they took off their skids, and went into the thick wood and sat down under a hornbeam tree; and ere Gold-mane could open his mouth to speak Bow-may began and said:
‘Well it was that I fell in with thee, Dalesman, else had there been murders of men to tell of; but ever she ordereth all things wisely, though unwisely hast thou done to seek to her. Hearken! dost thou think that thou hast done well that thou hast me here with my tale? Well, hadst thou busied thyself with the slaying of elks, or with sitting quietly at home, yet shouldest thou have heard my tale, and thou shouldest have seen me in Burgstead in a day or two to tell thee concerning the flitting of the token. And ill it is that I have missed it, for fain had I been to behold the House of the Face, and to have seen thee sitting there in thy dignity amidst the kindred of chieftains.’
And she sighed therewith. But he said: ‘Hold up thine heart, Bow-may! On the word of a true man that shall befall thee one day. But come, playmate, give me thy tale!’
‘Yea,’ she said, ‘I must now tell thee in the wild-wood what else I had told thee in the Hall. Hearken closely, for this is the message:
‘Seek not to me again till thou hast the token; else assuredly wilt thou be slain, and I shall be sorry for many a day. Thereof as now I may not tell thee more. Now as to the token: When March is worn two weeks fail not to go to and fro on the place of the Maiden Ward for an hour before sunrise every day till thou hear tidings.’
‘Now,’ quoth Bow-may, ‘hast thou hearkened and understood?’
‘Yea,’ said he.
She said: ‘Then tell me the words of my message concerning the token.’ And he did so word for word. Then she said:
‘It is well, there is no more to say. Now must I lead thee till thou knowest the wood; and then mayst thou get on to the smooth snow again, and so home merrily. Yet, thou grey-eyed fellow, I will have my pay of thee before I do that last work.’
Therewith she turned about to him and took his head between her hands, and kissed him well favouredly both cheeks and mouth; and she laughed, albeit the tears stood in her eyes as she said: ‘Now smelleth the wood sweeter, and summer will come back again. And even thus will I do once more when we stand side by side in battle array.’
He smiled kindly on her and nodded as they both rose up from the earth: she had taken off her foul-weather gloves while they spake, and he kissed her hand, which was shapely of fashion albeit somewhat brown, and hard of palm, and he said in friendly wise:
‘Thou art a merry faring-fellow, Bow-may, and belike shalt be withal a true fighting-fellow. Come now, thou shalt be my sister and I thy brother, in despite of those three shafts across the snow.’
He laughed therewith; she laughed not, but seemed glad, and said soberly:
‘Yea, I may well be thy sister; for belike I also am of the people of the Gods, who have come into these Dales by many far ways. I am of the House of the Ragged Sword of the Kindred of the Wolf. Come, brother, let us toward Wildlake’s Way.’
Therewith she went before him and led through the thicket as by an assured and wonted path, and he followed hard at heel; but his thought went from her for a while; for those words of brother and sister that he had spoken called to his mind the Bride, and their kindness of little children, and the days when they seemed to have nought to do but to make the sun brighter, and the flowers fairer, and the grass greener, and the birds happier each for the other; and a hard and evil thing it seemed to him that now he should be making all these things nought and dreary to her, now when he had become a man and deeds lay before him. Yet again was he solaced by what Bow-may had said concerning battle to come; for he deemed that she must have had this from the Friend’s foreseeing; and he longed sore for deeds to do, wherein all these things might be cleared up and washen clean as it were.
So passed they through the wood a long way, and it was getting dark therein, and Gold-mane said:
‘Hold now, Bow-may, for I am at home here.’
She looked around and said: ‘Yea, so it is: I was thinking of many things. Farewell and live merrily till March comes and the token!’
Therewith she turned and went her ways and was soon out of sight, and he went lightly through the wood, and then on skids over the hard snow along the Dale’s edge till he was come to the watch-tower, when the moon was bright in heaven.
Thus was he at Burgstead and the House of the Face betimes, and before the hunters were gotten back.
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