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It was long or the knights were all seated. Bitter was Kriemhild's wrath. She said, "Prince of Bern, I seek thy counsel and thy kind help in my sore need." But Hildebrand, the good knight, answered, "Who slayeth the Nibelungs shall do it without me; I care not what price thou offerest. None shall essay it but he shall rue it, for never yet have these doughty knights been vanquished."
"Look!" whispered one. "What is that scowling at us from the rocks below?" There, stealing along the river-bed, they saw a hideous little black dwarf. "Who are you, and what do you want?" asked the Rhine-daughters. "I am Alberich," answered the dwarf as he tried to climb up on the slippery rocks. "I came from the kingdom of the Nibelungs, down under the earth." "What!" said the Rhine-daughters.
Gudrun tries at first to reconcile the combatants, but, failing, arms herself and fights on the side of her brothers. The battle rages furiously with great loss on both sides, until nearly all of the Nibelungs are killed, when Gunnar and Hogni are forced to yield to the power of numbers and are captured and bound. Gunnar is asked, if he will purchase his life with the treasure.
On a sudden he espied the kings chaplain close by the chapel baggage, leaning with his hands upon the relics, and recalling that the wise women had told him that only this priest would return and none other of the Nibelungs, he seized him by the middle and cast him from the skiff into the Danube. Hold, Sir Hagen, hold! cried his comrades. Giselher grew wroth; but Hagen only smiled.
The story of the fall of the Nibelungs, that is, their killing at Etzel's court, may go back to the tale of the murder of relatives for money. On the other hand it is hard to believe that the Siegfried saga is nothing but a repetition of the Attila motive, for this is too brief a formula to which to reduce the long legend of Siegfried, with its many deeds.
Then was the hero in dire need. Siegfried gan fear a deal his death, when the warder struck such mighty blows. Enow his master Siegfried loved him for this cause. They strove so sore that all the castle rang and the sound was heard in Nibelung's hall. He overcame the warder and bound him, too. The tale was noised abroad in all the Nibelungs' land.
The horses were led out for Siegmund's men, for they were ready to ride back to the land of the Nibelungs; and their harness was laid on the sumpters. Then went Siegmund to Kriemhild, and said to her, "Siegfried's men wait by their horses. Let us away, for it irketh me here by the Burgundians." Kriemhild answered, "They that are faithful among my kinsfolk counsel me to abide here with them.
Sorely wept Dietrich and Etzel. So ended the high feast in death and woe. More is not to be said. Let the dead rest. Thus fell the Nibelungs, thus was accomplished the fate of their house!
The outline is as follows: Sigurd the Volsung, son of Sigmund and brother of Sinfjötli, slays the dragon who guards the Nibelungs' hoard on the Glittering Heath, and thus inherits the curse which accompanies the treasure; he finds and wakens Brynhild the Valkyrie, lying in an enchanted sleep guarded by a ring of fire, loves her and plights troth with her; Grimhild, wife of the Burgundian Giuki, by enchantment causes him to forget the Valkyrie, to love her own daughter Gudrun, and, since he alone can cross the fire, to win Brynhild for her son Gunnar.
Waftures of Walhalla most commonly accompany his steps; the close of his speech is frequently marked by the sturdy motif of his spear, the spear inseparable from him, cut by him from the World-Ash, carved with runes establishing the bindingness of compacts, by aid of which he had conquered the world, subdued the giants, the Nibelungs, and Loge, the Spirit of Fire.