Now Helga heard, and stood before her father, saying: "Take not this sin on thy head, but rather let both the men go."
Yet Einar's heart was turned to evil as he saw how but two of his men were there, and those of the trustiest; so that those cousins might be quickly slain, and buried, and none would know that they had come ashore from the wreck. "Stand aside," quoth he to Helga, "and let these foes of thy heritage die as they should."
But Helga stepped before Rolf and Frodi, and fronted the drawn swords of Ondott and his men. "Unlawful is such a deed," she cried, "until the morning light comes. For all night-slayings are forbidden, even of outlaws, and such slayings are murder." And when she saw her father waver again she told him how even the Earl of the Orkneys (and he was father of Earl Thorfinn) dared not slay those sons of Njal who came into his hands, and so take the sin of midnight slaying on his soul; but he set them aside till morning should come.
"Aye," answered Ondott, "and in the morning the twain were fled."
That Helga knew, and had the same thought in her mind; but she begged her father not to take such shame on himself, rather to let Rolf and Frodi lie in bonds till morning. And at last Einar promised her that those two should not die until the day.
Rolf said to her: "I thank thee, maiden; and when I come into mine own again I shall not forget this. For it has been prophesied me that I shall yet sleep in my father's locked bed, and that means that this house shall be mine again."
Then Ondott laughed. "Not so is the prophecy to be read!" he cried. "Throw them into the locked room of Hiarandi for this night. To-morrow they shall sleep soundly elsewhere."
So in that little room where Rolf's fathers had slept he was cast with Frodi, and there they lay on the floor, and had no comfort of that place because of their bonds.
"Now," grumbled Frodi, "vikings have we escaped, and baresarks, and the Scots, and all manner of dangers, and the sea, only to die here at last. What was that foolish tale of thine about a prophecy? I never heard of such a thing."
"Free me of my bonds," answered Rolf, "and thou shalt learn why I made that pretence."