The House of the Wolfings
be the nearer to mine! Wilt thou not wear it in the fight for my sake?"
He knit his brows somewhat, and said:
"Nay, it may not be: true it is that thou saidest that no evil weird went
with it, but hearken! Yesterday I bore it in the fight, and ere I
mingled with the foe, before I might give the token of onset, a cloud
came before my eyes and thick darkness wrapped me around, and I fell to
the earth unsmitten; and so was I borne out of the fight, and evil dreams
beset me of evil things, and the dwarfs that hate mankind. Then I came
to myself, and the Hauberk was off me, and I rose up and beheld the
battle, that the kindreds were pressing on the foe, and I thought not
then of any past time, but of the minutes that were passing; and I ran
into the fight straightway: but one followed me with that Hauberk, and I
did it on, thinking of nought but the battle. Fierce then was the fray,
yet I faltered in it; till the fresh men of the Romans came in upon us
and broke up our array. Then my heart almost broke within me, and I
faltered no more, but rushed on as of old, and smote great strokes all
round about: no hurt I got, but once more came that ugly mist over my
eyes, and again I fell unsmitten, and they bore me out of battle: then
the men of our folk gave back and were overcome; and when I awoke from my
evil dreams, we had gotten away from the fight and the Wolfing dwellings,
and were on the mounds above the ford cowering down like beaten men.
There then I sat shamed among the men who had chosen me for their best
man at the Holy Thing, and lo I was their worst! Then befell that which
never till then had befallen me, that life seemed empty and worthless and
I longed to die and be done with it, and but for the thought of thy love
I had slain myself then and there.
"Thereafter I went with the host to the assembly of the stay-at-homes and
fleers, and sat before the Hall-Sun our daughter, and said the words
which were put into my mouth. But now must I tell thee a hard and evil
thing; that I loved them not, and was not of them, and outside myself
there was nothing: within me was the world and nought without me. Nay,
as for thee, I was not sundered from thee, but thou wert a part of me;
whereas for the others, yea, even for our daughter, thine and mine, they
were but images and shows of men, and I longed to depart from them, and
to see thy body and to feel thine heart beating. And by then so evil was
I grown that my very shame had fallen from me, and my will to die: nay, I
longed to live, thou and I, and death seemed hateful to me, and the deeds
before death vain and foolish.
"Where then was my glory and my happy life, and the hope of the days
fresh born every day, though never dying? Where then was life, and
Thiodolf that once had lived?
"But now all is changed once more; I loved thee never so well as now, and
great is my grief that we must sunder, and the pain of farewell wrings my
heart. Yet since I am once more Thiodolf the Mighty, in my heart there
is room for joy also. Look at me, O Wood-Sun, look at me, O beloved!
tell me, am I not fair with the fairness of the warrior and the helper of
the folk? Is not my voice kind, do not my lips smile, and mine eyes
shine? See how steady is mine hand, the friend of the folk! For mine
eyes are cleared again, and I can see the kindreds as they are, and their
desire of life and scorn of death, and this is what they have made me
myself. Now therefore shall they and I together earn the merry days to
come, the winter hunting and the spring sowing, the summer haysel, the
ingathering of harvest, the happy rest of midwinter, and Yuletide with
the memory of the Fathers, wedded to the hope of the days to be. Well
may they bid me help them who have holpen me! Well may they bid me die
who have made me live!
"For whereas thou sayest that I am not of their blood, nor of their
adoption, once more I heed it not. For I have lived with them, and eaten
and drunken with them, and toiled with them, and led them in battle and
the place of wounds and slaughter; they are mine and I am theirs; and
through them am I of the whole earth, and all the kindreds of it; yea,
even of the foemen, whom this day the edges in mine hand shall smite.
"Therefore I will bear the Hauberk no more in battle; and belike my body
but once more: so shall I have lived and death shall not have undone me.
"Lo thou, is not this the Thiodolf whom thou hast loved? no changeling of
the Gods, but the man in whom men have trusted, the friend of Earth, the
giver of life, the vanquisher of death?"
And he cast himself upon her, and strained her to his bosom and kissed
her, and caressed her, and awoke the bitter-sweet joy within her, as he
cried out:
"O remember this, and this, when at last I am gone from thee!"
But when they sundered her face was bright, but the tears were on it, and
she said: "O Thiodolf, thou wert fain hadst thou done a wrong to me so
that I might forgive thee; now wilt thou forgive me the wrong I have done
thee?"
"Yea," he said, "Even so would I do, were we both to live, and how much
more if this be the dawn of our sundering day! What hast thou done?"
She said: "I lied to thee concerning the Hauberk when I said that no evil
weird went with it: and this I did for the saving of thy life."
He laid his hand fondly on her head, and spake smiling: "Such is the wont
of the God-kin, because they know not the hearts of men. Tell me all the
truth of it now at last."
She said:
"Hear then the tale of the Hauberk and the truth there is to tell:
There was a maid of the God-kin, and she loved a man right well,
Who unto the battle was wending; and she of her wisdom knew
That thence to the folk-hall threshold should come back but a very
few;
And she feared for her love, for she doubted that of these he should
not be;
So she wended the wilds lamenting, as I have lamented for thee;
And many wise she pondered, how to bring her will to pass
(E'en as I for thee have pondered), as her feet led over the grass,
Till she lifted her eyes in the wild-wood, and lo! she stood before
The Hall of the Hollow-places; and the Dwarf-lord stood in the door
And held in his hand the Hauberk, whereon the hammer's blow
The last of all had been smitten, and the sword should be hammer now.
Then the Dwarf beheld her fairness, and the wild-wood many-leaved
Before his eyes was reeling at the hope his heart conceived;
So sorely he longed for her body; and he laughed before her and cried,
'O Lady of the Disir, thou farest wandering wide
Lamenting thy beloved and the folk-mote of the spear,
But if amidst of the battle this child of the hammer he bear
He shall laugh at the foemen's edges and come back to thy lily breast
And of all the days of his life-time shall his coming years be best.'
Then she bowed adown her godhead and sore for the Hauberk she prayed;
But his greedy eyes devoured her as he stood in the door and said;
'Come lie in mine arms! Come hither, and we twain the night to wake!
And then as a gift of the morning the Hauberk shall ye take.'
So she humbled herself before him, and entered into the cave,
The dusky, the deep-gleaming, the gem-strewn golden grave.
But he saw not her girdle loosened, or her bosom gleam on his love,
For she set the sleep-thorn in him, that he saw, but might not move,
Though the bitter salt tears burned him for the anguish of his greed;
And she took the hammer's offspring, her unearned morning meed,
And went her ways from the rock-hall and was glad for her warrior's
sake.
But behind her dull speech followed, and the voice of the hollow
spake:
'Thou hast left me bound in anguish, and hast gained thine heart's
desire;
Now I would that the dewy night-grass might be to thy feet as the
fire,
And shrivel thy raiment about thee, and leave thee bare to the flame,
And no way but a fiery furnace for the road whereby ye came!
But since the folk of God-home we may not slay nor smite,
And that fool of the folk that thou lovest, thou hast saved in my
despite,
Take with thee, thief of God-home, this other word I say:
Since the safeguard wrought in the ring-mail I may not do away
I lay this curse upon it, that whoso weareth the same,
Shall save his life in the battle, and have the battle's shame;
He shall live through wrack and ruin, and ever have the worse,
And drag adown his kindred, and bear the people's curse.'
"Lo, this the tale of the Hauberk, and I knew it for the truth:
And little I thought of the kindreds; of their day I had no ruth;
For I said, They are doomed to departure; in a little while must they
wane,
And nought it helpeth or hindreth if I hold my hand or refrain.
Yea, thou wert become the kindred, both thine and mine; and thy birth
To me was the roofing of heaven, and the building up of earth.
I have loved, and I must sorrow; thou hast lived, and thou must die;
Ah, wherefore were there others in the world than thou and I?"
He turned round to her and clasped her strongly in his arms again, and
kissed her many times and said:
"Lo, here art thou forgiven; and here I say farewell!
Here the token of my wonder which my words may never tell;
The wonder past all thinking, that my love and thine should blend;
That thus our lives should mingle, and sunder in the end!
Lo, this, for the last remembrance of the mighty man I was,
Of thy love and thy forbearing, and all that came to pass!
Night wanes, and heaven dights her for the kiss of sun and earth;
Look up, look last upon me on this morn of the kindreds' mirth!"
Therewith he arose and lingered no minute longer, but departed, going as
straight towards the Thing-stead and the Folk-mote of his kindred as the
swallow goes to her nest in the hall-porch. He looked not once behind
him, though a bitter wailing rang through the woods and filled his heart
with the bitterness of her woe and the anguish of the hour of sundering.
CHAPTER XXVII--THEY WEND TO THE MORNING BATTLE
Now when Thiodolf came back to the camp the signs of dawn were plain in
the sky, the moon was low and sinking behind the trees, and he saw at
once that the men were stirring and getting ready for departure. He
looked gladly and blithely at the men he fell in with, and they at him,
and scarce could they refrain a shout when they beheld his face and the
brightness of it. He went straight up to where the Hall-Sun was yet
sitting under her namesake, with Arinbiorn standing before her amidst of
a ring of leaders of hundreds and scores: but old Sorli sat by her side
clad in all his war-gear.
When Thiodolf first came into that ring of men they looked doubtfully at
him, as if they dreaded somewhat, but when they had well beheld him their
faces cleared, and they became joyous.
He went straight up to Arinbiorn and kissed the old warrior, and said to
him, "I give thee good morrow, O leader of the Bearings! Here now is
come the War-duke! and meseems that we should get to work as speedily as
may be, for lo the dawning!"
"Hail to thine hand, War-duke!" said Arinbiorn joyously; "there is no
more to do but to take thy word concerning the order wherein we shall
wend; for all men are armed and ready."
Said Thiodolf; "Lo ye, I lack war-gear and weapons! Is there a good
sword hereby, a helm, a byrny and a shield? For hard will be the battle,
and we must fence ourselves all we may."
"Hard by," said Arinbiorn, "is the war-gear of Ivar of our House, who is
dead in the night of his hurts gotten in yesterday's battle: thou and he
are alike in stature, and with a good will doth he give them to thee, and