Part 10 (2/2)

Go down to Hela, Asan to mutter runes swiftly

Now Asmund turned white rath ”Cease thy evil talk,” he said, ”or thou shalt be hurled as a witch into Goldfoss pool”

”Into Goldfoss pool?--yea, there Iwhere the waters boil fiercest--but thine eyes shall never see it! _Thy_ eyes are shut, and shut are the eyes of Unna, for ye have gone before!--I do but follow after,” and thrice Groa shrieked aloud, throwing up her ar on the sanded floor

”An evil woman and a fey!” said Asmund as he called people to her ”It had been better for me if I had never seen her dark face”

Now it is to be told that Groa lay beside herself for ten full days, and Swanhild nursed her Then she found her sense again, and craved to see Asmund, and spoke thus to hiht but a vision of my dreary words against thee, because thou hast plighted troth to Unna, Thorod's daughter”

”That is so, in truth,” said Asmund

”I have to say this, then, lord: that most humbly I crave thy pardon for my ill words, and ask thee to put them away from thy mind Sore heart reat my faults, at least I have always loved thee and laboured for thee, and methinks that in some fashi+on thy fortunes are the debtor to my wisdom

Therefore when my ears heard that thou hadst of a truth put me away, and that another woue forgot its courtesy, and I spoke words that are of all words the farthest frorow old, and have put off that beauty hich I was adorned of yore, and that held thee to hteyes naive me, and, in memory of all that has been between us, let le and still watch and serve thee and thine till my service is outworn Out of Ran's net I came to thee, and, if thou drivest me hence, I tell thee that I will lie down and die upon thy threshold, and when thou sinkest into eld surely the rieve thee”

Thus she spoke and wept h with a doubting mind, he said it should be as she willed

So Groa stayed on at Middalhof, and was lowly in her bearing and soft of speech

VII

HOW ERIC WENT UP MOSFELL AGAINST SKALLAGRIM THE BARESARK

Now Atli the Good, earl of the Orkneys, comes into the story

It chanced that Atli had sailed to Iceland in the autumn on a business about certain lands that had fallen to hia, as an Icelander, and he had wintered west of Reyjanes Spring being come, he wished to sail home, and, when his shi+p was bound, he put to sea full early in the year But it chanced that bad weather came up from the south-east, with mist and rain, so he must needs beach his shi+p in a creek under shelter of the Westman Islands

Now Atli asked what people dwelt in these parts, and, when he heard the nalad, for in old days he and Asether

”We will leave the shi+p here,” he said, ”till the weather clears, and go up to Middalhof to stay with As, and left men to watch her; but two of the company, with Earl Atli, rode up to Middalhof

It must be told of Atli that he was the best of the earls who lived in those days, and he ruled the Orkneys so well that ave him a by-name and called him Atli the Good It was said of him that he had never turned a poorman, nor drawn his sithout cause, nor refused peace to hie had left fewwhite beard He was keen-eyed, and well-fashi+oned of forest ofhim no children, and this was a sorrow to him; but as yet he had taken no other wife, for he would say: ”Love e runs with youth, both shall fall,” and again, ”Mix grey locks and golden and spoil two heads” For this earl was a s

Now Atli ca the clatter of ar that perhaps Ospakar had coain as he had proh they had not ly, and put hiave place to his men upon the cross-benches Atli told all his story, and Asrew clearer

Now the Earl saanhild and thought the maid wondrous fair, and so indeed she was, as she moved scornfully to and fro in her kirtle of white Soft was her curling hair and deep were her dark blue eyes, and bent were her red lips as is a bow above her dimpled chin, and her teeth shone like pearls

”Is that fair hter, Asmund,” asked Atli

”She is na his face away

”Well,” said Atli, looking sharply on hi be called the 'Fatherless,' for few have such a daughter”

”She is fair enough,” said Asmund, ”in all save temper, and that is bad to cross”

”In every sword a flaw,” answers Atli; ”but what has an old hed