. . .

Vaenwode binds his stolen wings into a frame of stone-wood.

He carves blessings into the frame. Some are sacred. Some are not.

He anoints his eyes with the blood of the wasp and leaves no little of his own behind; and he eats the meat of the wasp; and then he goes and he glides past the army, over them, skirling through the air around them, and off past their march-way and into a deep chasm where lava roils and the heat of its air sends him shivering and shuddering and rising he to come at last to the demesne of the svart-elves and to the border of Hans’ farm.

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