“Two griefs I see before me in mighty hearts grown great; And to change both these into gladness out-goes the power of fate.  Yet I, a lonely maiden, have might to vanquish one Till it melt as the mist of the morning before the summer sun.  O Wood-Sun, thou hast borne me, and I were fain indeed To give thee back thy gladness; but thou com’st of the Godhead’s seed, And herein my might avails not; because I can but show Unto these wedded sorrows the truth that the heart should know Ere the will hath wielded the hand; and for thee, I can tell thee nought That thou hast not known this long while; thy will and thine hand have wrought, And the man that thou lovest shall live in despite of Gods and of men, If yet thy will endureth.  But what shall it profit thee then That after the fashion of Godhead thou hast gotten thee a thrall To be thine and never another’s, whatso in the world may befall?  Lo! yesterday this was a man, and to-morrow it might have been The very joy of the people, though never again it were seen; Yet a part of all they hoped for through all the lapse of years, To make their laughter happy and dull the sting of tears; To quicken all remembrance of deeds that never die, And death that maketh eager to live as the days go by.  Yea, many a deed had he done as he lay in the dark of the mound; As the seed-wheat plotteth of spring, laid under the face of the ground That the foot of the husbandman treadeth, that the wind of the winter wears, That the turbid cold flood hideth from the constant hope of the years.  This man that should leave in his death his life unto many an one Wilt thou make him a God of the fearful who live lone under the sun?  And then shalt thou have what thou wouldedst when amidst of the hazelled field Thou kissed’st the mouth of the helper, and the hand of the people’s shield, Shalt thou have the thing that thou wouldedst when thou broughtest me to birth, And I, the soul of the Wolfings, began to look on earth?  Wilt thou play the God, O mother, and make a man anew, A joyless thing and a fearful?  Then I betwixt you two, ’Twixt your longing and your sorrow will cast the sundering word, And tell out all the story of that rampart of the sword!  I shall bid my mighty father make choice of death in life, Or life in death victorious and the crowned end of strife.”

Ere she had ended, the Wood-Sun let her hands fall down, and showed her face, which for all its unpaled beauty looked wearied and anxious; and she took Thiodolf’s hand in hers, while she looked with eyes of love upon the Hall-Sun, and Thiodolf laid his cheek to her cheek, and though he smiled not, yet he seemed as one who is happy.  At last the Wood-Sun spoke and said: