"I like it too," Hrífa said, his bosom puffing partridge-proud. Though he did not take it particularly as a compliment; after all, it was not his handiwork. He did not craft this fine shield, nor any of its parts. He was quick to hang it by its guige from the wale, and others prepared their stations similarly, squirreling their weapons and mail shirts away underneath their benches, and their shields upon the ship's wide walls.
It was filling up. Looking over his shoulder, Hrífa was pleased that, although most their "soldiers" were rather too thin, and a rare few sported distinctly feminine curves underneath their thick wintry clothes, none carried their criminality on their sleeves! Through their tattoos, their bone charms and copper runes, their sex and their station, he could only speculate as to their crimes; they deceived his eyes, appearing to him as normal as he. Of course, he had been warned, and by the chieftain's speech, no less, about this queer little dread which rattled at the back of his mind. Indeed, because Hrífa knew that some of these men and boys were sure to be outlaws, and
níðingar, and drunkards and second sons and his fellow witches, subconsciously, down in his frail little heart, he wondered which men he could trust, and which would attempt to steal his salted fish. The Rat-eater had noticed as the crowds gathered at the shore that nothing had been stolen from the ship, but he recognized that this was not a purity of spirit which stayed men's hands, but rather, their fear of retribution. The village, and its broad-shouldered king, surely would not have tolerated such a transgression as that, in their urgent hour.
While Hrífa pulled his oar out from beneath the benches, and petitioned Ásdís to help, Hralding meanwhile continued to sieve through the growing crew, searching for that man who was the most skilled and experienced among them, the man who would bear the great burden of helping him to raise and lower the
Sjórheror's single sail. It was rolled up at that time, but with enough finesse and care poured into its handling, they could ride not the waves, but the winds, and spare themselves the callus-building drudgery or rowing for many pleasant hours.
Suddenly the gangplank had been yanked away, threatening to fall overboard as it was pulled upon the deck. Hralding was not moved by the dejected and crestfallen faces of those on dry land who had been too late to cross it; neither did he acknowledge the worries and woes of the crew's families onshore. In fact he seemed to nothing nothing
but his crew, and their instruments of war.
"I'm not one for long speeches," he growled. "So turn to our left, and remember what you see. When your hands sting with salt and splinters, and your arms burn, and you're ready to give up—" he swept his arm out toward the village— "I want these to be the faces you remember. These are the people you are failing if you give up! All right. Let's get this ship moving."
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