Forgetting his helplessness, the Songsmith tried to leap forward, so that the thongs that held him strained and creaked; and at the same instant the three old chiefs turned upon him such faces that Brynhild stepped in front of him as though their knotted hands on their hilts had already drawn their weapons.
“Make sure of it, first!” she demanded. “It may be no more than one of their hideous dances of entertainment. It is said that they sound as bad as battles.”
Disputing, their voices rose shrilly; but Randvar relaxed in his bonds, and bent his head to wipe off on his shoulder the cold drops that had sprung to his upper lip.
“You have a cool wit, Jarl’s sister!” he breathed. “That is the only thing it can be.” He spoke curtly to his keepers: “Why do you spend your force on me? There will be time enough for that hereafter. I advise you to see to it that your own people do not imperil Helvin by breaking the peace without cause.”
It seemed that that danger had already occurred to the old chieftains, as well it might with such uproar of voice and weapon coming from the river-bank. Before Randvar ceased speaking, Thorbiorn and Sigvat had plunged through the hemlocks into the seething caldron below. Now, cursing and brandishing his weapon, Mord flung himself after them, his voice distinguishable above the tumult until the din gradually sank and he occupied the air alone.
Far removed from the turmoil of the bank seemed the stillness of the hemlock nook where Rolf’s son stood worshipping Starkad’s daughter. Much as he had claimed to know of the spirit under her pride, he gathered wonder with gazing at her now. As Northern skies by Northern Lights, so were her gray eyes fired; and measured constraint had melted like ice from her motions. Swallow-swift, she had slipped through the branches and come back again, bearing in her white fingers a glowing brand from one of the deserted camp-fires.
He looked at her somewhat blankly, then, asking in wonder: “Are you going to light my funeral pyre?”
“I am going to set you free,” she answered, “so that you may have more chances for life than Mord’s mercy will grant you if it should prove that the Skraellings are not dancing.”
Her silken robes sweeping the leaves, she knelt down before him. Almost she had the fire laid to the ankle-thongs before he could speak.
“No, no! What is coming to me, I must abide here, as I have sworn.”