g lanes, and the din of
the hunt died behind her; silence fell like a curtain at their heels;
even the thudding hoof-beats were softened on the leafy ground. Randalin
lay along the horse's neck now, and her senses had begun to slip away
from her like the tide from the shore. It occurred to her that she
was dying, and that the Valkyrias could not find her if she should be
carried too far away from the battle-field. Trying to hold them back,
she stretched a feeble hand toward the trees; and it seemed to her that
they did not glide past quite so rapidly. And the green river that
had been rushing toward her, that passed under her more slowly too.
Sometimes she could even make out violets amid the waves. But the waves
were rising strangely, she thought,--rising, rising--

At last, she felt their cool touch upon her fore-head. They had risen
and stopped her. Somewhere, there was the soft thud of a falling body;
then the cool greenness closed around her and held her tenderly, a
crumpled leaf that the whirlwind had dropped from its sport.

Chapter VIII. Taken Captive

No one turns from good,
if it can be got.
Ha'vama'l.

Lying drowned in cool silence, the girl came slowly to a consciousness
that someone was stooping over her. Raising her heavy lids, eyes rested
on a man's face, showing dimly in the dusk of the starlight.

He said in English, "Canute's page, by the Saints!"

A chorus of voices answered him: "The fiend's brat that pierced your
shoulder?"--"Choke him!"--"Better he die now than after he has waxed
large on English blood."--"Finish him!"

Opening her eyes wider, she found that heads and shoulders made a black
hedge around her.

The victim of her blade straightened, shaking his shaggy mane. "Were I
a Pagan Dane, I would run my sword through him. But I am a Christian
Englishman. Let him lie. He will bleed his life out before morning."

"Come on, then," the chorus growled. "The Etheling is asking what
hinders us."--"Make haste!"--"The Etheling is here!"

While the warrior was turning, a new voice spoke.

"Canute's page?" it repeated after some unseen informant. "Is he dead?"

It was a young voice, and deep and soft, for all the note of quiet
authority ringing through it; something in its tone was agreeably
different from the harsh utterance of the first speaker. Randalin's eyes
rose dreamily to find the owner. He had ridden up behind the others on a
prancing white horse. Above the bl