He conducted her back to the palace in great state. There a magnificent banquet had been prepared, and soon after the wedding was celebrated, amid the rejoicings of the whole island. The feast lasted three days, and every one who saw the fair Queen Guda in her rich and costly robes, seated on the throne beside her husband, declared no more beautiful queen could possibly have been found, and though the king had loved his first wife, he soon became so completely wrapped up in Guda, that her word was law in everything.
Some months after the wedding, a war broke out in a neighbouring kingdom, belonging to a cousin of the king, who had, therefore, to start off and help him, as his enemies were too strong for him to fight them alone.
The king, therefore, ordered out his war-galleys, and, as he expected to be away some time, he, at the queen’s request, handed her his royal signet ring, begging her to rule the kingdom during his absence, and be a kind and loving mother to his two children, Thorwald and Ingibjörg.
This Guda promised she would do. So the king took a tender farewell of his wife and children, and getting on board his ship, followed by his men, a strong wind rapidly carried the vessels out of sight.
For some little time after the king had left, Queen Guda was very kind to the children. She had them to dine at her own table, gave them fruit and sweets and toys, and often took them for drives in her beautiful chariot, with the cream-coloured horses.
Then one day she asked them to go down to the shore with her and play some games.
It was a beautiful morning; the sun shone warm and bright, the blue sea was smooth and glistening like a great sheet of glass, and as the tiny wavelets receded, the golden sands were strewn with lovely pink and violet shells and glistening feathery weeds of every hue and shade.
“Oh, Thorwald!” cried Ingibjörg, running up to her brother and laughing merrily, her arms filled with long trails of crimson and green seaweed. “Look how beautiful they are! Let us play at being king and queen, and I will make two lovely crowns.”
“No; come here, children,” said the queen. She had walked some little distance along the shore, and now stood beside a big square stone. Then, as Thorwald and Ingibjörg came near her, she muttered, “Open, oh stone!” And at these words the great square stone parted asunder, showing a large cavity inside, and before the children knew what had happened, Queen Guda had pushed them both in; the stone closed with a snap, and, giving it a strong shove, she rolled the stone into the sea.
