CHAPTER XVII

What hath wrought Sigurd Of any wrong-doing That the life of the famed one Thou art fain of taking? LAY OF BRYNHILD.

White with fury, Fastrada yet stood glaring at the spot where Olvir had disappeared, when she heard a firm tread on the other side. As she looked about, she caught a glimpse of Roland approaching through the coppice. Her first impulse was to spring away before the king's kinsman could come upon her. But almost at the first step she paused and turned again, with a smile of wolfish joy.

When Roland burst from the thicket, the girl came running to meet him, her silken dress torn, her hair capless and dishevelled, her face blotched with earth.

"Save me! Save me, lord count!" she gasped. "In the name of your mother, do not let him harm me!"

"What is it? Who would harm you?" demanded Roland, in amazement.

But the girl flung herself on the ground before him, sobbing and moaning, and for a while it seemed as though she could not speak. The sight of her at his feet stirred to the depths all the love and pity of the Frank's heart. He stooped and sought to lift her; but she shrank from his touch, and hid her face in her hands.

"Leave me!" she moaned. "I had forgotten; not to you can I look to avenge my wrong."

"Wrong!" he repeated, and his blue eyes flared. "By my sword, I swear, daughter of Rudulf, I will avenge your wrong. Name the man."

Fastrada ceased her sobbing, and half raised herself. With one hand still across her face, she whispered brokenly: "He sought to-- Ah, I cannot name it! but you came, and he fled. He is--he was the man I loved--I trusted."

"Olvir!--my brother?" cried Roland, and he staggered as though struck. For a moment he stood, white and rigid, in an agony of doubt. But Fastrada's keen wits were sharpened by hate.

"O my hero! my dark-eyed hero!" she moaned. "Why should you wrong your betrothed? Why seek to harm the maiden who loved you so?"

"Where did he go?" gasped Roland. A terrible anger had seized upon him. His face was crimson with rage, his eyes bloodshot. Even as he spoke, he drew the heavy Norse sword at his side, and when, with head averted, the girl pointed behind her, he rushed away like a berserk in the fury.

Instantly Fastrada sat up to listen, her narrowed eyes dry and hot, her face white, her lips drawn away from the teeth in two blood-red lines. She was so intent on following Roland's headlong flight that Duke Lupus glided out of the coppice and gained her side unheeded. With all his subtlety, the Vascon did not lack courage; but he could not restrain a shudder when he saw the look on the girl's face. He crossed himself hastily, and would have slipped back to the coppice, had not Fastrada turned and perceived him. For a little the two glared at each other. Fastrada was first to speak.

"Spy!" she hissed.

But Lupus had recovered from his first superstitious dread. Unheeding the scornful term, he bent eagerly forward and half whispered: "I am not blind, maiden. You burn for vengeance. Who has wronged you? Tell me! I can aid."

Fastrada shook her head sullenly; but her fury was too great to be repressed.

"Vengeance!" she cried fiercely. "You speak truth; I thirst for vengeance! Nothing will quench my thirst but the heart's blood of that false heathen. The base outlander sought my shame."

"Holy saints!" cried Lupus, in affected horror. But Fastrada saw the ironical smile which flitted across his face, and she knew that he had not been deceived. She drew back her head and watched him, like a snake whose way is barred. The duke's face instantly assumed a look of deepest significance, and he extended a white hand.

"Let me be your friend," he urged. "I also have wrongs to avenge. Join with me and my friends. We will aid you gladly."

"Already my wolf-hound follows the warm trail," rejoined Fastrada, and she laughed shrilly.

"Roland?"

The girl rocked to and fro, her hands clasped about her knee.

"The sword-brothers meet with bared swords!" she cried, and again she broke into the terrible laugh.

"And if the Frank falls?" demanded Lupus.

"May each prove the other's bane!"

"My heart to that! Yet the Dane is quick. Roland alone may fall; then you will need aid. Join us. If we succeed, I know a duke who will give you a queen's crown.

"A queen's crown--a queen's crown," muttered Fastrada, and she pressed a hand over her eyes. "What was the word,--my mother's word? Ay; a king--"

"How's that, maiden? What has your mother foretold?"

"I shall wed a king--a king grey of eye."

The pale-grey eyes of Lupus sparkled.

"A true boding! The Merwing shall win back the throne of his forefathers, and you shall be his queen. I shall rule. Throne and queen, the alruna--the witch-wife--forebodes it!"

"Let that be as it may," muttered Fastrada; "only show me the corpse of that cold-blooded outlander, and I do your bidding."

"Then we should see how your hound has fared," replied Lupus, and the girl sprang up to follow him into the thicket.