The next morning, Hakon"s army was up before dawn. Under the orange glow of the funeral pyres they unpacked their armor and found what food they could to break their fast. The air was thick with ash and alive with shouted commands, uneasy laughter, and the rhythmic grating of whetstones on blades. As the first hint of light stretched across the fjord, the army launched their ships, leaving Geir in command of the ruin that was now Kaupang. Above them, a solid sheet of steel-colored clouds stretched to the horizon. An omen of the battle to come.
They rowed until they reached the open seas of the Skaggerak, then pointed their prows northward, but luck was not with them this day, for the air was calm and windless and the sea tame beneath their hulls. Hakon"s men would have to pull, a hard eno
