But about and between
Went baleful fate.
LAY OF SIGURD.
As Roland had predicted, nothing arose to interfere with the plans of
the maying party. Even Lupus found means to slip away from the king's
presence. His excuse was that he wished to attend the queen. With the
utmost show of deference, he and a pair of young pages had escorted her
to the landing-stage, where she was sitting at ease in the midst of the
royal children and half-a-dozen favorite bower-maidens, when the Norse
ship-boats came racing up from the viking camp. The craft were steered
by Olvir and Roland, Gerold of Bussen, and Count Worad.
Olvir's oarsmen were not the best among his vikings. Floki himself
pulled bow-oar in Roland's boat. Yet the greater skill of the sea-king
more than offset this disadvantage, and he steered in to the wharf
foremost of all.
Forgetful of sore muscles and stiffened joints, the heritage of his
ride, Olvir did not wait for his boat to make fast, but while it was yet
turning, leaped out upon the landing-stage. Though he hastened at once
to bow before Hildegarde, his eyes were fixed upon the glowing face
which regarded him over the queen's shoulder. He had thought for none
else. Hildegarde saw and understood. She met his half-stammered
greeting with a smile, and motioned him to step behind her.
"Greet the maiden, Olvir," she said. "No wooer ever rode so far and so
fast to win his true-love. I would not keep you waiting now."
Olvir thanked the kindly queen with a glance, and then he was beside
Fastrada. It was the moment to which both had looked forward during all
the six and twenty days of separation. For a time they stood with
clasped hands, gazing into each other's eyes, too full of love and
happiness to speak. They were so lost in mutual delight they did not
heed that all the others had embarked and were waiting for them, until
Rothada called out.
"Ah, sweetheart, we must go," sighed Olvir. "Yet, first, a word,--I
bring good tidings."
Fastrada's eyes shone still brighter.
"I know, my hero," she murmured. "Yesterday my heart burned that you
should have first seen Rothada; but I forgave her because of the joyful
word she brought. Oh, my lord, how my heart leaps to see you once more!
And you have ridden over Rhine and back again, with scarce a trace of
the long journey! Who else in Christendom could do the like?"
"Who else would not do it for the loveliest among maidens?" replied
Olvir; and with that, fearful of losing his self-control, he led the
girl aboard his boat.
Hildegarde had intrusted herself to Roland, along with the children.
All others had chosen places in the remaining boats, except only
Rothada. Though begged by Worad to come with him, the girl had placed
herself aboard Olvir's boat. Even Fastrada could not ask the little
princess to leave; but her ready wit suggested how to make the best of
the situation. At a word from her, Olvir told one of the pages to join
them. The boy was only too pleased to gain such a merry companion as
the king's daughter, and so, with much laughter and excitement, all was
agreeably arranged, and the five boats sheered off into the stream.
Accustomed as were most of the party to the river scenery, all found
much to delight the eye in the picturesque hills, the woods, and the
flower-strewn dales, now in the full green of early summer. Nature
added her share to the merry maying. There was no cloud to be seen,
either in the sky or on the faces of the pleasure-seekers. Even Roland
joined freely in the merriment, and unbent so far as to tell the king's
children a wonderful tale,--all about wood-sprites and werwolves.
Of all the party, two alone had no thought to give to jest or laughter,
and yet they were the happiest couple in the boats. Faint with blissful
languor, Fastrada sat beside her lover, too overjoyed for words; while
instinct alone guided Olvir's steer-oar, as his boat, leaping to the
strokes of the big-armed oarsmen, raced upstream in company with the
others.
All too soon, Gerold, in the lead, steered ashore to the crumbling stone
quay of an old-time Roman estate. Through the trees could be seen the
shattered walls of an immense villa, which, Lupus said, had been looted
and burned by the Saracens on their way to Tours. But on landing, in
place of proceeding to the ruins, the party turned aside to a nook in
the abandoned garden, where a stream of pure water gushed from the mouth
of a monstrous bronze dolphin.
Here a cloth was spread on the grass, and the bower-maidens played at
housewife, while the younger men ran races to the boat for forgotten
articles. After the meal a half-circle was formed before Hildegarde and
the children, and each member of the party was called upon for a tale.
So with stories of dragons and saints, heroes and sprites, the hour of
noon-rest was passed, and young Karl and Rotrude and Carloman slept with
their heads on their mother's lap. But the other youngsters at last
wearied of inaction, and Pepin begged to see the ruined villa. The idea
was at once caught up by Worad and Gerold, and met with approval on all
sides.
The villa had evidently been the country-seat of a Roman of great
wealth. In size it was little less than a palace. The party rambled
about the ruins during most of the afternoon, with no slackening of
interest. From the ash-heaps beneath the fire-scarred walls the young
men dug out pretty fragments of statuary and many whole tiles.
Fatigue and thirst, however, finally moved Hildegarde to call for a
return to the fountain. When she started, supported between Roland and
Lupus, her maidens and the younger men ran ahead to gather flowers with
the children. Olvir and Fastrada, however, walked behind, and slow as
was the queen's pace, theirs was yet slower. Lupus was quick to note
their loitering, and when presently they were lost to view behind a turn
of the wild-grown hedge, he sought to bring his royal mistress to a
halt.
"Pardon me, gracious dame," he said; "is it seemly that Lord Olvir and
the maiden--"
"What harm?" interrupted Hildegarde, smiling. "Are they not all but
betrothed? This very evening Fulrad will hear them plight their troth.
Come; one would think you had never loved."
Lupus looked quickly away, and drew in his breath with a softly hissing
sound. Nor was he the only one hurt. Roland groaned aloud and struck
his fist upon his broad chest.
"Ah, Roland--I had forgot!" exclaimed Hildegarde.
The warrior's stern-set face relaxed, and he smiled sadly.
"God double my brother's joy!" he said.
And so the three passed on to where the young folk were playing May
games around the fountain.
Meantime, the lovers had more than loitered on the way,--they had come
to a full stop.
The moment Fastrada perceived that the queen and her companions were
hidden by the foliage, she put a hand to her bosom, and exclaimed:
"Hold, Olvir. I have dropped the brooch you gave me. It must have been
at the last, when we started."
"I will run fetch it, sweetheart," replied Olvir, readily.
"And leave me here alone! I would sooner lose the clasp. Let us return
together. I have good tidings, which the queen left for me to tell
you."
"Come, then; we 'll go back. Now, dear one, what are your good
tidings?"
"Wait a little, my hero. Tell me first of your meeting with Count
Rudulf, my father, and with my--my mother."
Olvir half frowned, and drew a little apart, as he recalled his
encounter in the wild beech forest.
"What are your tidings?" he insisted.
The girl glanced up at him with a look which, though of but a moment's
duration, brought out with startling distinctness her resemblance to the
grisly old forest count. Then her scarlet lips parted in a smile that
showed her strong white teeth, and she replied slowly: "I bend to the
bidding of my lord. Know, then, that our lord king desires the company
of his daughter on his southward war-faring, and, that the princess may
not be lonely, he has asked the queen to choose her a journey-mate from
among the bower-maidens."
"The king takes the little vala on such a war-faring! and you, of all
the queen's maidens, are chosen to go-- By Loki, there are tales of
Pepin's son! Were I sure-- Ah! that boding of the witch,--her own
mother!"
"You speak in riddles," said Fastrada, sharply. "What of my mother's
boding?"
"No good word to you and me," replied Olvir; and he told briefly of the
meeting with the old count and his witch wife. As he spoke, his scorn
of spells and evil bodings came back to him, and he cast off the doubt
which had fallen upon his heart. But when, smiling at his foolish fear
and jealousy, he glanced down at the maiden, he caught a glimpse of her
eyes, green and narrow-lidded as her father's. They were still green
when the girl met his look full-faced, and asked in a sibilant voice:
"You are sure--my mother--she said a king--one grey of eye?"
"And I am neither!" muttered Olvir. "Yet were she twice your mother, I
'd laugh at such witchery."
But Fastrada turned from her lover's smiling look. She paused, and gazed
down at the weed-grown ash-heap at her feet, her eyes again narrowed to
a line.
A sudden chill fell upon Olvir. If the maiden truly loved him, why
should she stand pondering that wild foretelling? Half angered, he
glanced away, and his eye was caught by a glinting in the grass. He
went ahead, and found the missing brooch.
"Here is your clasp, daughter of Rudulf," he said coldly.
Heedless of his tone, Fastrada took the ornament, and stared fixedly at
the garnets with which it was studded.
"The queen's gems are far more precious," she murmured, half aloud.
"I will win you the like, maiden," answered Olvir, quickly, but his
frown deepened.
For a while Fastrada made no response. Her eyes were still downcast,
and her face was dark with doubt and inward struggle.
"_Ai_--my mother," she at last whispered; "not often do her bodings fall
amiss! Yet once I knew the fiends to fail her-- Ah, if--"
The words faltered on the girl's lips, and she glanced up furtively at
her lover. But at sight of his look she started back with a stifled
cry.
Olvir's face was white as new ivory, and his eyes glittered like an
angry snake's.
"So, witch-daughter," he lisped softly as a young child, "this is your
Frank love. It is a merry game to play fast and loose,--a merry game!
It seems that I fared to Rhine Stream on my lord king's errand,--both as
to father and daughter. 'A king, grey of eye'--and he has chosen you to
go as mate for--his daughter. So; the game is played! We will accept
your mother's boding; we will trust to her fiends."
"Olvir, Olvir!--my hero! What is this? Why do you speak so cruelly?
Ah, do not shrink from me! I was mad--mad! Truly, I love you, Olvir!
I will never love another. Take me back--into your heart!"
"You mistake, daughter of Rudulf," replied Olvir, a harder note in his
lisping voice. "My heart held the image of a maiden pure and true; you
have shattered that holy image. How can I hold love in my heart, when
you have thrust in doubt? Love! You say you love me, when you could
stand for an instant weighing my love against a queen's crown--love!"
His voice cut like a lash. The girl winced, and looked appealingly into
his face. But she saw only contempt and anger. Then her own eyes
hardened. The daughter of grey Rudulf and the Wend witch was not one to
repay scorn with a smile. The very excess of her passion for the
Northman served now to heighten her fury and hatred. As she turned upon
him, her beautiful features were distorted with a look more startling
than the wolfish visage of her father.
"Love!" she cried, half hissing the word. "You speak of love,--you, the
heathen outlander! This stone beneath my feet knows more of love than
you! Your blood is but ice,--salty ice! Take your ring, and begone!"
"Now do I see the werwolf!" muttered Olvir, and, flinging down
Fastrada's ring, he trod his own into the ashes and turned away, proud
and angry-eyed.