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 — John Shaqi
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
There then they awaited the onset. But the men of Mid-mark came up in
the morning, when the battle was but just joined, and fell on so fiercely
that the aliens gave back, and then they of the Upper-mark stormed out of
their eyot, and fell on over the ford, and fought till the water ran red
with their blood, and the blood of the foemen. So the Aliens gave back
before the onset of the Markmen all over the meads; but when they came to
the hillocks and the tofts of the half-burned habitations, and the wood
was on their flank, they made a stand again, and once more the battle
waxed hot, for they were very many, and had many bowmen: there fell the
War-duke of the Markmen, whose daughter had been offered up for victory,
and his name was Agni, so that the tofts where he fell have since been
called Agni's Tofts. So that day they fought all over the plain, and a
great many died, both of the Aliens and the Markmen, and though these
last were victorious, yet when the sun went down there still were the
Aliens abiding in the Upper-mark, fenced by their wain-burg, beaten, and
much diminished in number, but still a host of men: while of the Markmen
many had fallen, and many more were hurt, because the Aliens were good
bowmen.
But on the morrow again, as the old tale told, came up the men of the
Nether-mark fresh and unwounded; and so the battle began again on the
southern limit of the Upper-mark where the Aliens had made their wain-
burg. But not long did it endure; for the Markmen fell on so fiercely,
that they stormed over the wain-burg, and slew all before them, and there
was a very great slaughter of the Aliens; so great, tells the old tale,
that never again durst they meet the Markmen in war.
Thus went forth the host of the Markmen, faring along both sides of the
water into the Upper-mark; and on the west side, where went the Wolfings,
the ground now rose by a long slope into a low hill, and when they came
unto the brow thereof, they beheld before them the whole plain of the
Upper-mark, and the dwellings of the kindred therein all girdled about by
the wild-wood; and beyond, the blue hills of the herdsmen, and beyond
them still, a long way aloof, lying like a white cloud on the verge of
the heavens, the snowy tops of the great mountains. And as they looked
down on to the plain they saw it embroidered, as it were, round about the
habitations which lay within ken by crowds of many people, and the
banners of the kindreds and the arms of men; and many a place they saw
named after the ancient battle and that great slaughter of the Aliens.
On their left hand lay the river, and as it now fairly entered with them
into the Upper-mark, it spread out into wide rippling shallows beset with
yet more sandy eyots, amongst which was one much greater, rising amidmost
into a low hill, grassy and bare of tree or bush; and this was the island
whereon the Markmen stood on the first day of the Great Battle, and it
was now called the Island of the Gods.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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