But Juss spake against it, saying, “There’s likely some guile herein. We must not in this accursed land suffer aught to seduce our minds, but follow our set purpose. We must not be of those who go forth for wool and come home shorn.”
Brandoch Daha and Spitfire mocked at this, and cast lots between themselves. And the lot fell upon Lord Brandoch Daha. “Thou shalt not deny me this,” said he to Lord Juss, “else will I never more do thee good.”
“I never could yet deny thee anything,” answered Juss. “Art not thou and I finger and thumb? Only forget not, whatsoe’er betide, wherefore we be come hither.”
“Art not thou and I finger and thumb?” said Brandoch Daha. “Fear nothing, O friend of my heart. I’ll not forget it.”
So while the others slept, Brandoch Daha waked the sparrow-hawk, night-long in the eastern chamber. For all that the cold hillside without was rough with hoar-frost the air was warm in that chamber and heavy, disposing strongly to sleep. Yet he closed not an eye, but still beheld the sparrow-hawk, telling it stories and tweaking it by the tail ever and anon as it grew drowsy. And it answered shortly and boorishly, looking upon him malevolently.
And with the golden dawn, behold that lady in the shadowy doorway. At her entering in, the sparrow-hawk clicked its wings as in anger, and without more ado tucked its beak beneath its wing and went to sleep. But that bright lady, looking on the Lord Brandoch Daha, spake and said, “Require it of me, my Lord Brandoch Daha, that which thou most desirest of earthly things.”
But he, as one bedazzled, stood up saying, “O lady, is not thy beauty at the dawn of day an irradiation that might dispel the mists of hell? My heart is ravished with thy loveliness and only fed with thy sight. Therefore thy body will I have, and none other thing earthly.”
“Thou art a fool,” she cried, “that knowest not what thou askest. Of all things earthly mightest thou have taken choose; but I am not earthly.”
He answered, “I will have nought else.”
“Thou dost embrace then a great danger,” said she, “and loss of all thy good luck, for thee and thy friends beside.”