“Oh, Lord,” Davis prayed, “I beseech you, stop this killing, torturing, robbing, and raping, the heartbreak and the pain, the hatred and viciousness. How long must this go on?”
As long as men permit themselves to do all the horrible deeds, he thought, God wasn’t going to interfere. But, if He didn’t, then He had a good purpose in His mind.
A few hours past dawn, the fleet arrived at Sigurd’s kingdom. Or what had been his. It was obvious that it, too, had been torn apart by the strife that seemed to have been carried by the wind. Men and women capered
drunkenly while waving weapons and severed heads. Most of the bamboo huts and wooden buildings were blazing, and bodies lay everywhere. As the fleet drew near the bank, a horde climbed into boats and began paddling or rowing toward Ivar’s boats.
“Who are they?” Ivar said. Then, “It doesn’t matter. Sail on!”
“What about your brother?” Davis said.
“He may have escaped. I hope so. Whatever happened to him, I can’t save him. We are too few.”
After that, he was silent for many hours, pacing back and forth on the small afterdeck. He frowned much, and, several times, he smote his breast with an open hand. Once, he startled all on his boats when he threw his head back and howled long and mournfully.
Bjorn the Rough-footed, standing near Davis, shivered and made the sign of Thor’s hammer. “The cry of the great wolf Fenris himself comes from his throat,” he said. “Ivar acts as if he’s about to go berserk! Get ready to defend yourself! Better yet, jump into the River!”
But Ivar quit howling, and he stared around as if he had suddenly been transported here from a million miles away. Then he strode to the forward end of the deck, and he called down.
“Osteopath! Clown! Come up here!”
Reluctantly, knowing that the Dane’s actions could never be predicted and were often to be dreaded, Davis went up the short ladder with Faustroll. Both halted several feet away from Ivar. Davis did not know what Faustroll was thinking, but he himself was prepared to follow Bjorn’s advice.
Ivar looked down at them, his face working with some unreadable expression.
62
Philip .lose Farmer
CROSSING THE DARK RIVER
63
“You two are of lowly rank, but I’ve observed that even a slave may have more brains than his master. I’ve heard you speak of your quests, the spirit of which I admit I don’t quite understand. But you’ve intrigued me. Especially when you spoke about the futility and emptiness of always striving to gain more land, more property, and more power. You may be right. I really don’t know. But, a few minutes ago, I was seized by some spirit. Perhaps I was touched by whatever god made us, the unknown and nameless god. Whatever strange thing happened, I suddenly felt emptied, my mind and blood pouring out of me. That terrible feeling was quickly gone, and I saw the sense in your wisdom, I also was overwhelmed, for a moment, with the uselessness of all I had done. I saw the weariness of forever fighting to get power and then fighting to keep it or to get even more power. Glory seems golden. But it’s really leaden.”
He smiled at them, then looked past them toward the north. When he resumed talking, he kept on staring past them. It was as if, Davis thought, Ivar was envisioning something really glorious.
Faustroll murmured softly. “He sees, however dimly, the junction point of zero and infinity.”
Davis did not speak, because Ivar was glaring at him and the Frenchman. When Ivar spoke, he wanted your complete attention, no interruptions. But Davis thought, No, it’s not that, whatever that means. It’s… can’t remember the Greek theological term… it means a sudden and totally unexpected reversal—a flipflop—of spirit. Like the reversal of attitude and of goal that Paul of Tarsus experienced on the road to Damascus… he had been fanatically persecuting the Christians… the great light came even as he was plotting death for all
Christians… he fell paralyzed for a while… when he arose, he had become a zealous disciple of Christ. Sudden, unexpected, unpredictable by anyone. Your spirit, hastening you toward the South Pole, turns you around without your will and shoots you toward the North Pole. There were records of similar mystical or psychological reversals of spirit.