"Now the end is near, and I also am going to my crowning, and you, my children, have to tarry until it is the Lord's will to call you. My words have come true, and you three are united, now that you know the meaning of the thorn-crowned cross. Yea, and you, Wulnoth, you mighty man, have helped to plant it firmly in this land when it was in danger of being uprooted; and you have aided two kings to be crowned. Hard has been your fight, Wulnoth, and like a hero have you conquered; and ere I die your reward shall be sure."
And then did Wulnoth ask Wyborga of a thing which had long worried him.
"Where is he, good mother, with whom I wrestled so often?" he said, "and what is the meaning of his riddle?"
"Thou hast slain him at last, Wulnoth," she answered softly, "or I should say that thy dear Lord has slain him for thee. For indeed he was thyself—thy evil spirit, Wulnoth. The Wulnoth who desired the things of earth, and the pride of life, and the lust of the flesh. Wulnoth, though all may not know it, each one who serves the Lord must so fight with himself, and if he fights beneath the cross, he wins, but if he fights in his own strength he is vanquished; and if self is not conquered, then it is master forever, and leads the better will and desire in thraldom."
So did Wyborga say, and long did Wulnoth ponder, for the thing was as a strange, strange thing to him; yet he could see that always this being had sought to lead him from the way of duty into the way of desire, and he rejoiced that he had striven and overcome, as he had done.
Now, after this did the holdas and thanes, and all the people, come and take Guthred, and lead him away to the sacred stone—at least, now that they were departing from the old gods they looked upon it as sacred no longer—but because always their kings had been proclaimed there, they took Guthred also; and the stone is on a hill named Oswin's Dune.
And then they placed upon his arms the royal bracelets, and upon his head the golden circlet, and hailed him as King of Northumbria and overlord of every thane and holda there. And Guthred took off his crown and laid it before Alfred, and Alfred placed it again upon his head; and the two kings sat side by side and drank heal to each other, and Wulnoth stood beside his friend and brother Guthred, and Edgiva sat at his side.
Then from thence did Guthred go to Lindisfarne Abbey, and there was he baptized by the Bishop, and there did he profess his Lord, and vow to rebuild the Abbey and set it in order. And he gave broad lands to the Bishop to be held for the Church; and from that gift made by Guthred the King it comes that right down to this very day, the Bishop of Durham may, if he chooses, don his scarlet robes and seat himself beside the judges whenever they come to try criminals within what is called his palatinate—that is, the boundaries of those lands which were given to Bishop Eadred, in the days of his crowning by Guthred.
And this is how the people of Northumbria chose Guthred for their king, and the words spoken of old by Wyborga came true in the end.