Now when Brighteyes saw her he gave a great cry.

“Greeting, sweet!” he said.  “I am no longer afraid, since thou comest to bear me company.  Thou art dear to my sight—­ay even in yon death-sheet.  Greeting, sweet, my May!  I laid thee stiff and cold in the earth at Middalhof, but, like a loving wife, thou hast burst thy bonds, and art come to save me from the grip of trolls.  Thou art welcome, Gudruda, Asmund’s daughter!  Come, wife, sit thou at my side.”

The ghost of Gudruda spake no word.  She walked through the fire towards him, and the flames went out beneath her feet, to burn up again when she had passed.  Then she sat down over against Eric and looked on him with wide and tender eyes.  Thrice he stretched out his arms to clasp her, but thrice their strength left them and they fell back to his side.  It was as though they struck a wall of ice and were numbed by the bitter cold.

“Look, here are more,” groaned Skallagrim.

Then Eric looked, and lo! the empty space to the left of the fire was filled with shadowy shapes like shapes of mist.  Amongst them was Gizur, Ospakar’s son, and many a man of his company.  There, too, was Swanhild, Groa’s daughter, and a toad nestled in her breast.  She looked with wide eyes upon the eyes of dead Gudruda’s ghost, that seemed not to see her, and a stare of fear was set on her lovely face.  Nor was this all; for there, before that shadowy throng, stood two great shapes clad in their harness, and one was the shape of Eric and one the shape of Skallagrim.

Thus, being yet alive, did these two look upon their own wraiths!

Then Eric and Skallagrim cried out aloud and their brains swam and their senses left them, so that they swooned.

When they opened their eyes and life came back to them the fire was dead, and it was day.  Nor was there any sign of that company which had been gathered on the rock before them.

“Skallagrim,” quoth Eric, “it seems that I have dreamed a strange dream—­a most strange dream of Norns and trolls!”

“Tell me thy dream, lord,” said Skallagrim.

So Eric told all the vision, and the Baresark listened in silence.

“It was no dream, lord,” said Skallagrim, “for I myself have seen the same things.  Now this is in my mind, that yonder sun is the last that we shall see, for we have beheld the death-shadows.  All those who were gathered here last night wait to welcome us on Bifrost Bridge.  And the mist-shapes who sat there, amongst whom our wraiths were numbered, are the shapes of those who shall die in the great fight to-day.  For days are fled and we are sped!”

“I would not have it otherwise,” said Eric.  “We have been greatly honoured of the Gods, and of the ghost-kind that are around us and above us.  Now let us make ready to die as becomes men who have never turned back to blow, for the end of the story should fit the beginning, and of us there is a tale to tell.”