"It is--it is, earl! No beast could pass so quietly. Follow your guardian sprite, sire! It leads you to safety!"
"Would you have me follow a forest fiend? And yet, beast or sprite, we can do no better! Come, then; our guide vanishes."
"Lead on, sire," answered Olvir; and all hurried in pursuit of the dim white figure. Once close upon it, they slackened their pace, and silently followed the wraith-like guide as it lumbered steadily onward into the forest.
Half a league or more had been passed, and both Hildegarde and Rothada were nearly outspent, when the strange guide swerved suddenly and disappeared. At the same moment a dark object, broader than any oak, loomed before the wanderers. They advanced, turning a little to one side, and there, only a few paces before them, they saw a red spot glowing in the dark barrier.
"The hut!" cried Karl.
Gerold sprang ahead, and, thrusting open a loose corner of the window parchment, peered into the hut. The others would have hurried past him to the rude door just beyond; but he uttered a low cry, and stepped before the king with outstretched hands.
"Stay, sire, stay!" he muttered in a hushed tone. "Better wolf and storm than witch-cheer! Look within!"
Startled by the warning, Karl and then Liutrad peered through the broken parchment, and each in turn drew back with the same look which distended the eyes of the Swabian. Last of all, Olvir put his eye to the hole. The first glance showed him a squalid little room whose walls of rotting logs stood out grimy and bare in the glow of the driftwood fire. The rafters of the low thatch were veiled by the smoke, indriven by the wind, which eddied through the roof-hole and sent little whirls of snowflakes hissing into the flames.
Crouched upon the rude hearth, across the fire from each other, were two women; and Olvir instantly recognized the one on the left as Fastrada. She sat with her head thrust forward, gazing keenly across at her hearth-mate.
After the maiden, Olvir felt little surprise when his glance turned to the tall woman who sat rocking to and fro on the edge of the hearth and crooning a strange song, while weasels played about her feet and ran up and down her outstretched arms. It was the girl's mother, the Wend mate of the old Grey Wolf.