But she lay quiet, and said softly and slowly:
'O Fathers of my kindred! O Warrior and God of the Earth! bear
witness that I plight my troth to this man, to lie in his grave if I
die, and in his bed if I live.'
And she smiled on him again, and then closed her eyes; but opened
them presently once more, and said:
'Dear friend, how fared it with Gold-mane to-day?'
Said Folk-might: 'So well he did, that none might have done better.
He fared in the fight as if he had been our Father the Warrior: he
is a great chieftain.'
She said: 'Wilt thou give him this message from me, that in no wise
he forget the oath which he swore upon the finger-ring as it lay on
the sundial of the Garden of the Face? And say, moreover, that I am
sorry that we shall part, and have between us such breadth of wild-
wood and mountain-neck.'
'Yea, surely will I give thy message,' said Folk-might; and in his
heart he rejoiced, because he heard her speak as if she were sure of
life. Then she said faintly:
'It is now thy work to depart from me, and to do as it behoveth a
chieftain of the people and the Alderman of Silver-dale.
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