woven, until at length we sank to sleep, our arms about each other's
necks. 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. But this woman was not Freydisa; it
was Iduna! Yes, Iduna's self!

I rose to my feet and stood still. She also stood still, on the farther
side of the stone of sacrifice whereon that which had been Steinar was
stretched between us. Then came a struggle of silence, in which she won
at last.

"Have you come to save him?" I asked. "If so, it is too late. Woman,
behold your work."

She shook her beautiful head and answered, almost in a whisper:

"Nay, Olaf, I am come to beg a boon of you: that you will slay me, here
and now."

"Am I a butcher--or a priest?" I muttered.

"Oh, slay me, slay me, Olaf!" she went on, throwing herself upon her
knees before me, and rending open her blue robe that her young breast
might take the sword. "Thus, perchance, I, who love life, may pay some
of the price of sin, who, if I slew myself, would but multiply the debt,