Ostfold, Fall, AD 954
The old man was tied to a flame-blackened post. His matted gray beard rested on his chest and his legs were splayed out before his body. He leaned forward so that only his arms, which were pulled behind him and tied to the post at the wrists, held him upright. To Hakon, he looked as dead as the corpses lying around him.
“He lives,” called Toralv, Hakon"s champion, whose massive frame dwarfed the man he knelt beside as he felt his wizened neck for a pulse.
Hakon exhaled loudly with relief. This was the fourth razed settlement they had found along the Ostfold coast. A survivor had been left in each of the other villages in a similar manner, but this old bugger was the first they had discovered alive. Now, hopefully, they could learn more about the raiders who had lai
