In placid halls beside the tide The tiresome scrape of quill on hide Passes every plodding hour In the care of a hollow power Lying alone, treasures abound Spells sent forth throughout the lands But stubborn hearts are not beguiled Beyond the waves a wrath is riled
Longships break the waters Dragonfire paints the sky Anger rends the silence Harried by a wild warcry Relics through ravaged altars White Christ servants flee Havoc on Holy Island Punishment from the sea
A lonesome life they embrace Walled within this hallowed space Toiling for a higher cause Loyal slaves to heavenly laws Macabre rites with rag and bone Praise to corporal idols shown But empty words cannot resist Whirlwinds wreck the fragile bliss
Solo: Wulfstan
So he bade them go, carry forth To the daunting halls of the north Promise of salvation they brought Pilgrims in a distant domain Wily words spreading like a plague So was a land led astray
'Her wæron reðe forebecna cumene ofer Norðhymbra land,...ormete þodenas and ligrescas, and fyrenne dracan wæron gesewene on þam lifte fleogende. Þam tacnum sona fyligde mycel hunger,...[and] earmlice hæþenra manna hergunc adilegode Godes cyrican in Lindisfarnaee...' - AS Chronicle 793
(Here came dreadful forewarnings over the land of the Northumbrians: huge whirlwinds and flashes of light, and firey dragons flying in the sky. After these tokens soon followed much hunger, and the harrying of wretched heathen men destroyed God's church on Lindisfarne.)
Longships break the waters Dragonfire paints the sky Anger rends the silence Harried by a wild warcry Relics through ravaged altars White Christ servants flee Havoc on Holy Island Punishment from the sea