The Story of the Volsungs

CHAPTER XII. Of the Shards of the Sword Gram, and how...

Now King Lyn­gi made for the king’s abode, and was mind­ed to take the king’s daugh­ter there, but failed here­in, for there he found nei­ther wife nor wealth; so he fared through all the realm, and gave his men rule there­over, and now deemed that he had slain all the kin of the Vol­sungs, and that he need dread them no more from hence­forth.

Now Hjordis went amidst the slain that night of the bat­tle, and came where­as lay King Sig­mund, and asked if he might be healed; but he an­swered –

“Many a man lives af­ter hope has grown lit­tle; but my good-​hap has de­part­ed from me, nor will I suf­fer my­self to be healed, nor wills Odin that I should ev­er draw sword again, since this my sword and his is bro­ken; lo now, I have waged war while it was his will.”

“Naught ill would I deem mat­ters,” said she, “if thou might­est be healed and avenge my fa­ther.”

The king said, “That is fat­ed for an­oth­er man; be­hold now, thou art great with a man-​child; nour­ish him well; and with good heed, and the child shall be the no­blest and most famed of all our kin: and keep well with­al the shards of the sword: there­of shall a good­ly sword be made, and it shall be called Gram, and our son shall bear it, and shall work many a great work there­with, even such as eld shall nev­er min­ish; for his name shall abide and flour­ish as long as the world shall en­dure: and let this be enow for thee. But now I grow weary with my wounds, and I will go see our kin that have gone be­fore me.”

So Hjordis sat over him till he died at the day-​dawn­ing; and then she looked, and be­hold, there came many ships sail­ing to the land: then she spake to the hand­maid –

“Let us now change rai­ment, and be thou called by my name, and say that thou art the king’s daugh­ter.”

And thus they did; but now the vikings be­hold the great slaugh­ter of men there, and see where two wom­en fare away thence in­to the wood; and they deem that some great tid­ings must have be­fall­en, and they leaped ashore from out their ships. Now the cap­tain of these folks was Alf, son of Hjal­prek, king of Den­mark, who was sail­ing with his pow­er along the land. So they came in­to the field among the slain, and saw how many men lay dead there; then the king bade go seek for the wom­en and bring them thith­er, and they did so. He asked them what wom­en they were; and, lit­tle as the thing seems like to be, the bond­maid an­swered for the twain, telling of the fall of King Sig­mund and King Eyli­mi, and many an­oth­er great man, and who they were with­al who had wrought the deed. Then the king asks if they wot­ted where the wealth of the king was be­stowed; and then says the bond­maid –

“It may well be deemed that we know full sure­ly there­of.”

And there­with she guides them to the place where the trea­sure lay: and there they found ex­ceed­ing great wealth; so that men deem they have nev­er seen so many things of price heaped up to­geth­er in one place. All this they bore to the ships of King Alf, and Hjordis and bond­maid went them. There­with these sail away to their own realm, and talk how that sure­ly on that field had fall­en the most renowned of kings.

So the king sits by the tiller, but the wom­en abide in the fore­cas­tle; but talk he had with the wom­en and held their coun­sels of much ac­count.

In such wise the king came home to his realm with great wealth, and he him­self was a man ex­ceed­ing good­ly to look on. But when he had been but a lit­tle while at home, the queen, his moth­er, asked him why the fairest of the two wom­en had the few­er rings and the less wor­thy at­tire.

“I deem,” she said, “that she whom ye have held of least ac­count is the no­blest of the twain.”

He an­swered: “I too have mis­doubt­ed me, that she is lit­tle like a bond­wom­an, and when we first met, in seem­ly wise she greet­ed no­ble men. Lo now, we will make tri­al of the thing.”

So on a time as men sat at the drink, the king sat down to talk with the wom­en, and said: –

“In what wise do ye note the wear­ing of the hours, whenas night grows old, if ye may not see the lights of heav­en?”

Then says the bond­wom­an, “This sign have I, that whenas in my youth I was wont to drink much in the dawn, so now when I no longer use that man­ner, I am yet wont to wake up at that very same tide, and by that to­ken do I know there­of.”

Then the king laughed and said, “Ill man­ners for a king’s daugh­ter!” And there­with he turned to Hjordis, and asked her even the same ques­tion; but she an­swered –

“My fa­ther erst gave me a lit­tle gold ring of such na­ture, that it groweth cold on my fin­ger in the day-​dawn­ing; and that is the sign that I have to know there­of.”

The king an­swered: “Enow of gold there, where a very bond­maid bore it! But come now, thou hast been long enow hid from me; yet if thou hadst told me all from the be­gin­ning, I would have done to thee as though we had both been one king’s chil­dren: but bet­ter than thy deeds will I deal with thee, for thou shalt be my wife, and due join­ture will I pay thee whenas thou hast borne me a child.”

She spake there­with and told out the whole truth about her­self: so there was she held in great hon­our, and deemed the wor­thi­est of wom­en.