A Prince of Cornwall / A Story of Glastonbury and the West in the Days of Ina of Wessex

by Charles W. Whistler

It was not long before that fell, crashing inwards, and across it strode the heathen priest into the gap. He was fully armed, and wore the great golden ring of the temple--all that was left him of his old surroundings since Ethelwalch the king, who sent Wilfrith to us, had destroyed the building that stood with the image of Woden in it hard by his house. Men used to take oath on that ring, as do we on the Book of the Gospels, and they held it holier than the oaken image of the god itself. I do not think that any man had seen it since that time until this night.

Now Erpwald stood for a moment in the gate, with his men hard behind him, expecting a rush at him, as it would seem. But our folk stood firm in the line across the courtyard, shoulder to shoulder, with my father and Owen before them. So they looked at one another.

Then Erpwald slipped the golden ring from his arm and held it up. There may have been some thought in his mind that my father was hesitating yet.

"By the holy ring I adjure you, Aldred, for the last time, to return to the Asir," he said loudly.

My father shook his head only, but Stuf the house-carle, who had stood beside him at the font this morning, had another answer which was strange enough.

"This for the ring!" he said.

And with that he hurled a throwing spear at it as it shone in the firelight, with a true aim. The spear went through the ring itself without harming the hand of the holder, and coming a little slantwise, twitched it away from him and stuck in the timber of the stockade whence the gatepost had been riven. The ring hung spinning on the shaft safely enough, but to Erpwald it seemed that his treasure had gone altogether, and he yelled with rage and sprang forward. After him came his men, and in a moment the two parties were hand to hand.

Then was fighting such as the gleemen sing of, with the light of the red fire waxing and waning across the courtyard the while. The strange lights and shadows it cast were to the advantage of our men for a little while, but the numbers were too great against them for that to be of much avail. Soon they who had not fallen were borne back to the hall door, and there stood again, but my father was not with them.

He fell at the first, as Owen tells me. Another has told me that Owen stood across his body and would have fallen with him, but that Stuf drew him away, calling on him to mind his promise concerning me, and so he went back, still fighting, until he stood in the door of the hall.

There Erpwald and his men stayed their hands, like a ring of dogs that bay a boar. There was a little porch, so that they could not get at him sideways, and needs must that they fell on him one at a time. It seemed that not one cared to be the first to go near the terrible Briton as he stood, in the plain arms and with the heavy sword my father had given him, waiting for them. Well do I know what he was like at that time, and I do not blame them. There is no man better able to wield weapons than he, and they had learnt it.