Sword of Doom Read Free Page A

is better suited for it. I know he’s a fool at times…well, most of the time, but perhaps he’ll have better luck than I have. He wants to go raiding for food, but…is that the right thing to do? If you could just give me a sign…a thunderclap? A bird call? A chirping of crickets? Anything!”
    The hail ceased, the rain eased a bit, and a moment later Dane felt a warm glow upon his face. He opened his eyes and saw a bright, shimmering light hovering above him, as if the thunderclouds had suddenly parted and the sun maid Sol had shown herself. The light filled him with tranquility, until it dawned on Dane that it wasn’t the sun warming him but an entity of an altogether different nature. He rose unsteadily to his feet and reached up to touch the thing within the dazzle of light, when a female voice cried, “Behind you!”
    And turning too late, all Dane saw in his last moments of consciousness was the blur of a swiftly advancing stranger bringing a club down upon his head.

2
A D EADLY A RRIVAL
    I n the woods beyond the village the ten-year-old quietly stalked the enemy. There! A mere hundred paces away he spied him. The boy ducked behind a tree and drew an arrow to his bow, knowing this would be a difficult shot in the rain. Pulling back the bowstring as far as strength would allow, he let the arrow fly.
    It landed a good thirty paces shy of his target—an ancient pine.
    William the Brave swore at how badly he had missed. He had been sneaking off to the woods every day to practice against imaginary enemies, gradually building his arm strength to hit targets farther and farther away. From seventy paces or less he was deadly, but he lacked the muscle to launch an arrow accurately beyond that. Until the day he could kill reliably from at least a hundred paces, he wouldnot be deemed a warrior worthy to stand in battle beside Dane the Defiant, the young man whom he had come to idolize in the short time he had known him.
    William had been a Saxon orphan whom Dane had rescued from slavery just months before. William had shown a particular act of courage—an act inspired by Dane himself—and Dane then had dubbed him William the Brave, a name the boy longed to live up to. And so daily he visited these woods in secret to practice his art, even in the pouring rain.
    He strung another arrow, envisioning an attacker skulking up behind him. He whirled to shoot—and was surprised to see a strange man standing there wearing a chain-mail shirt and helmet, brandishing a shield and war axe. Behind this stranger stood a dozen others. William had been so intent on his imaginary invaders, he hadn’t heard the real ones creep up. Thwack! An arrow hit the tree behind him, just missing his shoulder.
    William ran. He heard the hiss of arrows as they shot past into the trees and brush. Behind him he heard the attackers crashing through the woods in pursuit. He knew he had to alert the village but was too far away to be heard. Emerging from the trees, he raced like a hare across the open field toward the village perimeter, expecting any moment to feel the impact of an arrow shaft. As he ran, he threw a quick look over his shoulder. The attackers were just reaching the tree line and were coming fast. But not being weigheddown by chain mail as they were, William knew he had the advantage. And thus he ran, and gave a blood-curdling cry so high and loud, it scared even him to hear it.
    â€œ Attack! ATTAAACK!”
    Â 
    Geldrun rose from the goat pen to see her village under assault. Villagers, including Astrid and Jarl, Rik, Vik, Fulnir, and Drott, had quickly found weapons and engaged the invaders but were being pushed back by the onslaught. Immediately Geldrun thought of the children. In a blink she was racing through the village, taking control of the panicked women and wee ones, herding them away from the fighting to the ships beached on shore. If the village was overrun, she knew, the only