“I know you well,” said she; “and it’s sorry I am that you are here. Do you see those twelve men out there opposite? You are going to make for them now; but rest on your legs, and let the beginning of another day come to you.”
“Your advice may be good,” said Blaiman, and he went in. The old woman prepared his supper as well as it was ever prepared at his grandfather’s house at home, and prepared a bed for him as good as ever he had. He slept enough, and he wanted it. When day overtook him on the morrow, he rose, and washed his face and hands, and asked mercy and help from God, and if he did not he let it alone; and the old woman prepared breakfast in the best way she could, and it was not the wrong way. He went off then in good courage to the castle of the king; and there was a pole of combat in front of the castle which a man wanting combat would strike with his sword. He struck the pole a blow that was heard throughout the whole kingdom.
“Good, good!” said the king; “the like of that blow was not struck while I am in this castle.”
He put his head through a window above, and saw Blaiman outside.
Around the rear of the castle was a high wall set with iron spikes. Few were the spikes without heads on them; some heads were fresh, some with part of the flesh on them, and some were only bare skulls. It was a dreadful sight to see; and strong was the man that it would not put fright on.
“What do you want?” asked the king of Blaiman.
“Your daughter to marry, or combat.”
“’Tis combat you will get,” said the king; and the twelve champions of valor were let out at him together. It was pitiful to see him; each one of the twelve aiming a blow at him, he trying to defend himself, and he all wounded and hacked by them. When the day was growing late, he began to be angry; the noble blood swelled in his breast to be uppermost; and he rose, with the activity of his limbs, out of the joints of his bones over them, and with three sweeping blows took the twelve heads off the champions. He left the place then, deeply wounded, and went back to the old woman’s cabin; and if he did, it was a pleasure for the old woman to see him. She put him into a caldron of venom, and then into a caldron of cure. When he came out, he was perfectly healed; and the old woman said,—