had made me learn to write.

So after that I abode with Ingild, going to the court of Ethelred
the King with him, and seeing the great feasts which the merchant
guilds made for the king while he was in London; with many other
wondrous sights, so that the time went quickly, and the more so
that this Egfrid was ever with me. I had known him when we were
little lads together at our own king's court, but he had left to go
to that of our great overlord, Ethelred, so that I had not seen him
for long years. And one may sail up our Waveney river to Hoxne,
where his father's house is, from ours at Reedham, though it is a
long way.

Now in the week before Yuletide we would start homewards, so with
many gifts and words of good speed, Ingild set us forth; and we
rode well armed and attended as the sons of great thanes should. So
the way was light to us in the clear December weather, and if it
were long the journey was very pleasant, for Egfrid and I grew to
be great friends, and there is nothing more joyous than to be
riding ever homeward through wood and over wild, with one whose
ways fit with one's own, in the days of youth, when cares are none
and shadows fall not yet across the path.

When we came to Colchester town we heard that Eadmund was yet at
Thetford, and when we asked more we learnt that Lodbrok was there
also with my father. So, because Hoxne was but twenty miles or
thereby from Thetford, both Egfrid and I were glad that our way was
yet together, and we would go there first of all.

One other thing we heard in Colchester, for we waited there for two