“I will well,” said the princess; and she made Solita to sit upon a couch, and with two bands of her golden hair she tied her hands fast behind her, and so laid her upon her back on the couch.  And when she had so laid her she said: 

“But for all that you die, he shall not go to Broye, but here shall he bide, and share my throne with me.”

Thereupon did Solita perceive all the treachery of Princess Joceliande, and vainly she struggled to free her hands and to cry out for help.  But Joceliande clapped her palm upon Solita’s mouth, and drawing a gold pin from her own hair, she drove it straight into her heart, until nothing but the little knob could be seen.  So Solita died, and quickly the princess wiped the blood from her breast, and unbound her hands and arranged her limbs as though she slept.  Then she returned to the hall, and, summoning the warden, bade him loose the Sieur Rudel.

“It shall be even as you wish,” she said to him.  Wise and prudent had she been, had she ended with that; but her malice was not yet sated, and so she suffered it to lead her to her ruin.  For she stretched out her hand to him and said, “I myself will take you to your wife.”  And greatly marvelling, the Sieur Rudel took her hand and followed.

Now when they were come to Solita’s chamber, the princess entered first, and turned her again to my Lord Rudel and laid her finger to her lips, saying, “Hush!” Therefore he came in after her on tiptoe and stood a little way from the foot of the couch, fearing lest he might wake his wife.

“Is she not still?” asked Joceliande in a whisper.  “Is she not still and white?”

“Still and white as a folded lily,” he replied, “and like a folded lily, too, in her white flesh there sleeps a heart of gold.”  Therewith he crept softly to the couch and bent above her, and in an instant he perceived that her bosom did not rise and fall.  He gazed swiftly at the princess; she was watching him, and their glances met.  He dropped upon his knees by the couch and felt about Solita’s heart that he might know whether it beat or not, and his fingers touched the knob of Joceliande’s bodkin.  Gently he drew the gown from Solita’s bosom, and beheld how that she had been slain.  Then did he weep, believing that in truth she had killed herself, but the princess must needs touch him upon the shoulder.

“My lord,” she said, “why weep for the handmaid when the princess lives?”

Then the Sieur Rudel rose straightway to his feet and said: 

“This is thy doing!” For a little Joceliande denied it, saying that of her own will and desire Solita had perished.  But Rudel looked her ever sternly in the face, and again he said, “This is thy doing!” and at that Joceliande could gainsay him no more.  But she dropped upon the floor, and kissed his feet, and cried: 

“It was for love of thee, Rudel.  Look, my kingdom is large and of much wealth, yet of no worth is it to me, but only if it bring thee service and great honour.  A princess am I, yet no joy do I have of my degree, but only if thou share my siege with me.”