Adiva raised her hands.
“May the blessed mother preserve us, child! What a wonderful dream.”
“Canst thou tell what it doth portend, Adiva?” questioned the maiden eagerly.
“Child, child, I dare not tell thee that which I think; but if thou wilt say naught before the stranger or Denewulf, thou and I will go to Gunnehilde. She is a Dane, Denewulf’s foster-mother, and a wicca.”
“I like not the fact that she be Dane,” and Egwina shrank back a little, for the Northmen held a painful place in her memory.
“Tut, child! She is more Saxon than Dane, though I tell not that to Denewulf. She came with her husband years ago when Egbert, the present king’s grandfather, was on the throne. No Christian is she, but a good woman, though she hath been a vala in her own country. Denewulf hath she reared from a lad. Her husband brought him home a Saxon boy of tender years, whose father fell fighting the Welsh and whose mother died soon after. She will tell thee all that thou wishest to know of things to come. I countenance not Denewulf when he speaks of her foretellings, for it is not wisdom to humor a man in aught that savors of heathenism. She reads the runes for me often, though he wots not of it.”
“If it be not wrong then, Adiva, and thou thinkest best I will go with thee.”
“Then to-morrow will we go,” said the dame, and so it was planned.
[CHAPTER IX—WOULD YOU STRIKE YOUR KING?]
Early the next day Adiva and Egwina started for the cottage of the foster-mother of Denewulf, Gunnehilde, the Danish woman.