will come for me soon unless you deliver me." Then love grew between
them as they looked at each other; and Helgi said: "Fear not Hodbrord,
for I will meet him unless I am dead."

King Hodbrord called up his levies and mustered a host. The ships
flocked about Brandey, but still he waited, and warriors came to him,
hundreds of them, from Hedinsey and other islands. Then said Helgi to
Hiorleif, "Is the host called?" And Hiorleif nodded his head and
pointed them out over sea, high-beaked ships, hemmed with shields,
thick on the water like wild swans. They fought in a storm, and the
waves played their part in the battle. The waters drank as much blood
as the swords; from on high Sigrun the Valkyr guided the warriors of
Helgi.

Now King Hodbrord stood in the gate of his house, hooded and helmed,
his spear in his hands. He saw far off in the valley horsemen riding
with speed, whose cloaks flew out in the wind they made. Who come
here? Whose is the host? And Godmund, his housewife, told him of the
sea-fight, and that the Wolfings were coming against his house. Then
looking, he saw the helm-bright Valkyrs coursing the air, keeping pace
with the horsemen below. They met in a crash by the Wolf rock; the
swords flamed, the spears were like flying stars. Over the dead
Hodbrord Sigrun the Valkyr cried in triumph, "Never for your arms is
Sigrun of Sevafell," and as she spoke the arm of Helgi the hero held
her fast.

Their love was fierce, but it was short. Helgi is dead of countless
wounds, and laid in his barrow with his weapons beside him. Sigrun of
Sevafell keeps the house; she sits by the fire; her eyes are hard. She
says to herself--

"Now had been here
Had he been minded
Sigmund's son,
The hero Helgi,
Out of the halls of Odin;
But the eagles roost
On the high ash-boughs,
All the household
Falleth to dreams--
Faint is my hope of him now."

But her handmaid at the window sees a man riding in armour. He rides a
grey horse, his face is pale and streaked with blood. She speaks to
herself, and then to the dead--

"What wraith rideth?
Is Doomsday come?
Shall dead men ride,
Shall they drive spurs in?
Ho, pale rider,
Hast thou leave homeward to fare?"

It is Helgi who answers her as he rides by upon a noiseless horse--

"This is no wraith,
This is not World's Doom
Though a dead man rides,
Though he pricks with spurs,
Leave I have homeward to fare."