Beowulf (8 page)

The thief halted on the edge of the trees and pointed, trembling. ‘There, down there where the smoke curls among the rocks; that is where the fire-drake has his lair and guards his treasure. I have brought you to the place as you bade me, and there is no further use that you can have for such as I am. Now be merciful as you are mighty, my lord Beowulf, and let me go.'

Beowulf glanced at him in scorn. ‘Even as you say, I have no further use for such as you. Go where you will, then; your part is done.' And when the man had scurried back into the woods, he seated himself on a fallen tree bole, to rest and gather strength, his elbows on his knees, his gaze going down into the valley and across it to the tumble of rocks under the green flank of the Whale's Ness. And sitting there he felt Wyrd touch him, like a shadow passing across the sun. He had been young and confident, glorying in his own strength when he fought his battle with Grendel, but now he was old and he knew that this would be his last fight. And suddenly lifting his head he began as the wild swans are said to do to sing his own death-song. ‘I have lived a long life, and all since before I was seven summers old, I remember.' He sang of his contest with Breca son of Beanstan, and of Hygelac his House-Lord, and the companions who had been his war-boat's crew and sailed with him for Denmark, and the fights with Grendel and his Dam. He sang of the death of Hygelac and the death of Heardred, and his own coming to the Kingship. ‘The Frankish warrior who slew Hygelac my King, him I slew with my naked hands, even as I slew Grendel the Night-Stalker,' and with the words, he sighed, and it seemed that all at once he had come to the end of his song. ‘But this fight that waits for me now is a different thing, and I am old. Yet the battle-power is not yet fallen away from me, and I am still the King.' He looked about him at the warriors gathered on the woodshore, and slowly got to his feet, holding out his hand for the great iron shield.

Wiglaf gave it to him, stammering in desperate eagerness, ‘My King and House-Lord—I beg you let me come with you!'

Beowulf shook his head, but his eyes were kindly as he looked at the young warrior. ‘Na, na, did I not say that I am the King? This is a fight, not for a war-host but for one man, even as my fight with Grendel was for one man. But stay here, all of you, with your weapons ready, and watch to see how it goes with me down yonder.'

And he took up the heavy shield and walked out from among them, out from among the charred trees and down into the valley of desolation, his sword naked in his hands.

As Beowulf drew near to the gigantic rock-tumble under the Whale's Ness, he saw in the midst of it the dark mouth of a cave about which the smoke hung more thickly than elsewhere. A stream broke out from the darkness of it, flowing away down the slope of the valley, the water boiling as it came, and flickered over with the vaporous flame of dragon's breath; and Beowulf, with his shield before his face, forced his way up beside it until he reached the trampled ground before the cave mouth and could go no further for the choking fumes and smoke that poured out from the darkness under the flank of the hill.

There he stood, and beat sword upon shield and shouted his defiance to the fire-drake within. His shout rose like a storm, the war-cry that his thanes had heard above the clamour of many and many a battlefield; it pierced in through the opening among the rocks, and the fire-drake heard it and awoke. A great cloud of fiery breath belched out from the cave mouth, and within there sounded the clapping of mighty wings; and even as the King flung up his shield to guard his face, the earth shook and roared and the dragon came coiling from its lair.

Heat played over its scales so that they changed colour, green and blue and gold, as the colours play on a sword-blade heated for tempering, and all the air danced and quivered about him. Fire was in his wings and a blasting flame leapt from his eyes. With wings spread, he half-flew half-sprang at Beowulf, who stood firm to meet him and swung up his sword for a mighty blow. The bright blade flashed down, wounding the monster in the head: but though the skin gaped and the stinking blood sprang forth, the bones of the skull turned the blow so that the wound was not mortal. Bellowing, the creature crouched back, then sprang again, and Beowulf was wrapped from head to heel in a cloud of fire. The iron rings of his mail seared him to the bone and the great shield of smith's work glowed red-hot as he strove to guard his face and bring up his blade for another blow.

On the hill above the watching thanes saw the terrible figure of their lord in its rolling shroud of flame, and brave men though they had been in battle, terror seized them and they turned to fly; all save one. Wiglaf, grandson of Waegmund, and the youngest of them all, stood firm. For one despairing moment he tried to rally the rest, crying after them to remember their loyalty to their House-Lord. ‘Brave things we promised in the King's hall when we drank his mead and took the gifts he gave us! Often we swore ourselves his men to the death—and now the death comes, we forget! Shame to us for ever if we bear home our shields in safety from this day; but I will not share the shame!' And snatching up his shield and dragging his sword from its sheath, he began to run also, not back towards the safety of the woods, but forward and down into the smoke-filled valley.

Head down and shield up, he plunged into the fiery reek, shouting, ‘Beowulf, beloved lord, I come! Remember the battles of your youth and stand strong—I am here beside you!'

Beowulf heard his young kinsman's voice and felt him at his shoulder, yellow linden shield beside that of glowing iron, and his heart took new strength within him. But the sound of another voice roused the dragon to yet greater hatred, and the earth groaned and the rocks shivered to his fury, while he drove out blast on blast of searing flame. Wiglaf's shield blackened and flamed like a torch, and he flung the blazing remnant from him and sprang to obey his lord as Beowulf shouted to him, ‘Here! Behind my targe—it shall serve to cover us both!' And steady and undismayed they fought on behind the red-hot shield of iron.

But at last, as it came whistling down in mighty blow, Beowulf's sword that had seen the victory in a hundred battles shivered into fragments on the dragon's head.

With a great cry, the King threw the useless hilt away from him, but before he could snatch the saex from his belt, the fire-drake was upon him, rearing up under the flailing darkness of its wings, its poisonous foreclaws slashing at his throat above the golden collar.

In the same instant, while the King's life blood burst out in a red wave, Wiglaf sprang clear of the iron targe and, diving low under the fire-drake, stabbed upward with shortened blade into its scaleless underparts.

A convulsive shudder ran through all the lashing coils of the dragon's body, and instantly the fire began to fade, and as it faded, Beowulf with the last of his battle strength, tore the saex from his belt and hurling himself forward, hacked the great brute almost in two.

The dragon lay dead, with the brightness of its fires darkening upon it. But Beowulf also had got his death hurt, and now as he stood swaying above the huge carcass, his wounds began to burn and swell, the venom from the monster's talons boiled in his breast and all his limbs seemed on fire. Blindly he staggered towards a place where the rocks made a natural couch close beside the cave entrance, and sank down upon it, gasping for air.

Wiglaf with his own burns raw upon him bent over his lord, loosened the thongs of his helmet and lifted it away so that the cool sea wind was on his forehead; brought water in his own helmet from the stream, which now ran cool and clear, to bathe Beowulf's face and wounds, all the while calling to him, calling him back from somewhere a long way off. By and by Beowulf's head cleared a little, and for a while the scalding tide of poison seemed to ebb, and the old King gathered up strength to speak, knowing that his time for speaking would soon be done. ‘Now I wish in my heart that the All-Father had granted me a son to take my war-harness after me; but since that may not be, you must be son to me in this, and take my helm and good saex, and my battle-sark from my body after I am dead, and wear them worthily for my sake.'

He felt Wiglaf's tears upon his face and gathered himself again. ‘Na, na, here is no cause for weeping. I am an old man and have lived my life and fought my battles. Fifty winters I have held rule over my people and made them strong so that never a war-host dared to cross our frontiers. I have not sought out feuds, nor sworn many oaths and lightly broken them; and when my life goes out from my body I shall not have to answer to the All-Father for slain kinsfolk or unjust rule.'

He propped himself on to his elbow and looked about him, and his gaze came to rest on the carcass of the fire-drake lying sprawled before the entrance to the cave. ‘I have paid away my life to slay the thing which would have slain my people, and now I see it lying dead before me. But if the thief's tale be true, then I have won for them in my last battle some store of treasure also, and that too I would see before the light goes from my eyes. Go now, Wiglaf, my kinsman, and bring out to me what you can carry.'

Wiglaf, who had been kneeling at his lord's side, got to his feet and stumbling past the still twitching coils of the dead monster, went into the cave.

Within the entrance he came to a halt, staring with scarce-believing eyes at the piled-up wonders of the fire-drake's hoard. Golden cups and pitchers, jewelled collars for a king's throat, ancient ring-mail and boar-masked helmets and swords eaten through with rust; and upreared high above the rest, a golden banner curiously wrought with long-forgotten magic, which shone of itself, and shed about it a faint light in which he saw all the rest. But he had neither the time nor the heart for much marvelling. In frantic haste he loaded himself with cups and arm-rings and weapons, and the banner last of all, and carried them out into the daylight and flung them clanging down at the old man's feet.

Beowulf lay still with his eyes closed, and the blood still flowing from his wounds. But when Wiglaf fetched more water from the stream and again bathed his face he revived once more, and opened his eyes to gaze upon the treasure as it lay glittering among the rocks. ‘A fine bright gleam of gold to light me on my way,' he said. ‘Glad am I that since the time has come for me to go I may leave behind me such treasure for my people.' Then his gaze abandoned the glitter of the dragon's hoard, and went out and upward to where the great bluff forehead of the Whale's Ness upreared itself against the sky. ‘After the bale-fire is burned out, bid them raise me a burial howe on the Whale's Ness yonder, a tall howe on the cliff edge, that it may serve as a mark for seafaring men such as I was in my youth. So they may see it from afar as they pass on the Sail-Road, and say, “There stands Beowulf's Barrow” and remember me.'

For the last time his gaze went to young Wiglaf's face, and his hands were at his wounded throat, fumbling off the golden collar of the Kingship. ‘Take this also, with my war-gear.' His voice was only a whisper now. ‘Use it well, for you are the last of our kindred. One by one, Wyrd has swept them all away at their fated hour; and now it is time for me to go to them.'

And with the words scarce spoken, a great sigh broke from him and he fell back into the young warrior's arms. And Wiglaf laid him down.

He was still sitting at his dead lord's shoulder when a shadow fell across them both and, looking up slowly, he saw that the King's hearth-companions had come stealing down from the high woods of their refuge, and were standing about him staring down in shame at slain hero and slain monster. He did not trouble to rise, but sitting drearily where he was, stony-eyed, he flayed them with all the bitter scorn that was in his heart. ‘So you come, do you, now that the fire is spent! Well may men say, seeing you safe and unmarked in the war-gear that Beowulf gave you, that he made a bad bargain with his gifts. When his sorest need came upon him he had no cause to boast of his companions in arms. Small honour will Geatland have in her foremost warriors, when the princes of other lands hear of this day's work! Aye, you have kept whole your skins under your bright battle-sarks; but it may be that death is better for a warrior than a life of shame!'