The Sagas of the Icelanders (80 page)

11
Odd was all ready to put to sea, when he and his father met, and Ofeig told Odd that he had conceded the confederates self-judgement.

‘You miserable creature, you abandoned the case!’ said Odd.

‘The full story has not been told yet, kinsman,’ replied Ofeig, and related the whole course of events, with the fact that a wife was betrothed to him.

Then Odd thanked him for all his help, saying that he had pursued matters far beyond anything that had occurred to Odd as possible, and he should never go short of money again.

‘Now you must sail as you planned,’ said Ofeig, ‘and your wedding will take place at Mel six weeks before winter begins.’

After that, father and son parted on the best of terms.

Odd put to sea, and got a favourable wind north as far as Thorgeirsfjord, where there were merchants lying at anchor. Then the breeze failed and the ship lay there becalmed for several days. Odd grew impatient waiting for a wind, so he climbed a certain high hill and saw that out beyond the fjord the weather was quite different. He went back aboard his knorr and ordered his men to put out of the fjord under oars.

The Norwegian merchants mocked them and said that it would be a long row to Norway.

Odd said, ‘Who knows whether you’ll still be waiting when we get back?’

When they got clear of the fjord, they picked up a favourable wind, and did not lower their sail until they reached the Orkneys. There Odd purchased
malt and grain, and spent a short while there preparing his ship. Just when he was ready, an easterly wind rose, and they set sail before it. They made an excellent voyage, and put in to Thorgeirsfjord to find the merchants still there. Odd sailed on west along the coast and put in at Midfjord, having been away seven weeks.

Then preparations were made for the wedding feast, and good provisions were in plentiful supply. A great crowd of guests came, including Gellir and Egil and many other important men. The feast went off well and indeed magnificently, and people thought they had never attended a better wedding in Iceland. When the party was finally over, the guests were seen off with splendid presents, the costliest falling to Gellir’s share.

Gellir said to Odd, ‘I hope you are going to be generous to Egil. He deserves it.’

‘It seems to me,’ said Odd, ‘that my father has been pretty generous to him already.’

‘You can improve on it though,’ said Gellir.

Then he rode away with his supporters.

When Egil left, Odd saw him on his way and thanked him for his help: ‘I can never do as much for you as you deserve, but yesterday I had sixty wethers and two oxen driven south to Borg, and they’ll be waiting for you when you get home. And I’ll never be ungenerous to you as long as we both live.’

Egil was very pleased at this, and they pledged friendship. Then they parted and Egil went home to Borg.

12
That same autumn Hermund gathered his forces and went out to the Hvamm Assembly, intending to go on to Borg and burn Egil in his house. When they came level with Valfell, they heard a sound like a bowstring twanging up on the hillside, and at the same moment Hermund felt a sickness and a stabbing pain in his armpit, so they had to turn back from their expedition. Hermund’s sickness increased, and when they had come by Thorgautsstadir, they had to lift him from his horse. They sent to Sidumuli for a priest, but when he came, Hermund could not speak, so the priest stayed by him.

One time when the priest bent over Hermund, his lips moved, and he mumbled, ‘Two hundreds in the gully, two hundreds in the gully.’
^*

Then he breathed his last, and his life ended just as reported here.

Odd now lived on his farm in lordly style and was well content with his wife.

All this time nothing had been heard of Ospak. A man named Mar Hildisson married Svala and moved into the farm at Svolustadir. He had a brother called Bjalfi, half imbecile and extremely strong.

There was a man named Bergthor, living at Bodvarsholar; he had summed up the case when Ospak was outlawed. It happened one evening at Bodvarsholar when people were sitting by the fire, that someone came and banged on the door and asked the farmer to come out. The farmer realized it was Ospak who had arrived, and he refused to go out. Ospak kept taunting him to come out, but he was not to be moved and he forbade his men to go out either, and so they parted. But in the morning when the women came in to the cowshed, nine cows had been mortally injured. This news spread widely.

Some time later it happened at Svolustadir that someone walked into the room where Mar was sleeping. It was early morning. The man went across to the bed and thrust at Mar with a short sword, right into his belly. It was Ospak, and he spoke a verse:

As he turned to the door, Bjalfi jumped to his feet and drove a woodworking knife into him. Ospak walked to the farm called Borgarhol and declared the killing, and then went away, and nothing was heard of him for some time. The news of Mar’s killing spread and was widely condemned.

The next item of news was that the best five stud horses which Odd owned were all found dead, and people held Ospak to blame for that.

Now for a long time nothing was heard of Ospak. Then in the autumn, when some men went to round up wethers, they found a cave in some crags, and in it a dead man. Beside him stood a basin full of blood, and it was as black as pitch. It was Ospak, and people reckoned that the wound Bjalfi dealt him must have weakened him, so that he then died for lack of food
and help. That was the end of him. It is not reported that any case was ever brought over the killings of Mar and Ospak.

Odd lived at Mel until old age and was thought a most outstanding man. Many important men in Midfjord are descended from him, including Snorri Kalfsson. The friendship and good family feeling between Odd and his father lasted the rest of their lives. And there this saga ends.

Translated by
RUTH C. ELLISON