At that time I could not reward as I would those good people who had thus cared for me, but I would send presents when I might.

Yet they said they needed naught from me but to see me again at some time, which I promised, as well for my own love of them as for their asking.
We went unharmed and unquestioned, for all the land was at peace.
Truly there were new-made huts where farmsteads had been, and at the town gates were Danish axemen instead of our spearmen as of old.

Yet already in the hayfields Dane and Anglian wrought together, and the townsmen stood on Colchester Hill beside the Danish warriors, listening while gleeman and scald sang in rivalry to please both.
Little of change was there in London town, save again the scarlet-cloaked Danish guards and watchmen.

Few enough of these there were, and indeed the host left but small parties in the towns behind them in our land.

Yet those few could hold the country in peace, because men knew that at their back was the might of Ingvar's awful host, which came on a land unawares, marching more swiftly than rumour could fly before it, so that not one might know where the next blow would fall until suddenly the war beacons of flaming villages flared up, and it was too late to do aught but fly.
Yet in our land was none to fight for.