Adventure Magazine Cover — page 24: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

emed able to rob him of the fruit of ctory. oY ou may come up and tell me your ”” he said gruffly. “J am iiclma sister of Olaf Sigurdsen,” she answered. But she made no motion to obey him; simply stood there with her hands clasped. TROS vaulted the rail, descended Y midway down the wooden ladder } that was spiked to the bireme’s — side and offered her his right hand. She refused it with an imperious chin-gesture that commanded him to climb and let her follow; so he laughed and led. She was beside him almost before his own feet touched thedeck. There their eyes met again and he smiled, but she turned her back, went to her brother’s side to take | the sponge from Conops and attend his | wounds. She said not one word to Tros or to her brother or to any one. CHAPTER IV _ TROS MAKES PRISONERS AND FALLS IN NEED OF FRIENDS HE raft drew near, and as the horses’ feet found bottom they were har- nessed fo it to increase the speed. Cas- walion, with Orwic beside him, stood in the rait’s bow, wiping blood off the white skin over his ribs where a Northman’s spear had ' entered an inch or two. He wore belted breeches, spear and shield, and a little peaked iron cap, but the blue designs painted on his skin made it look as if he wore a shirt, too, until he was a dozen yards - away. " there was no news Tros could give him. Orwic had told about Volstrum’s ship, sunk lower down the Thames. The Northmen whom Tros could claim as his own prison- ' ers, men and women, had climbed aboard the bireme and were standing in the ship’s waist looking miserable, all except Sigurd- "sen’s wile, who was helping Helma tend his wounds. The other woman was a widow; her man had been cut down by the Britons in the forest fighting and she was keening to the - sky about her loss. As many of the wounded Britons on the " bireme as could stand up shouted to Cas- wallon and his men the news of Sigurdsen’s an Da eel Peed Sie ade eee | ec uletetiomes pat inn a ee EP OPS oe TO GE a Te ee ne Adventure surrender, including the terms of combat and the fact that the longship now belonged to Tros. By the look on Orwic’s face there was something in the wind beside the Northman business; he kept glancing at Caswallon and from him to Tros, who for his own part studied the prisoners and counted their weapons on the poop beside him. Conops, swearing Greek oaths, leaned against the arrow-engine, itching to loose its charge against the Britons on the raft if they should dare to invade the-+tengship. He'knew how much loot they would leave in it! They would burn it when every movable stick had been ripped away! However, Caswallon came hand-over- hand up the bireme’s ladder, followed by Orwic and six others; he ordered the men on the raft ashore to find some way of follow- ing the Norse fugitives down-stream. Half a dozen tried to disobey him, swarmimg up the bireme’s side, but he jumped off the poop and beat them back with his spear- butt, the others laughing at them from the raft. Then Caswallon looked the wounded over —a third of them were his blood-relations— and said a few words to each before he climbed the poop again and answered Tros’ salute. ‘So you have come home, Tros!” He smiled, but he did not offer to embrace Tros as the British custom was. “‘Orwic tells me you are a great sea-captain.” His words were almost cordial; there only lacked a half-note and the old careless air of friendship to make him the same Caswallon who had seen the bireme on its way from Lunden ten days before—but that might be due to the fighting over-river and distress to see so many good men dead and maimed. Tros answered with his hands be- hind him: “T bring my father’s body, for which I must beg obsequies. I crave the favor that he may lie in British earth beside your own brave men. Caswallon, not a man is miss- ing; dead or alive I have brought them all!” Caswallon nodded, glancing to right and left. “Are you well enough paid—with a long- ship and—how many prisoners?” he asked. “T never asked payment,” Tros answered. “Caswallon, what is wrong between us?” Caswallon frowned, stroking his. mus- tache and tossing the long hair back over Gcomicbooks.com