‘Whither are we going?’ said he.
Said she: ‘I am to show thee the way back home, which thou wilt not know surely amidst this snow. Come, no words! thou shalt not have my tale from me till we are in the wood: so the sooner we are there the sooner shalt thou be pleased.’
So Face-of-god held his peace, and they went on swiftly side by side. But it was not Bow-may’s wont to be silent for long, so presently she said:
‘Thou art good so do as I bid thee; but see thou, sweet playmate, for all thou art a chieftain’s son, thou wert but feather-brained to ask me why I shot at thee. I shoot at thee! that were a fine tale to tell her this even! Or dost thou think that I could shoot at a big man on the snow at two hundred paces and miss him three times? Unless I aimed to miss.’
‘Yea, Bow-may,’ said he, ‘art thou so deft a Bow-may? Thou shalt be in my company whenso I fare to battle.’
‘Indeed,’ she said, ‘therein thou sayest but the bare truth: nowhere else shall I be, and thou shalt find my bow no worse than a good shield.’
He laughed somewhat lightly; but she looked on him soberly and said: ‘Laugh in that fashion on the day of battle, and we shall be well content with thee!’
So on they sped very swiftly, for their way was mostly down hill, so that they were soon amongst the outskirting trees of the wood, and presently after reached the edge of the thicket, beyond which the ground was but thinly covered with snow.
There they took off their skids, and went into the thick wood and sat down under a hornbeam tree; and ere Gold-mane could open his mouth to speak Bow-may began and said:
‘Well it was that I fell in with thee, Dalesman, else had there been murders of men to tell of; but ever she ordereth all things wisely, though unwisely hast thou done to seek to her. Hearken! dost thou think that thou hast done well that thou hast me here with my tale? Well, hadst thou busied thyself with the slaying of elks, or with sitting quietly at home, yet shouldest thou have heard my tale, and thou shouldest have seen me in Burgstead in a day or two to tell thee concerning the flitting of the token. And ill it is that I have missed it, for fain had I been to behold the House of the Face, and to have seen thee sitting there in thy dignity amidst the kindred of chieftains.’