Then Ralph took Ursula’s hand again, and went up the hall calmly and proudly, and the champions followed with Richard and the Sage.  Ralph and Ursula went up on to the dais, and he set down Ursula in the stone high-seat, and even in the halldusk a right fair-coloured picture she looked therein; for she was clad in a goodly green gown broidered with flowers, and a green cloak with gold orphreys over it; her hair was spread abroad over her shoulders, and on her head was a garland of roses which the women of the Flower de Luce had given her; so there she sat with her fair face, whence now all the wrinkles of trouble and fear were smoothed out, looking like an image of the early summer-tide itself.  And the champions looked on her and marvelled, and one whispered to the other that it was their Lady of aforetime come back again; only Roger, who had now gone back to the rest of the fellowship, cast his eyes upon the ground, and muttered.

Now Ralph draws his sword, and lays it naked on the stone table, and he stood beside Ursula and said:  “Champions of the Dry Tree, by the blade of Upmeads which lieth here before me, and by the head which I love best in the world, and is best worthy of love” (and herewith he laid his hand on Ursula’s head), “I swear that whensoever the Captain of the Dry Tree calleth on me, whether I be eating or drinking, abed or standing on my feet, at peace or at war, glad or sorry, I shall do my utmost to come to his aid straightway with whatso force I may gather.  Is this rightly sworn, Champions?”

Said Stephen a-Hurst:  “It is sworn well and knightly, and now cometh our oath.”

“Nay,” said Ralph, “I had no mind to drive a bargain with you; your deeds shall prove you; and I fear not for your doughtiness.”

Said Stephen:  “Yea, Lord; but he bade us swear to thee. 
Reach me thy sword, I pray thee.”

Then Ralph reached him his sword across the great stone table, and Stephen took it, and kissed the blade and the hilts; and then lifted up his voice and said:  “By the hilts and the blade, by the point and the edge, we swear to follow the Lord Ralph of Upmeads for a year and a day, and to do his will in all wise.  So help us God and Allhallows!”

And therewith he gave the sword to the others, and each man of them kissed it as he had.

But Ralph said:  “Champions, for this oath I thank you all heartily.  But it is not my meaning that I should hold you by me for a year, whereas I deem I shall do all that my kindred may need in three days’ space from the first hour wherein we set foot in Upmeads.”

Stephen smiled friendly at him and nodded, and said:  “That may well be; but now to make a good end of this mote I will tell thee a thing; to wit, that our Captain, yea, and all we, are minded to try thee by this fray in Upmeads, now we know that thou hast become a Friend of the Well.  And if thou turn out as we deem is likest, we will give thee this Castle of the Scaur, for thee and those that shall spring from thy loins; for we deem that some such man as thou will be the only one to hold it worthily, and in such wise as it may be a stronghold against tyrants and for the helping of peaceable folk; since forsooth, we of the Dry Tree have heard somewhat of the Well at the World’s End, and trow in the might thereof.”