of the foemen. Howbeit
Thiodolf bethought him that succour might come to the Romans from their
main-battle, as they needed not many men there, since there was nought to
fear behind them: but the thought was dim within him, for once more since
he had gotten the Hauberk on him the earth was wavering and dream-like:
he looked about him, and nowise was he as in past days of battle when he
saw nought but the foe before him, and hoped for nothing save the
victory. But now indeed the Wood-Sun seemed to him to be beside him, and
not against his will, as one besetting and hindering him, but as though
his own longing had drawn her thither and would not let her depart; and
whiles it seemed to him that her beauty was clearer to be seen than the
bodies of the warriors round about him. For the rest he seemed to be in
a dream indeed, and, as men do in dreams, to be for ever striving to be
doing something of more moment than anything which he did, but which he
must ever leave undone. And as the dream gathered and thickened about
him the foe before him changed to his eyes, and seemed no longer the
stern brown-skinned smooth-faced men under their crested iron helms with
their iron-covered shields before them, but rather, big-headed men, small
of stature, long-bearded, swart, crooked of body, exceeding foul of
aspect. And he looked on and did nothing for a while, and his head
whirled as though he had been grievously smitten.
Thus tarried the kindreds awhile, and they were bewildered and their
hearts fell because Thiodolf did not fly on the foemen like a falcon on
the quarry, as his wont was. But as for the Romans, they had now stayed,
and were facing their foes again, and that on a vantage-ground, since the
field sloped up toward the Wolfing dwelling; and they gathered heart when
they saw that the Goths tarried and forbore them. But the sun was
sinking, and the evening was hard at hand.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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