But now are all his sons taken, and laid in bonds and led away;
and Signy was ware withal that her father was slain, and her
brothers taken and doomed to death, that she called King Siggeir
apart to talk with her, and said --

"This will I pray of thee, that thou let not slay my brothers
hastily, but let them be set awhile in the stocks, for home to me
comes the saw that says, "Sweet to eye while seen": but longer
life I pray not for them, because I wot well that my prayer will
not avail me."

Then answered Siggeir

"Surely thou art mad and witless, praying thus for more bale for
thy brothers than their present slaying; yet this will I grant
thee, for the better it likes me the more they must bear, and the
longer their pain is or ever death come to them."

Now he let it be done even as she prayed, and a mighty beam was
brought and set on the feet of those ten brethren in a certain
place of the wild-wood, and there they sit day-long until night;
but at midnight, as they sat in the stocks, there came on them a
she-wolf from out the wood; old she was, and both great and evil
of aspect; and the first thing she did was to bite one of those
brethren till he died, and then she ate him up withal, and went
on her way.

But the next morning Signy sent a man to the brethren, even one
whom she most trusted, to wot of the tidings; and when he came