"All's well!" he called cheerily. "Hold on only a little longer, and you may ease the pace."
Still smiling, he plucked an arrow from his quiver, and swept around on his daring mission. In another moment he was skimming at arrowy speed straight into the face of the pack, his gold-red hair streaming, his face bright and eager with the joy of battle.
Once and again the war-bow twanged, and two of the grey leaders sprang high in the death-leap. But, heedless of their dead, the pack swept on over the writhing bodies to meet the slayer. Already the rash skater was upon them. Another instant, and he would be struggling in their midst. But even as the lolling tongues drew in for the leap-bite, and the fiery eyes gleamed red with baleful joy, the mad quarry wheeled like a striking hawk, and shot away to the right from under their very jaws. In their eagerness, many of the foremost wolves leaped at the Northman; but their jaws clashed together through empty air, and they fell sprawling upon the ice, to be overrun by their fellows.
Wild with baffled fury, the whole pack swerved to follow the fleeing quarry as he swept slantingly across the broad expanse of the river. Olvir could have asked no more. Skimming along just beyond reach of the foam-dripping jaws, he gazed back at his ferocious pursuers with a mocking smile.
"Follow! follow me, dogs of Odin!" he jeered. "I 'll lead you a merry dance; to and fro,--a game of ice-tag. So; we near the bank. Now across to the other side; and as we go, I 'll play on my one-stringed harp. You shall have music to your singing!"
Circling on the very edge of the ice-rim, Olvir swept obliquely back across the river. But as he turned, his smile gave way to sudden grimness, and he raised his hand to his quiver. Then the war-bow began to twang its answer to the yelling beasts, and arrow after arrow drove into their midst with vengeful force. Hardly a shaft flew wide of its mark; yet they followed so swiftly one upon the other that the quiver was emptied and the last shaft whirring from the string before the flying bowman had crossed the channel.
"Thor!" he shouted in fierce joy. "We 've played a merry game, white-fangs; now for a merrier!"
Deftly the bow was unstrung and slipped into its case, and then the bared blade of Al-hatif glittered in the sea-king's upraised hand. But as he swerved out again from the alder thickets, he first glanced up the river after his fleeing companions. Briefly as the terrible play had lasted, the others had already gained many more yards over the horde. While their peril, however, was lessening, his had suddenly doubled. Not all the wolves had followed him in his second turn across the river. A hundred or more, running straight onward, had put themselves in advance of the doubling quarry. The foremost were already circling around to hedge him in.