Chapter 43: The Prince Returns

Word reaches King Sweyn that Canute lives and will arrive within two days; the ruler answers the messenger with silence. Camped near Gainsborough, Floki dismisses the same report as a fabrication by Thorkell and reinforces his flank, refusing to believe the prince could come back with the giant as a devoted follower. In January of 1014 Canute rides in on horseback, trailed by Askeladd, Thorfinn, Thorkell, and five hundred men. When Floki draws bows, the prince coldly rebukes him for greeting royalty with weapons, and Floki sees before him a man wholly changed.

Inside the town, Askeladd settles the wounded Bjorn into a room Canute arranged and promises a servant will tend his bandages. Bjorn, gravely hurt, presses him about how badly his leg took the arrows; Askeladd answers that it will mend and that he can still swing a blade. The two agree to meet the following day. Walking with his retinue, Canute explains they must bide their time, since acting against the king now would brand him a rebel. He sends the charismatic Thorkell to court the lesser chieftains and win their favor.

Asked for counsel, Askeladd judges that assassination is the swiftest path, since with Harald far away Canute would automatically command the forces in England, though the deed must be pinned on a powerful officer. Gazing at a cross on a stone wall, Canute calls it unforgivable that God merely watches men suffer, and vows to raise a paradise on earth for those who live in torment. Reaching Sweyn's hall, he is beckoned forward, but Askeladd halts him: roughly twenty men and archers above lie in wait. The prince orders both companions to keep their swords sheathed no matter what, for in this kind of contest the first to draw is the one who loses.

Canute arrives at Gainsborough transformed, with Thorkell and Askeladd openly at his side, stunning Floki. Askeladd tends the dying Bjorn and the two agree to reunite the next day. The prince dispatches Thorkell to charm the minority chieftains and hears Askeladd argue for assassinating the king. Canute declares his intent to build a worldly paradise and to seize back what has been lost, even by becoming a demon. At Sweyn's hall he and his guards detect an ambush and are warned never to draw first.

Known in Japanese as Ohji Seikan, this forty-third chapter opens Volume 7. Its pages were split across the anime, with most adapted in Episode 20 and a short stretch appearing in Episode 21. The installment marks Canute's public reintroduction as a hardened political figure and first voices the paradise-on-earth ideal that drives much of his later arc.