at you
should kill. Also I know, through friends of mine, that henceforth, for
reasons of policy, my little end of life is safe, and perhaps with it my
sight. All this I owe to you, though now at times I regret that I asked
the boon. From the lot of an Empress to that of a spinning-wife is a
great change, and one which I find it heard to bear. Still, I have my
peace to make with God, and towards that peace I strive. Yet will you
not take me with you, Olaf? I should like to found a nunnery in that
cold North of yours."

"No, Augusta. I have done my best by you, and now you must guard
yourself. We part for ever. I go hence to finish where I began. My
birthplace calls me."

"For ever is a long word, Olaf. Are you sure that we part for ever?
Perchance we shall meet again in death or in other lives. Such, at
least, was the belief of some of the wisest of my people before we
became Christian, and mayhap the Christians do not know everything,
since the world had learnt much before they came. I hope that it may
be so, Olaf, for I owe you a great debt and would repay it to you full
measure, pressed down and running over. Farewell. Take with you the
blessing of a sinful and a broken heart," and, rising, she kissed me on
the brow.

Here ends the story of this life of mine as Olaf Red-Sword, since of
it I can recover no more. The darkness drops. Of what befell me and
the others after my parting with Irene I know nothing or very little.
Doubtless we sailed away north, and, I think, came safely to Aar, since
I have faint visions of Iduna the Fair grown old, but still unwed, for
the stain of Steinar's blood, as it were, still marked her brow in all
men's eyes; and even of Freydisa, white-haired and noble-looking. How
did we meet and how did we separate at last, I wonder? And what were the
fates of Heliodore and of our children; of Martina and of Jodd? Also,
was the prophecy of Odin, spoken through the lips of Freydisa in the
temple at Aar, that he and his fellow gods, or demons, would prevail
against my flesh and that of those who clung to me, fulfilled at last in
the fires of martyrdom for the Faith, as his promise of my happiness was
fulfilled?

I cannot tell. I cannot tell. Darkness entombs us all and history is
dumb.

At Aar there are many graves! Standing among them, not so long ago, much
of this history came back to me.

End of Project Gutenberg's The Wanderer's Necklace, by H. Rider Haggard

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