And she set down the basket and cast her arms about her,
and kissed her and wept over her; and the other twain, they also
kissed her lovingly. Birdalone wept even as Viridis, and said: May
ye do well, who have been so kind to me; but now am I both so glad
and so sorry, that the voice of me will not make due words for me. O
farewell!
Therewith she took up her basket, and turned and went speedily to the
Sending Boat; and they beheld her how she stepped aboard and bared
her arm, and drew blood from it with the pin of her girdle-buckle,
and therewith reddened stem and stern; and a pang of fear smote into
their hearts lest their lady had banned it for Birdalone as for them.
But Birdalone sat down on the thwart, and turned her face south, and
spake:
The red raven-wine now
Hast thou drunk, stern and bow;
Awake then, awake!
And the southward way take:
The way of the Wender forth over the flood,
For the will of the Sender is blent with the blood.
No cloud barred the gateway of the sun as she spoke; no wave rose
upon the bosom of the lake; no clatter nor tumult was there; but the
Sending Boat stirred, and then shot out swiftly into the wide water;
and the sun arose as they looked, and his path of light flashed on
Birdalone's golden gown for a moment, and then it grew grey again,
and presently she was gone from before their eyes.
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