earek's coffers would open
wider; and now he was dragged along over the Wolf's Throat to a
midwinter feast which would have to be celebrated on the sea.

"Had we but fire--" Torbek thrust his hands inside his cloak, trying to
warm them a little. The ship rolled till she was almost on her beam
ends; Torbek braced himself with practiced feet, but Cappen went into
the bilge again.

He sprawled there for a while, his bruised body refusing movement. A
weary sailor with a bucket glared at him through dripping hair. His
shout was dim under the hoot and skirl of wind: "If ye like it so well
down here, then help us bail!"

"'Tis not yet my turn," groaned Cappen, and got slowly up.

The wave which had nearly swamped them had put out the ship's fire and
drenched the wood beyond hope of lighting a new one. It was cold fish
and sea-sodden hardtack till they saw land again--if they ever did.

As Cappen raised himself on the leeward side, he thought he saw
something gleam, far out across the wrathful night. A wavering red
spark-- He brushed a stiffened hand across his eyes, wondering if the
madness of wind and water had struck through into his own skull. A gust
of sleet hid it again. But--

He fumbled his way aft between the benches. Huddled figures cursed him
wearily as he stepped on them. The ship shook herself, rolled along the
edge of a boiling black trough, and slid down into it; for an instant,
the white teeth of combers grinned above her rail, and Cappen waited for
an end to all things. Then she mounted them again, somehow, and wallowed
toward another valley.

King Svearek had the steering oar and was trying to hold the longboat
into the wind. He had stood there since sundown, huge and untiring, legs
braced and the bucking wood cradled in his arms. More than human he
seemed, there under the icicle loom of the stern-post, his gray hair and
beard rigid with ice. Beneath the horned helmet, the strong moody face
turned right and left, peering into the darkness. Cappen felt smaller
than usual when he approached the steersman.

He leaned close to the king, shouting against the blast of winter: "My
lord, did I not see firelight?"

"Aye. I spied it an hour ago," grunted the king. "Been trying to steer
us a little closer to it."

Cappen nodded, too sick and weary to feel reproved. "What is it?"

"Some island--there are many in this stretch of water--now shut up!"

Cappen crouched down under the rail and waited.

The lone