Hagen, fearing that Siegfried might blunder in his reply, took the answer out of his mouth and said:  “O Queen, the good knight Siegfried was hard by the ship when Gunther won the games from you.  Naught indeed knew he of them.”

Siegfried now expressed great surprise that any man living had been able to master the mighty war-maid.  “Is it possible,” he exclaimed, “is it possible, O Queen, that you have been vanquished at the sports in which you excel so greatly?  But I for one am glad, since now you needs must follow us home to the Rhineland.”

“You are speedy of speech, Sir Siegfried,” replied Brunhild.  “But there is much to do ere yet I quit my lands.  First must I inform my kindred and vassals of this thing.  Messengers must be sent to many of my kinsmen ere I depart from Isenstein.”

With that she bade couriers ride to all quarters, bidding her kinsmen, her friends, and her warriors come without delay to Isenstein.  For several days they arrived in troops:  early and late they came, singly and in companies.  Then with a large escort Brunhild sailed across the sea and up the Rhine to Worms.

Siegfried and Brunhild

It now became increasingly clear that Siegfried and Brunhild had had affectionate relations in the past. [Indeed, in the Volsunga Saga, which is an early version of the Nibelungenlied, we find Grimhild, the mother of Gudrun (Kriemhild), administering to Sigurd (Siegfried) a magic potion in order that he should forget about Brunhild.] On seeing Siegfried and Kriemhild greet each other with a kiss, sadness and jealousy wrung the heart of the war-maiden, and she evinced anything but a wifely spirit toward her husband Gunther, whom, on the first night of their wedded life, she wrestled with, defeated, and bound with her girdle, afterward hanging him up by it on a peg in the wall!  Next day he appealed to Siegfried for assistance, and that night the hero donned his magic cloak of invisibility, contended with Brunhild in the darkness, and overcame her, she believing him to be Gunther, who was present during the strife.  But Siegfried was foolish enough to carry away her ring and girdle, “for very haughtiness.”  These he gave to Kriemhild, and sore both of them rued it in after-time.  Brunhild’s strength vanished with her maidenhood and thenceforth she was as any other woman.

Siegfried and Kriemhild now departed to the capital of Santen, on the Lower Rhine, and peace prevailed for ten years, until Brunhild persuaded Gunther to invite them to a festival at Worms.  She could not understand how, if Siegfried was Gunther’s vassal, as Gunther had informed her, he neither paid tribute nor rendered homage.  The invitation was accepted cordially enough.  But Kriemhild and Brunhild quarrelled bitterly regarding a matter of precedence as to who should first enter church, and at the door of the minster of Worms there was an unseemly squabble.  Then Kriemhild taunted Brunhild with the fact that Siegfried had won and deserted her, and displayed the girdle and ring as proof of what she asserted.