'
She said: 'I am called the Sun-beam.'
Then he said, and his voice trembled therewith: 'O Sun-beam, I have
been seeking pleasant and cunning words, and can find none such. But
tell me this if thou wilt: dost thou desire me as I desire thee? or
is it that thou wilt suffer me to wed thee and bed thee at last as
mere payment for the help that I shall give to thee and thine? Nay,
doubt it not that I will take the payment, if this is what thou wilt
give me and nought else. Yet tell me.'
Her face grew troubled, and she said:
'Gold-mane, maybe that thou hast now asked me one question too many;
for this is no fair game to be played between us. For thee, as I
deem, there are this day but two people in the world, and that is
thou and I, and the earth is for us two alone. But, my friend,
though I have seen but twenty and one summers, it is nowise so with
me, and to me there are many in the world; and chiefly the Folk of
the Wolf, amidst whose very heart I have grown up. Moreover, I can
think of her whom I have supplanted, the Bride to wit; and I know
her, and how bitter and empty her days shall be for a while, and how
vain all our redes for her shall seem to her.
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