Styrbiorn said nothing, meeting her gaze in an uneasy silence. Then on the sudden they both smiled.
That night the King made Styrbiorn and his folk good entertainment. Styrbiorn spake most to Thyri, and she was easy and open in her talk with him. There was no word nor look of hers that pointed to that bad night that had parted them in Upsala, but it was as if her mind had been wiped clean now of all knowledge and remembrance of it. And wondrous it seemed with what friendship she took up the threads of their days that had gone before, so that no dear brother and sister, meeting again after many years, might have known more familiarly the jests and likings each of other.
Suddenly he said to her, “Men have told me thou art to wed King Burisleif.”
“So it is,” said she, as if roused suddenly from some dream.
“Is that with thy good will?” asked Styrbiorn.
All her easy way with him was gone. She lifted her head proudly as if to say, what had he to do with these things? Then her eyes met his. She lowered her gaze and said, scarce to be heard, “No.”
“It is an old man?” said Styrbiorn.
“So I am told,” she said, soft as a breath.
They kept silence for a while. Then Styrbiorn said, “I did wrong. Is it too late?”
Thyri lifted her eyes full on his. “No,” she said.
Next morning Styrbiorn and Harald the King went forth to speak together apart upon a bluff of rock that overlooks the strand of the sea below Alaburg. These were Styrbiorn’s peace-terms that he laid before the King: that the Danes should fetch Styrbiorn an hundred ships full-manned to follow and fight for him in three great battles, and that he besides should have to wife Thyri, Harald’s daughter.
It was easily seen that the King was not minded to have aught to do with such terms.
So now they talked on this for a long while, turning it over this way and that, but no whit the nearer were they agreed together. “That have I heard,” said the King at length, “that thou hast been little of a tame horse to lead for thine unfriends. But this thou asketh passeth all reason, and I will not do it.”
“That is ill, then,” said Styrbiorn. “For so it is, King, that hereon hangeth all our friendship betwixt you and us Jomsburgers.”
The King looked him in the eye. “I would have thee answer me this,” he said: “Who art thou, that Jomsburg lieth in thy mouth? Let Palnatoki speak for Jomsburg, and thou for thyself.”
Styrbiorn laughed. “Well,” he said, “I will speak for myself.”
“And I,” said the King, “have given thee thine answer.”
“But it is an answer I will not take,” said Styrbiorn.
The King looked angry as a man might be. For a time he held his peace, then, suddenly looking up at Styrbiorn, “Would thou mightest go from hence,” he said fiercely, “and all the fiends of hell go with thee. There was never ill words, let alone ill deeds, ’twixt me and Jomsburg, till that thou camest hither. With Palnatoki and every man else of Jomsburg I should lightly be set at one. Would I might never look upon thy face again.”
Styrbiorn smiled. “I have tried your temper over much, King. And now I’m sorry for it. The ships I will forgo. But to knit our friendship the closer you shall give me your daughter.”
“That is not to be thought of,” said King Harald. “Thou hast had thy chance of that, and little with my good will, when thine uncle backed thee. I scarce think he’ll back thee again, though.” With that, he gave Styrbiorn a lowering look. “Truly thou hast the front of a dog,” said he: “ ‘Be wary with ale and with another’s wife.’ When thou’st learnt that, come and ask me again for my daughter.”
The hair of Styrbiorn’s head rose up a little, and his face became dark as blood. “I’ the meantime,” said the King, “she is promised to King Burisleif. And the wedding is to be this summer.”
“Is that with her good will?” said Styrbiorn.
“It is my will,” said the King.
“Wilt thou leave it in her free choice?”
“I will not,” said the King.
Styrbiorn came a pace nearer to Harald the King and stood over him like as one fighting dog stands a-bristling over another. “I love not talk and chat,” said he; “yet, to please your whim, King, I have spent two hours a-talking. Here be no eavesdroppers. Thou seest under thy feet there my ships and thine. Think well: for this choice I give thee, either to stretch out thine hand and betrothe to me thy daughter, and swear friendship to me, and these hundred ships too; or if not, I will flit thee ashipboard this very night, over seas to Kirialaland or the Finn-heaths of Smaland or otherwhere, and deliver thee up to savage men shall shear off thy nose and thine ears and draw out thy tripes for their dogs to eat. Choose,
