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The heath-clad upland over which they were passing sloped into another fertile valley, through which a lily-padded stream ran between rows of drooping willows. Suddenly the Lord of Ivarsdale broke off with an exclamation. "It was not in my mind that we could see the old forked elm from here. Hey, comrades!" he called over his shoulder. "Yonder to the left the old land-mark! Do you see?"
He did not seem bitten by her haste, but he took a step forward, clanging his gold-bound scabbard against the stone well-curbing to make himself heard. "Unhand the Lord of Ivarsdale, my chiefs," he ordered.
What they were no one ever knew, and each man had a different theory; but their result was plain to all. Slowly Edmund's knitted brows unravelled; slowly his mouth relaxed into its wonted curves. At last he had regained all his lofty composure and turned back. "Lord of Ivarsdale, I am not rich of time, and my present need is too great to spare any of it to the chastising of rebellious boys.
All at once Sebert of Ivarsdale reached out, and taking her by her cloak, drew her gently to his side, interposing his sword-arm between her and the others. Though his hand manacled her slim wrists securely, the clasp was more one of protection than of restraint; and the warm human touch was like a talisman against the haunting shadows.
Much to his surprise, the Dane accorded this challenge no notice whatever. He stood studying the Lord of Ivarsdale with eyes in which malicious amusement was growing into open mirth. It came out in another laugh. "Now it would be more unlikely than the wonder which has occurred, yet I begin to believe you! I myself will guide you to your Fridtjof, only for the pleasure of watching your face.
But his page bent and kissed the clenched fist with a cry of fierce exulting. "You will never get out to find your lily-fair lady. You will never have a lady wife, lord! We shall die together." There is a mingling of affection Where one can tell Another all his mind. Ha'vama'l. After that night the deep-set windows of Ivarsdale looked out upon some grim sights.
Slowly the bleak light warmed into golden radiance and the touch of dawn strung the scattered bird-notes into a chain of joyous song. Passing at last from the forest shades, the men of Ivarsdale came out into the grassy lane-like road that wound away over the Middlesex hills.
Wild with helpless misery, the Lord of Ivarsdale would have charged the Berserkers with his handful of armed servants if the old cniht had not restrained him almost by force; when he spent his breath in railing at everything between earth and sky. "It is the folly of it that maddens me," he cried over and over, "the needless folly!
But Canute was tracing idle patterns on the carving of his chair-arm. "Listen, Lord of Ivarsdale," he said quietly.
What difference that, somewhere beyond the hills, men were fighting and castles were burning? At Ivarsdale in the shelter and cheer of the lord's great hall, the feast of the barley beer was at its height.
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