Gudruda turn her thoughts to trading. I think that she
has it in her mind to sail from Iceland with this outlaw Eric, and seek
a home over seas, and that I will not bear."

"It may be," said Gizur, "and I should not be sorry to see the last of
Brighteyes, for I think that more men will die at his hand before he
stiffens in his barrow."

"Thou art cowardly-hearted, thou son of Ospakar!" Swanhild said. "Thou
sayest thou lovest me and wouldest win me to wife: I tell thee that
there is but one road to my arms, and it leads over the corpse of Eric.
Now this is my counsel: that we send the most of our men to watch that
ship of Gudruda's, and, when she lifts anchor, to board her and search,
for she is already bound for sea. Also among the people here I have a
carle who was born near Hecla, and he swears this to me, that, when
he was a lad, searching for an eagle's eyrie, he found a path by which
Mosfell might be climbed from the north, and that in the end he came
to a large flat place, and, looking over, saw that platform where Eric
dwells with his thralls. But he could not see the cave, because of the
overhanging brow of the rock. Now we will do this: thou and I, and the
carle alone--no more, for I do not wish that our search should be
noised abroad--to-morrow at the dawn we will ride away for Mosfell, and,
passing under Hecla, come round the mountain and see if this path may
still be scaled. For, if so, we will return with men and make an end of
Brighteyes."

This plan pleased Gizur, and he said that it should be so.

So very early on the following morning Swanhild, having sent many men to
watch Gudruda's ship, rode away secretly with Gizur and the thrall, and
before it was again dawn they were on the northern slopes of Mosfell.
It was on this same night that Eric went down from the mountain to wed
Gudruda.

For a while the climbing was easy, but at length they came to a great
wall of rock, a hundred fathoms high, on which no fox might find a
foothold, nor anything that had not wings.

"Here now is an end of our journey," said Gizur, "and I only pray this,
that Eric may not ride round the mountain before we are down again." For
he did not know that Brighteyes already rode hard for Middalhof.

"Not so," said the thrall, "if only I can find the place by which, some
thirty summers ago, I won yonder rift, and through it the crest of the
fell," and he pointed to a narrow cleft in the face of the rock high
above their hea