Einar. What size shot have you?
Sølvi. Duck-shot.
Einar. Ljot, you don't mind, do you? I shall not be gone long. If they rise, I'm not going after them. Exit.
(Ljot rises.)
Sølvi (goes to her). My star must be in the heavens to-night.
Ljot. You must not think that I was sitting up so late because I was waiting for you—I saw you walking over the hraun—but we shan't talk about that.
Sølvi. Shall I tell you why I came home from abroad? It was for your sake.
Ljot (sits down). That is not true.
Sølvi (sits down). One night, the last winter I was away, I must have been dreaming, but it seemed to me that I was awake. I had come back home and was walking on the hraun. The hraun was covered with ashes. As I walked, I suddenly fell into a deep cleft and kept on falling and falling. At last I found myself lying on the bottom, unable to stir. Death came and sucked the life out of my eyes and held it in her hand like a tiny flame. Suddenly a woman stood beside me dressed in moss. She pleaded for me so long that death gave her my life. She looked like you. It was you. Don't you know that you hold my life in your hands?
(They rise.)