A Golden Legend

Chapter 2

An agonizing cry broke the silence of night, from one of the men who were on duty in the North. Overcoming fatigue and sleep, defense measures that were part of the discipline of a Viking camp immediately were put into practice. The warriors woke up each other, and as everyone slept near their swords and in just a few moments were on war footing. Once determined the source of the alarm the leaders lined up their men and tended defense lines, forming a typical Viking square surrounded by shields. After a few moments of tension, with the slow emergence of clarity, the fog in front of them stood up and suddenly they saw a horde of naked and armed men, approaching from the inner fields into several undulating lines. At an order of the head of the expedition Thorvald, the Viking archers prepared their bows, and to a new cry a cloud of arrows fell on the skraelings, producing numerous voids in the first row of attackers. Survivors accelerated their race towards the Norwegians, encouraged by the small number of these. Some darts injured a few defenders, whose combat positions were eagerly covered by the men who were in the second row. Just at the moment that the Indians came close to the shields line, above these emerged a swarm of long Spears, decimating the first attackers. A new cloud of arrows fell on the aborigines that were left behind, producing new gaps in their ranks. The wave of attackers hesitated momentarily to the unforeseen events, and at that moment shields line took the field, a terrifying roar broke in unison of the gorges of the defenders and the spears rushed to the attacking horde; behind them in the emerging sun shone formidable swords of the Vikings, severing, beheading, and finally putting natives in flight who, baffled by a fighting technique unknown to them, could not halt the momentum of the counterattack. Swords and Spears competed in wreaking havoc among the aborigines now in withdrawal. The Norwegian slid on the ground soaked in blood of their rivals, who were pursued towards the foot of the rolling hills of which had arisen. When the foothills were reached, the chief Thorvald ordered his assistant to sound the horn, and the counterattack ceased suddenly. The Vikings retreated orderly, taking care to finish off wounded enemies, in a way not to leave dangers behind. Upon returning to camp, a formidable Hurrah came from sixty gorges, closing the bloody episode.

After another prolonged stay, without additional setbacks, the sailors embarked and put bow to the South to continue their exploration of areas that the Scandinavian never had reached previously.

Again they had to withstand strong storms that lasted four days and that took them far from their course. At the end of the storms, the drakkar in which Bjorn was traveling found itself isolated, without contact with the rest of the fleet. The boat, crewed by eleven men finally ended up in a muddy coast in which they descended to replenish water and food.

Bjorn moved away from the place of landing armed with a bow and his sword, in search of game. After a long and fruitless trip, he decided to return along with his comrades to rest and to assist in the erection of the camp. When he approached he heard noises that worried him, including human cries. He quickly ranged the distance to the camp until he reached a high mound; there his breathing was interrupted when he noted the situation: a fierce combat was developing on the beach between the members of the crew and a group of savages. Many fallen bodies scattered on the ground. Bjorn did not doubt an instant and embarked on what was his baptism in single combat. He descended running with his sword in the air and fell upon the rear of the indigenous sowing destruction in his wake, the first two skraelings who were lodged in its path fell with tremendous cuts in their torsos. The next confronted him with his spear but his head flew away from a single blow. The battle gained in intensity and number of attackers gradually overwhelmed the resistance of sailors. Bjorn was approaching a particular core among the natives, where he could distinguish a man who by his outfit identified as a chieftain. He thought of killing him for attempting to halt the attackers deprived of command. He threw his weight among those who surrounded the chieftain, tearing apart with his sword several custodians, and receiving several spear hits in his body, and as already was approaching his goal a blow on his head made him lose consciousness.

 The Sun on the face made him wake up. He verified that the minimal movement made him feel an intense pain, so it took him a long time to have forces to stand up. He sat on the ground and there he could verify the state of his body. Lance wounds had torn it in many places, and he was practically covered with his blood and that of his enemies. On the ground laid the wrecked corpses of three of his companions, including that of Thorstein, who had arrived from Norway along with him. There were no bodies of the fallen skraelings, which surely his companions had taken away with them by retiring. The remains of the camp were still burning and there were no traces of the vessel.

In Bjorn´s mind took place a mental reconstruction of what happened on the basis of visible evidence: probably the Nordic survivors have managed to push the boat to the sea, leaving the beach, persecuted by the natives, and were not able to remove the bodies of their fallen comrades. Apparently, both they and the Indians had presumed Bjorn dead, and paradoxically thanks to that he could survive.

Bjorn remained long days in that desolate beach, while his wounds closed and his body restored his forces. He had buried his comrades, built a precarious refuge against rough weather using branches and algae brought by sea, while he precariously fed with mollusks, some birds hunted with arrows and fish speared by fortune. Unfortunately the site was miserly in food and other elements necessary for life, and pure water that emerged from a shed located inland was its only abundant resource. Therefore, the young warrior undertook the march along the coast and up to the cliffs, limiting the beach, penetrating into the plateau located behind. There he soon met the bed of a creek that ran parallel to the coast and decided to follow his course for lack of a better alternative. After a couple of hours walk, he came to a forest of deciduous trees, and assumed it would be the same that reached the edge of the cliff; tired and sore, he decided to rest before deciding his future actions. He leaned on a heap of leaves and fell asleep immediately with a dream that lasted long hours. As he woke up, his mind wandered a while without purpose, until an idea began to take shape in his brain. Using his sword, he cut several young trees whose trunks he then cleaned of branches, a task which took him a day and a half. When he judged that he had obtained sufficient trunks for his purpose, he made them fall rolling from the top of the canyon to the sea shore.