"Up! Take the way to the east. There dwells the dragon, Fafner, and near him Alberich also watches. That is the only place in the world Wotan avoids. Go thou, and I will detain the Father till thou art far and safe. Take these pieces of the magic sword. I snatched them when Siegmund fell. Give them to thy son and Siegmund's, and that son shall be named Siegfried. With these sword-pieces again made whole, the sword shall win the world for that son of thine." With these words she turned Sieglinde's face toward the east, while she herself stood waiting.
Sieglinde was no sooner gone than the storm grew more fierce, and Wotan called with a loud voice from the clouds:
"Brünnhilde!" Full of fear she sought to hide herself in the midst of her sisters.
"He is coming, sister," they shouted. All the forest about them was lighted up with a lurid fire, and Wotan came raging through the midst of it.
Scene II
Striding from the wood he called again:
"Come forth! Naught can save thee from thy punishment." Without hope, Brünnhilde came from the company of her sisters and threw herself on her knees before Wotan. He looked at her in pity because he loved her dearly.
"For thy treason to the Eternals and to me, I doom thee to roam the earth as a mortal woman. I take thy glory from thee. Walhall shall know thee no more. Thou art forever cast out from us. Henceforth thy fate shall be to spin the flax, to sit by the hearth, a slave to man." He could not look upon her because he loved her so.
At this, all the Valkyries cried out.
"Away!" he called to them. "Her punishment is fixed and whoever tries to help her shall share her fate."