Under Ekethorp
The Corn King and Queen appear to Wistan in a dream. It seems that there is strife amongst the leadership in Ekethorp in the wake of the Queen’s death. One Coven member, Mira, with whom Wistan negotiated at Forchafn, is still in favour of paying a Geatgeld to persuade them from Eowland. The other, Anya, favours resistance to the last and is summoning Staenbogan and plans a mass conjuring of Cauldron Born. They favour Mira’s approach for they feel that Anya’s way pollutes the land and needlessly prolongs the conflict. They bid him come with a dozen warriors – armed with rune-blades if possible – at dawn, and they will lead him by secret ways into Ekethorp, there to slay Anya and depart. They bid him act in secret as they know Anya has a spy in their camp.
In extreme secrecy, excluding even his own family, Wistan gathers together the warriors from the Black Pig, who he is sure may be trusted. He and Thegn Osgar find sufficient rune-marked blades for each to have one, and they creep from Ossby in the twilight to meet the Corn Twins at the foot of the bluff on which stands Ekethorp. They lead the Geats to a secret passage, guarded by Staenbogan, who stand aside at their command. By many twists and turns they climb upwards to the temple of Nerthus – the dual aspect god/goddess that is the patron of the Corn King and Queen – in the centre of Ekethorp. There they see yet more Staenbogan. Once more the Twins command them to stillness and say that this night no Staenbogan will harm them. However, they make it clear that it is their intention to show the Geats what they will have to contend with should they return in strength to take the Burgh.
From the Temple of Nerthus the Twins lead them in silence through Ekethorp to the Great Hall where Anya resides. The door is opened from the inside by two Staenbogan, but again they seem not to notice the Geats. However, once inside they are greeted with steel by a dozen Cauldron Born. Wistan, Osgar and his gesiths surge forward to meet the lichs, others of the party tarry, mistrusting the inaction of the Staenbogan. It is fortunate indeed that those few were sufficient to dispatch the dead-eyed lichs.
From the Great Hall, they smash through a partition door to find a set of stone-flagged steps. Wistan, Osgar and his gesiths take these to a basement where they find two witches and their servitors in mid-ritual as they create yet more Cauldron Born. The witches look up and one points at Thegn Osgar shrieking a curse. “Lads, to me!” shouts Osgar, “I’m blind!” Saefrith and Grimcytel immediately lock shields in front of him but Wistan, Hrothgar and Svipdag plough onwards into a mob of fresh-made Cauldron Born, lacking armour and weapons, but deadly nonetheless as heedless of blades they try with clutching hands to grip and overwhelm the Geatish warriors. However, they soon begin to fall away as the rune-marked blades of the Geats cleave their flesh. When at length Tohrwulf leads the rest of the Geats down the steps and Osgar regains his sight, it is all up with the Eowan in the cellar. The servitors throw down their weapons. One witch shapeshifts into a rat and flees leaving her clothing and possessions in a puddle on the ground. The other tries to hide behind her great cauldron.
Wistan pulls her from her hiding place and demands to know who she is. She attempts to prevaricate with the steely-eyed Geat but from the back of the cavern comes a call from Eawig, the Corn King: “It is Anya, slay her!” Wistan drives his Sea-Giant-wrought blade through her body as she gasps out one last curse, as each of the Geats in the hall feels an icy hand clutch at his heart. However, as the lifeblood drains from the witch the hand slackens and none take serious hurt from the curse.
There are a dozen Geats imprisoned within the cellar. They are freed and under the guidance of their leader, a warrior called Oshere, they grab armour and weapons from a pile clearly set aside for the new Cauldron Born. To the surprise of Osgar, one of them is Stithwulf, his detractor from the household of the late Eorl Sighhere. He looks in a sorry way.
The Geats scoop up the possessions of the rat-witch, loot the corpse of the other and take any item of value from the bodies of the Cauldron Born and the servitors. They also take the time to ransack the witch’s personal quarters. Then they leave Ekethorp the way they came, led once again by the Twins who keep them safe from the Staenbogan. On their return they make report to Beornfrith, who is delighted with their news, and hand over the gold and silver they have taken for general distribution.
The End of the War
A truce is agreed the following day. Negotiations with the Eowan are protracted but in the end the Geats agree to an exchange of prisoners and depart, their holds groaning with Eowan gold and silver. Eowan willingness to treat is no doubt encouraged by the arrival of several more ships from the Isle of the Weather Geats – though in truth they are more full of provisions than men and serve mostly to transport exchanged prisoners homewards.
To everyone’s surprise, the witch Arna decides to accompany the Geatish fleet back to the Isle of the Weather Geats, on the arm of the Woden-Priest, Saeric Raven’s Cloak. As the Osprey comes to land, her arms are grasped by warriors on either side. Saeric steps up behind to put a sealskin bag over her head and a noose around her neck and she is hoist from the yardarm. Saeric takes something out of another bag (those nearby later say that it was a large dead rat), impales it upon the head of a spear that he then thrusts through her body as it twitches upon the rope, dedicating the sacrifice to Woden as he does so. It seems that Saeric had sniffed out the spies and ensured they spied no more.
After the distribution of the loot – which was considerable, with the Geatgeld alone amounting to around 30,000 marks in value – the army dispersed. Many of the host were Weather Geats and they were home. Those others who had ships or could agree passage home set off for whence they came. However, there remained significant numbers of outlanders, mostly concentrated around Wisby, the largest port on the island, with dwindling stocks of silver, wondering what the future might hold for them.