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"The bear is dead!" exclaimed Ragnar. "Odin's curse be on that club-footed fool who gave us this cold ride for nothing." "Yes, I suppose so," said Steinar doubtfully. "Don't you think that it is dead, Olaf?" "What is the good of asking Olaf?" broke in Ragnar, with a loud laugh. "What does Olaf know about bears?
"This is the hall of Thorvald of Aar, is it not? And a certain Steinar dwells here with him, does he not?" asked their spokesman. "It is, and I am Thorvald," answered my father. "Also Steinar has dwelt here from his birth up, but is now away from home on a visit to the lord Athalbrand of Lesso. Who are you, and what would you of Steinar, my fosterling"
When I asked her why, she replied that she feared the maid was somewhat selfish, also too fond of drawing the eyes of men, and of the adornment of her beauty. Of those who were dearest to me, indeed, only Steinar seemed to think Iduna as perfect as I did myself.
So they went, as I thought, heavily enough. A while afterwards my father rose and came into the hall, where from my bed I could see Steinar seated on a stool by the fire brooding. He asked where the men of Agger were, and Steinar told him what he had done. "Are you mad, Steinar?" he asked, "that you have sent them away with such an answer? Why did you not consult me first?"
She was kind to me also, and bade me tell her the story of the slaying of the bear, which I did as best I could, though afterwards Ragnar told it otherwise, and more fully. Only Steinar said little or nothing, for he seemed to be lost in dreams.
Steinar and Iduna answered, "No," but I, who did see something, said: "Look yonder among the shadows. Mayhap it is a wolf stirring. Nay, it is a man. Look, Iduna." "I look and find nothing," she answered. "Look again," I said. "He reaches the top of the mount and stands there staring towards the south. Oh! now he turns, and the moonlight shines upon his face." "You dream, Olaf," said Steinar.
That is all the tale. Now what would you with Steinar?" "This Lady. The lord Hakon and the three sons whom that other woman you tell of bore him ere she died for after Steingerdi's death he married her were drowned in making harbour on the night of the great gale eighteen days ago." "That is the day when the bear nearly killed Steinar," I interrupted.
At least, I suppose that I heard them; at any rate, I know what they said, although, strangely enough, nothing at all comes back to me of their tale of an attack upon a ship or of what then I did or did not do. "It is not wise to jeer at Olaf," said Steinar, "for when he is stung with words he does mad things.
My heart grew full of sorrow that in the end broke from my eyes in tears. Yes, I wept over Steinar, my brother Steinar, and kissed his cold and gory lips. The evening gathered, the twilight grew, and, one by one, the stars sprang out in the quiet sky, till the moon appeared and gathered all their radiance to herself. I heard the sound of a woman's dress, and looked up, thinking to see Freydisa.
It was the custom of that time and land that, if possible, the wife to be should not pass the night before her marriage under the same roof as her future husband. Therefore Athalbrand, whose mood had been strange of late, went with Iduna to sleep in his beached ship. At my request Steinar went with them, in order that he might see that they were brought back in good time in the morning.
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