Soon the brave one seized his booty.
By the help of God’s good favour
Have we overcome the heathen;
Steeped our swords are all in red blood;
Round us lie the sable corpses.
When they had cleared the Drómund, they set it on fire. When the big man whom they had taken prisoner saw this, he changed colour and became pale, and could not keep himself still. But though they tried to make him speak, he did not say a word, neither did he make any kind of sign; he was immovable to fair promises and menaces alike. But when the Drómund began to blaze up, they saw a glowing stream, as it were, run into the sea. At this the captive man was greatly moved. They concluded that they had not made a careful search for the money, and now the metal, whether gold or silver, had melted in the fire.
Then Earl Rögnvald and his men sailed south, under Serkland, and lay off a certain town of Serkland, and had seven nights’ truce with the men of the town, and sold them silver and other valuables. No one would buy the big man; and then the Earl gave him leave to go away with four men. He came back on the morning after, with his men, and told them that he was a nobleman of Serkland, and that he had been ransomed from there with the Drómund and all its contents. “It grieved me most,” he said, “that you should burn it, and thus destroy so much treasure, without any one’s having the benefit of it. Now you are in my power, but it counts for your benefit with me that you spared my life, and did me such honour as you could. But I would gladly never see you again, and now may you live hale and well.” Then he rode away into the country.
Earl Rögnvald sailed to Crete, and anchored in a strong gale. When Armod kept watch during the night, he sang:
Lie we now, where stormy billows
Break above the sturdy bulwarks;