The banners of the new king pass along the road, passing like birds in the distance. The horses of the new king ride on by, stamping and champing and rolling their eyes. The men of the new king march on by, shying their faces from this oath-bound tower. The banners of the new king pass on by, never taking the road to the shore. That road is grown green with the time since we came and flowers grow careless round the wall. The ditch is filled, the dyke is dry, the wall is a ruin of lichen. Our fields are enthistled, our tower lists over, the roof is thatched with green moss.
Oath-shield, oath-spear, oath-sword, we are sworn to the king, the king who has fallen, the king who is buried in the hills. Oath-bound we will stand on this tower of guard, forever looking out to the sea. Oath-sworn we will stand like the rocks on the shore, never cleaving to the harsh-breaking waves. Oaths of shed blood and drawn swords we have sworn, we will hold to our king and our word.
The wind from the sea roars hard on the tower, shakes the shale, shakes the shingle, shakes our spears. The wind from the shore howls, and we howl, remembering our battles, our oaths, and our songs. The wind rushes on, through the brakes, through the hills, over villages that have forgotten our king. The wind rushes on through the hills to the tomb where our king hears our oaths once again.
The wind turns back at the mountains, turns back to the shore, to the tower, to our waiting. The wind turns back with the voice of our king, voice of gravel, voice of stone, and we recall what we are. The wind from the mountains brings the voices of armies, the crow-eaten tongues, the wolf-savaged throats, the words of our brothers who died long ago. The voice of our king, the voice of our brothers, the voices in the wind, they howl for their loss, and we howl.
The banners of the new king are blown in the wind, torn and tattered by the voices buried in stone. The wind from the shores carries our cries, bears our voices of pain, bears them to the ears of his frothing steeds as they lather in fear. The wind from the mountain is the cry of an army long-dead, crow-feasted, wolf-eaten, bones scattered in heather, the cry that strikes dumb the men of the new king. The dogs cower beneath the wagons, the oxen lie down and moan, the stallion races free with terror on his back, and the old men fall down in the road.
The wind from the sea shakes our shields, chills our bones, our armour rattles in the wind. Our spears sway, our spearheads glimmer, our helmet-plumes dance in the breeze. Our banners, the banners of the true king, fly out proud and high over our tower, our oath-stones, our blood-stones, our charge. We stand guard on the wall, we stand fast at the gate, we sing of our oath to our king.
Our horses rise from the thrashing sea-foam, white as milk, white as moon, cold as hearth. We saddle them with wrack and tallow, we raise mead to the clouds, to the king, to the moon, and we ride. We charge across meadow, across blossoming mead, through grove and coppice and copse. Our shields are covered, our banners are furled, our swords are sheathed in our ribs. Our eyes are rotten and our teeth are yellow, our bones show clean through our skin. Our hair flies wild and cobwebbed, our cloaks are wet from the sea.
We ride out like a plague, like a covenant's wroth, we ride out from our crumble-down tower. We shake down the boughs and the fruit from the trees, we trample the crops under hoof, we ride to the tomb of king. We raise up our spears and sing out our oath, carving our bones with our swords. We howl to our king, dead ten centuries now, but never again does he come. We curse down the new king, we scream to the moon, we stampede through hamlet and town. We rush on the wind over roofs and through rivers, we suck out the life from the herd. We ride along shores as pale as our bones, hoofs crash on shingle, our armour shines bright in the spray. We ride to the tower to retake our watch, to sleep upright in our tombs.
We are centuries dead and centuries gone and our banners fly proud in the sky.