"Thou hast been with me through many battles, O sword! Thou hast drunk the blood of more lives than I can count. Be thou true to me now, for all else is lost."
Then he knelt upon the rampart and placed the hilt firmly in the earth, the blade point leaning toward him. He braced himself and cast his weight with force. A gasp, a shudder, a struggle of strong limbs, and Petronius was in command of the Roman camp, for his superior officer was dead.
There were many screams at the prison pen, but afterward all was quiet, and Petronius returned, to be told of this new misfortune which had befallen.
"Keep ye good watch," he said, "lest the Britons take us unawares. There is more than one trireme yet to come. But now we will raise the funeral pile of him who lieth here, for he died in all honor."
Orders were given and the soldiers brought much wood, but they came and went in silence, for their fates were dark before them.
So was it with the camp of the Romans; but at the camp of the Saxons, at the cove and spring, there was high feasting, for they found the wild boar well roasted and the venison was abundant. They needed but harps and harpers, for the spirit of song came upon all singers, and it was a day of triumph. Not even the older vikings could say that they had ever heard of the taking of a Roman warship in this wise.
"Some have the sea kings rammed to sinking," they said. "Some have they driven ashore and some have they burned; but the Romans themselves ever burn any keel that they are leaving. Hael to The Sword, the victor!"
"The smiters of my kindred have themselves been smitten," said Olaf, the son of Hakon, but he sat with a fierce fire burning in his eyes and his seax lay bare at his side.
"We have smitten them upon the sea," said Ulric the Jarl, "but not yet upon the land. I may not yet leave Britain. Not until I have kept the counsel of Hilda and my promise to my father at his tomb."