The decks were crowded with knights and soldiers, whose armour
glittered in the sun. It was the most powerful and splendid armament
that had ever set out from the fords of Scandinavia, and it bore proudly
away with a light wind for Shetland and Orkney, where additional forces
enlisted under the Norse banner.
Bearing down among the Western Isles, levying contribution of men and
stores from all the chiefs who owed him tribute, Hakon was joined at the
isle of Skye by the forces of Magnus, king of the island of Man. The
combined fleet now amounted to a hundred and sixty dragon ships, with
over twenty thousand fighting men.
Now, on the ship of King Magnus of Man there was a mighty warrior, whom
men called Rudri, and he was the most terrible pirate that ever roved
upon the western seas, and all men feared him. There was not a vic or
sound that he had not sailed into, nor an island upon which he had not
drawn his sword.
He was the one man in all that host who could best instruct the Norse
king concerning the invasion. So, taking many ships with him, Rudri went
among the island earls and compelled them one and all to remember their
duty, and to follow under the banner of their Norse master. Many of
those who had taken oaths of loyalty before King Alexander's ambassadors
demurred. But the power of the King of Scots was remote, the vengeance
of piratical warfare was near at hand, and the islanders submitted,
agreeing to pay fine of so many hundred head of cattle as punishment for
their former desertion of Norway.
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