It was a world of gloom and terror, yet shot with a strange brightness.

The High Gods might be met with in beggar's guise at any ferry, jovial fellows and good friends to brave men, for they themselves had to fight for their lives, and the End of All Things hung over them like a cloud.

Yet till the day of Ragnarok there would be feasting and fine fighting and goodly fellowship, and a stout heart must live for the hour.
Leif the Outborn was his chief friend.

The man was no warrior, being lame of a leg and lean and sharp as a heron.

No one knew his begetting, for he had been found as a child on the high fells.