it after Guttorm as he fled, and the
magic weapon cut him in two ere he reached the door. Then Sigurd fell
back into the arms of Gudrun and died.

Then did great grief fall upon the land of the Niblungs; and a mighty
funeral pyre was built for Sigurd, and his body was laid thereon.

Gudrun, his wife, sat silent and apart, her heart breaking for her
hero-husband; but Brunhild, when she saw what she had done, was filled
with grief and despair beyond endurance, and snatching a dagger from
her handmaidens, she stabbed herself and so died.

In such wise had the doom of the Magic Gold descended upon Regin and
Fafnir, and upon Sigurd and Brunhild. Nor was this the end of the
misery it was to work.

Loathing the thought of life in her brother's palace, Gudrun now fled
to the court of Alf, the foster-father of Sigurd, where for some years
she remained, busying herself in working a vast piece of tapestry on
which she embroidered the heroic deeds of Sigurd.

But after a time Atli, King of the Huns, the brother of Brunhild, sent
to Gunnar to demand that compensation should be made to him for his
sister's death; and to him Gunnar promised that, in satisfaction for
this, he should receive the hand of his sister Gudrun in marriage. So
the Niblung princes sent and fetched her from the court of Alf, and
forced her to marry Atli, much against her will.

Now at Atli's court her talk was ever of Sigurd and of the wondrous
gold-hoard he had brought to the Niblungs' land. And so it came to
pass that the greed of Atli was kindled when he heard of that
treasure, and he determined to make it his own.

So he sent a messenger to invite all the Niblung princes to visit his
court, intending, when he had them in his power, to put an end to
them. Now Gudrun guessed what was in Atli's mind, and therefore she
took off the gold ring from Andvari's hoard, and twined about it a
wolf's hair as a sign of warning; and this she sent by the same
messenger to her brothers.

But this messenger untwined the wolf's hair and gave only the ring to
Gunnar, who took it as a signal of good faith and gladly accepted the
invitation.

Hoegni alone was unwilling to accept the invitation, but when he found
that Gunnar would pay no heed to him, he prepared to go along with
him.

First, however, he persuaded his brother to take that great
treasure-hoard and to cast it into a deep hole at the bottom of a
mighty river, where none might find it save themselves.