Now I heard the music play from across the water, and I heard the shouts of the people—­and all the while the hoofs of Ingvar’s horses thundered nearer and nearer.  Then they came over the little rise in the road and were on me with levelled spears.

I got my horse between them and me, across the narrow roadway, and hove up my axe and waited.  But when Ingvar saw who I was, he held up his hand, and his men threw up their spear points and halted, thinking perhaps that I was the king.

“Where is the king?” shouted Ingvar.

I saw that their horses were done, and not knowing which way the king had gone answered truly.

“I know not.  The road forks, and that is as far as I know.”

Then Ingvar swore a great oath.

“You know not which way he went?”

“I do not,” I said.

“Catch a thrall and ask him,” he said to his men.

And those silly folk were yet standing at the corner, maybe thinking us belated wedding guests, and the men took one, dragging him to their chief.  But the man said that he had seen no horsemen pass.  Truly he had heard some, but all men were at the house door waiting for the bride to come forth, and paid no heed.

So the king had passed by before the procession set out, and I knew not what to think.

“What bride?” said Ingvar.

And the music answered him, coming nearer and nearer, and now they were crossing Hoxne bridge—­a bright little array of wedding guests, and in the midst I could see those two, Egfrid and Eadgyth, and after came a crowd of village folk.

“See yonder,” said a Dane, pointing.  “By Baldur, here is a wedding!  Gold and jewels to be had for the taking!”

But my horse was across the road, and my axe was in the way, and I cried to Ingvar as the men began to handle their weapons.

“Mercy, Jarl Ingvar!  This is my sister’s wedding—­that Eadgyth of whom your own sister would ever ask so much.”

“Hold!” roared the chief, and his men stayed, wondering.  “An you touch so much as a hair of any in that company—­the man who touches, I will slay!” he said, and the men stared at him.

“Yon is the bridal of Reedham folk,” he said, “and the bride is she who befriended Lodbrok.  They shall not be hurt.”

For he must needs justify himself, and give reason for withholding plunder from Danes as free as himself.

“Aye, King, that is right,” they said on hearing that, and Ingvar turned to me.

“For Osritha’s sake, lest I should harm you in aught,” he said.  “Now ask me no more.  Let us meet them in peace.”

Now I knew that my folk were safe for this time at least, and my heart was light, and so leaving my horse I walked beside the king, as his men called him, until we met the first of the company on this side of the bridge.

Then was a little confusion, and they stopped, not knowing what this war-stained troop might betoken.  And I saw that no word had come of the great defeat as yet.