Read "A Lovers' Tale" by Maurice Hewlett online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
To the Thing at Thorsness came all the West. When Berse came there with his friends he was late. Most of the booths were full, and he could not get his proper place in that of his chief, Anlaf Peacock of Herdholt. There was a great crowd. In the seat which Berse had always had, next to his friend Thord, there sat a large man, very broad-shouldered, covered with a bearskin. Over his head he had a hood made of the skin, which fell before his eyes and made a darkness. He had a black beard down to his breast. Between his knees was a long sword in a grey sheath of walrus hide, and both his hands were upon the hilt of it.
Berse looked him over, and puzzled who he was.