‘Now art thou Gold-mane indeed: but come now, sit by me and eat, though the Wood-woman giveth thee but a sorry banquet, O guest; but from the Dale it is, and we be too far now from the dwellings of men to have delicate meat on the board, though to-night when they come back thy cheer shall be better. Yet even then thou shalt have no such dainties as Stone-face hath imagined for thee at the hands of the Wood-wight.’
She laughed therewith, and he no less; and in sooth the meat was but simple, of curds and new cheese, meat of the herdsmen. But Face-of-god said gaily: ‘Sweet it shall be to me; good is all that the Friend giveth.’
Then she raised her hand and made the sign of the Hammer over the board, and looked up at him and said:
‘Hath the Earth-god changed my face, Gold-mane, to what I verily am?’
He held his face close to hers and looked into it, and him-seemed it was as pure as the waters of a mountain lake, and as fine and well-wrought every deal of it as when his father had wrought in his stithy many days and fashioned a small piece of great mastery. He was ashamed to kiss her again, but he said to himself, ‘This is the fairest woman of the world, whom I have sworn to wed this year.’ Then he spake aloud and said:
‘I see the face of the Friend, and it will not change to me.’
Again she reddened a little, and the happy look in her face seemed to grow yet sweeter, and he was bewildered with longing and delight.
But she stood up and went to an ambrye in the wall and brought forth a horn shod and lipped with silver of ancient fashion, and she poured wine into it and held it forth and said:
‘O guest from the Dale, I pledge thee! and when thou hast drunk to me in turn we will talk of weighty matters. For indeed I bear hopes in my hands too heavy for the daughters of men to bear; and thou art a chieftain’s son, and mayst well help me to bear them; so let us talk simply and without guile, as folk that trust one another.’
So she drank and held out the horn to him, and he took the horn and her hand both, and he kissed her hand and said: