“Here, Jarl,” said Thyri, again handing me the horn. It was filled with the mead of Torvaldsland, brewed from fermented honey, thick and sweet.

The hall of IvarForkbeard was a longhouse. It was about one hundred and twenty feet Gorean in length. Its walls formed of turf and stone, were curved and thick, some eight feet or more in thickness. It is oriented north and south. Thls reduces its exposure to the north wind, which is partlcularly important in the Torvaldsland winter. A fire, in a rounded pit, was in its center. It consisted, for the most part, of a single, long room, which served for living, and eating and sleeping. At one end was a cooking compartment, separated from the rest of the house by a partition of wood. The roof was about six feet in height, which meant that most of those within, if male, were forced to bend over as they moved about. The long room, besides being low, is dark. Too, there is usually lingering smoke in it. Ventilation is supplied, as it is generally in Torvaldsland, by narrow holes in the roof. The center of the hall, down its length, is dug out about a foot below the ground level. In the long center are set the tables and benches. Also, in the center, down its length are two long rows of posts, each post separated from the next by about seven feet, which support the roof. At the edges of the hall, at ground level, is a dirt floor, on which furs are spread. Stones mark sections off into sleeping quarters. Thus, in a sense, the hall proper is about a foot below ground level, and the sleeping level, on each side, is at the ground level, where the walls begin. The sleeping levels, which also can accommodate a man’sgear, though some keep it at the foot of the level, are about eight feet in length. The hall proper, the center of the hall, is about twelve feet in width.

The two bond-maids, stripped, too, like the others, for the feast, Pretty Ankles and Pouting Lips, struggled down the length of the smoky, dark hall, a spitted, roasted tarsk on their shoulders. They were slapped by the men, hurrying them along. They laughed with pleasure. Their shoulders were protected from the heat of the metal spit by rolls of leather. The roasted tarsk was flung before us on the table. With his belt knife, thrusting Pudding and Gunnhild back, Ivar Forkbeard addressed himself to the cutting of the meat. He threw pieces down the length of the table.I heard men laughing. Too, from the darkness behind me, and more than forty feet away, on the raised level, I heard the screams of a raped bond-maid. She was one of the new girls. I had seen her being dragged by the hair to the raised platform. Her screams were screams of pleasure.

“Well,” said Ivar Forkbeard to me, “I am an outlaw.”

“I did not know that,” I said.

“That is one reason,” said he, “that my hall is not of wood.”

“I see,” I said. “But you have at least a palisade,” I said.

He threw me a piece of meat.He cut two small pieces, and thrust them in the mouths of Pudding and Gunnhild.They ate obediently, his pets.

“The palisade,” he said, “is low, and the cracks are filled with daub.”

I tore a piece of meat from what Ivar had thrown me and held it to Thyri. She smiled at me. She was trying to learn how to please a man. “Thank you, my Jarl,” she said. She took the meat, delicately, in her teeth. I grinned, and she looked down, frightened. She knew that soon she might be taught, truly, how to please men.

“You are rich,” I said, “and have many men. Surely you could have a hall of wood, if you wished.”

“Why did you come to Torvaldsland?” suddenly asked Ivar Forkbeard.

“On a work of vengeance,” I told him. “I hunt one of the Kurii.”

“They are dangerous,” said Ivar Forkbeard.

I shrugged.

“One has struck here,” said Ottar, suddenly.

Ivar looked at him.

“Last month,” said Ottar, “a verrwas taken.”

I knew then that it could not be the one of the Kurii I sought.

“We hunted him, but failed to find him,” said Ottar.

“Doubtless he has left the district,” said Ivar.

“Do the beasts often bother you?” I asked.

“No,” said Ivar. “They seldom hunt this far to the south.” “They are rational,” I told him. “They have a language.” “That is known to me,” said Ivar.

I did not tell Ivar that those he knew as Kurii, or the beasts, were actually specimens of an alien race, that they, or those in their ships, were locked in war with PriestKings for the domination of two worlds, Gor and the Earth. In these battles, unknown to most men, even of Gor, from time to time, ships of the Kurii had been shattered and fallen to the surface. It was the practice of Priest-Kings to destroy the wrecks of such ships but, usually, at least, they did not attempt to hunt and exterminate survivors. If the marooned Kurii abided by the weapon and technology laws of Priest-Kings, they, like men, another life form, were perrmitted to survive. The Kurii I knew were beasts of fierce, terrible instincts, who regarded humans, and other beasts, as food. Blood, as to the shark, was an agitant to their systems. They were extremely powerful, and highly intelligent, though their intellectual capacities, like those of humans, were far below those of Priest-Kings. Fond of killing, and technologically advanced, they were, in their way, worthy adversaries of Priest-Kings. Most lived in ships, the steel wolves of space, their instincts bridled, to some extent, by Ship Loyalty, Ship Law. It was thought that their own world had been destroyed. This seemed plausible, when one considered their ferocity and greed, and what might be its implementation in virtue of an advanced technology. Their own world destroyed, the Kurii now wished another.

The Kurii, of course, with which the men of Torvaldsland might have had dealings, might have been removed by as much as generations from the Kurii of the ships. It was regarded as one of the great dangers of the war, however, that the Kurii of the ships might make contact with, and utilize, the Kurii of Gor in their schemes.

Men and the Kurii, where they met, which was usually only in the north, regarded one another as mortal enemies. The Kurii not unoften fed on men, and men, of course, in consequence, attempted to hunt and slay, when they could, the beasts. Usually, however, because of the power and ferocity of the beasts, men would hunt them only to the borders of their own districts, particularly if only the loss of a bosk or thrall was involved. It was usually regarded as quite sufficient, even by the men of Torvaldsland, to drive one of the beasts out of their own district. They were especially pleased when they had managed to harry one into the district of an enemy.

“How will you know the one of the Kurii whom you seek?” asked Ivar.

“I think,” I said, “he will know me.”

“You are a brave, or foolish, man,” said Ivar.

I drank more of the mead. I ate, too, of the roast tarsk.

“You are of the south,” said Ivar. “I have a proposition, a scheme.”

“What is that?” I asked.

The bond-maid, Olga, laughing and kicking, thrown helplessly over the shoulder of an oarsman, was carried past.

I saw several of the bond-maids in the arms of Ivar’s men. Among them, too, some trying to resist, were the new girls. One, who had irritated an oarsman, her hands held, was beaten, crying out, with his belt. Released, she began to kiss him, weeping, trying to please him. Men laughed. Another of the new girls was thrown over one of the benches; she lay on her back; her head was down, her dark hair, lon wild, was in the dirt and reeds, strewn on the floor of the hall; her head twisted from side to side; her eyes were close her lips were parted; I saw her teeth.

“Do not stop, ~ Jarl,” she begged. “Your bond-maid begs you not to stop!

“I am an outlaw,” said Ivar. ‘In a duel I killed Fin BroadbeIt.”

“It was in a duel,” I said.

“Finn Broadbelt was the cousin of Jarl Svein Blue Tooth.