There Gudbrand held an assembly with them, and said: 'There is a man come to Loa named Olaf; he would fain offer us a faith other than we had before, and break all our gods in sunder. And he says that he has a God far greater and mightier. A wonder it is that the earth does not burst in sunder beneath him who dares to say such things; a wonder that our gods let him any longer walk thereon. And I expect that if we carry Thor out of our temple, wherein he stands and hath alway helped us, and he see Olaf and his men, then will Olaf's God and Olaf himself and all his men melt away and come to nought.'
At this they all at once shouted loud, and said that Olaf should never escape alive if he came to meet them. 'Never will he dare to go further south by the Dales,' said they. Then they appointed seven hundred men to go and reconnoitre northwards to Breida. This force was commanded by Gudbrand's son, then eighteen years old, and many other men of renown with him; and they came to the village called Hof and were there for three nights, where they were joined by much people who had fled from Lesja Loa and Vagi, not being willing to submit to Christianity.
But King Olaf and Bishop Sigurd, after appointing teachers of religion at Loa and Vagi, crossed over the channel between Vagi and the land and came to Sil, and were there for the night; and they heard the tidings that a large force was before them. And the people of the country who were at Breida heard of the King's movements, and prepared for battle against him. But when the King rose in the morn, then he clad him for war, and marched south by Silfield, nor stayed till he came to Breida, where he saw a large army arrayed for battle.
Then the King set his men in array and rode himself before them, and, addressing the country-folk, bade them embrace Christianity.
They answered: 'Thou wilt have other work to do to-day than to mock us.'
And they shouted a war-shout and smote their shields with their weapons. Then the King's men ran forward and hurled their spears; but the country-folk turned and fled, few of them standing their ground. Gudbrand's son was there taken prisoner; but King Olaf gave him quarter and kept him near himself. Three nights the King was there. Then spake he with Gudbrand's son, saying: 'Go thou back now to thy father and tell him that I shall come there soon.'
Whereupon he went back home and told his father the ill tidings, how they had met the King and fought with him; 'but our people all fled at the very first,' said he, 'and I was taken prisoner. The King gave me quarter, and bade me go and tell thee that he would come here soon. Now have we left no more than two hundred men out of that force with which we met him, and I advise thee, father, not to fight with that man.'
'One may hear,' said Gudbrand, 'that all vigour is beaten out of thee. Ill luck went with thee, and long will thy journey be spoken of. Thou believest at once those mad fancies which that man brings who hath wrought foul shame on thee and thine.'
In the following night Gudbrand dreamed a dream. A man came to him, a shining one, from whom went forth great terror. And thus he spake: 'Thy son went not on a path of victory against King Olaf; and far worse wilt thou fare if thou resolvest to do battle with the King, for thou wilt fall, thyself and all thy people, and thee and thine will wolves tug and ravens rend.'
Much afraid was Gudbrand at this terror, and told it to Thord Fat-paunch, a chief man of the Dales.