It was a fortnight after Easter. The trees of the chase were springing into leaf. Flocks of twittering starlings in whirling clouds hovered and sang above the towers of Wordingborg Castle. The cuckoo's note was heard in the beech groves, and the nightingale was come. The Marsk stood in the ante-chamber awaiting orders. Ah inquiry was made after the Drost. He had repaired to the maidens' tower with the judges of the court of justice of the castle, in order to be present at an examination of Marsk Stig's daughters. He had himself hastened this act of justice, in his firm conviction of their innocence; he hoped by his testimony to be instrumental towards their acquittal, and that the affair might, from the king's presence there, come to a speedy and happy termination. The Drost's longing to see the fair Margaretha again, had perhaps some share in the haste and zeal with which he followed the grave judges. But hardly had he entered the prison with these personages, and had met, and responded to, a tender and melancholy glance from the gentle Margaretha, ere Ulrica, who appeared to have been sitting quietly before her sister's tapestry frame, suddenly started up with a wild look and dishevelled hair, and rushed menacingly towards them. "Ye have murdered him, ye monsters,"--she cried--"Ye have murdered my true knight--are ye now come to drag me also to the scaffold? Look! here I am!--tarry not!--bring forward your chains!--bring forward your executioner! Lead me but to death! I despise life and all of ye! I knew KaggÉ was here to avenge my degradation, and lead me out of this vile captivity. Me, you may murder also--the sooner the better. I ask no other freedom--call but your executioner, and put an end to my sorrow! I knew the king's life was in danger, and I was silent to save my friend and true knight--but my sister is innocent--none shall injure a hair of her head. She besought me to move him to flee, and cause no mishap--that I can witness on the gospels."

"Both were then, it seems, cognizant of the presence of the outlawed regicide and of his treasonable purpose," said the chief judge; "Sir Drost! the testimony we have here from the most guilty of the two, renders them both, at the least, state prisoners for their lifetime."

Drost AagÉ appeared thunderstruck. "The unhappy lady must rave," he said, hastily recollecting himself. "She hath been ill, and not in her right mind, as we know--her confession and testimony are of no weight. Her knowledge of yon miscreant I have indeed observed; but it is impossible she could have been an accomplice in his crime, and still less her pious sister; that I will stake my life upon! Answer us! for the sake of the Lord in heaven, tell us the truth noble Lady Margaretha! Knew you KaggÉ was here in disguise at the castle, and seeking after the king's life?"

"I knew it, Sir Drost." answered Margaretha calmly, with her hand on her heart. "But by the lips of the Holy Virgin, and the Spirit of holy truth, it lay not in my power, nor in my sister's, to hinder his coming. When I heard he was here, and what he meditated, it was night, and our prison door was locked. It was not possible for me to caution you and the king against him, had I even (which I trust in God I had) courage and strength and will to do so. In the morning it was affirmed he had escaped, and--I was silent, that I might not plunge an erring unhappy soul into still greater misery."

"A serious case! a very serious case!" said the judge. "We must examine into all the circumstances of the affair."

While the examination was continued the commandant of the castle entered, and summoned the Drost to the king. AagÉ left the chamber with a deep sigh, and a sorrowing glance at the unhappy maidens, of whose acquittal and liberation from prison he now almost despaired. With feelings of deep emotion the Drost joined the Marsk in the ante-chamber, where he was to await the king's commands. They heard the king pacing with hasty steps up and down his private chamber.

"There are snakes in the grass, Drost!" said the Marsk. "Why did they not instantly cut off the heads of those hounds, without ceremony, and cast their high-born friend and protector into the tower. Now they have all 'scaped, the whole pack of them, and we have enough to do to be on our guard."

"Whom mean you, Sir Marsk?" asked AagÉ absently. "You have received letters I know?"

"Yes, in abundance--Brock and PapÆ got off for that once; they are scouring Jutland round, and stirring up the people about these priest-riots and the shutting of the churches, which all dread so much; just as if a church-door was a fortress gate with ramparts and towers, and had St. Paul himself for a porter. I thought truly, it was a bad business when those haughty nobles laid their heads together so often with the junker, and had slit napkins laid before their noses. I should have been right glad to have hewn the whole pack of them in pieces; but amid all our stupid ceremonies with trencher and napkin, and tattered clouts, we let fly the birds of prey, and the junker into the bargain, although he got a rent to hide which made his ears glowing red."

"How, Sir Marsk!" exclaimed AagÉ, a conjecture suddenly flashing across his mind. "You surely were not yourself his secret accuser?"

"You have hit it, Drost! I cared not much to keep the secret: had any one asked, my answer would have been ready, and my good sword with it, if required: proofs and such like frippery I had not, it is true--that was the worst of it; but, however, I had my conjectures and my own thoughts. I cannot abide that fellow, do you see--were he guiltless, and had he courage to defend his honour,--by the foul fiend! he would not have sat there as if upon thorns, and have hid that little rent. I was just going by the table, do you see? and saw how matters stood with those three mangy hounds. The junker's napkin lay so conveniently at hand, my blood was up, and it struck me the high-born junker would be the better for a little alarm."

"By your favour. Sir Marsk! it was a most rash proceeding; by acting thus, you have increased the misunderstanding between the king and his brother."

"So much the better; either keep with him or break with him--one or the other; nought comes of this truckling: but so far you are right--I should not have busied myself with those apish ceremonies, they better beseem all of you. I should rather have said it right out, and answered for it instantly with my hand on my neck:--but enough of this--Know ye Master Grand is here?"

"Grand! the Archbishop? Where?"

"At Copenhagen, and with a royal convoy. That was a piece of folly, also--You were, no doubt, one in council?"

"It was not deemed necessary," answered AagÉ, repressing his annoyance at the Marsk's offensive bluntness. "The counsel you so flatteringly attribute to me was not mine either. The state council and the king himself considered it good policy. The cardinal demanded it, and offered his mediation. If the archbishop becomes manageable, and recalls the ban, he, of course, could not come hither without an assurance of personal safety."

"Do ye not yet know that fellow better?" answered the Marsk. "Ere he becomes tractable, heaven and earth will pass away. In this respect, the king is not far behind him--but if he will be at the archbishop--by Satan! he should not have given him a convoy, and allowed him to set foot again upon Danish ground, though the whole state-council should get a colic from fright. Now, Grand and that accursed red hat sit like a pair of popes at Axelhuus, and none dare injure a hair of their heads: there they may begin the game, and stir us up the whole country in a trice. The cardinal hath already confirmed that confounded constitution of VeilÉ, and the Bishop of Roskild now causes all his churches to be shut. The storm will and must burst soon, and then all depends on how wind and current drive."

"Great Heavens! is it possible?" exclaimed AagÉ, in dismay. "Have you certain tidings, Sir Marsk? Doth the king know it?"

"I have brought him some doses on a fasting stomach in a couple of letters--that he hath swallowed them you may know from the clatter of his spurs and boot-heels--You brought him letters from Sweden, Drost! Love letters, doubtless, and fine ballads from his betrothed? Were there any tidings of a rational kind?"

"None of a very cheering description," answered AagÉ, looking with uneasiness towards the king's door. "What the princess hath imparted I know not; but the excellent Master Petrus can effect nothing with the state-council touching the king's marriage."

"S'Death!" said the Marsk, rubbing his hands. "Then it will not be easy to get to talk with him to-day. These are knots which it will be hard even for your state-policy to loose, my wise Sir Drost! but if I know the king well, he will give all your fine wisdom to the devil, and keep him to me and his good sword."

"Against rebels we may use the sword, Marsk, but neither against bishop nor pope, and just as little against the king's future brother-in-law," answered AagÉ. "We stand in need of discretion in this matter, and, above all, of the help of the Lord."

The door of the king's private chamber now opened, and the king himself looked out into the ante-chamber, and nodded. His countenance indicated passion and anxiety, and the Marsk, as well as the Drost, entered the chamber with a thoughtful aspect.

An hour afterwards Marsk Oluffsen departed with the Wordingborg troop of horse on his way to Jutland; and Drost AagÉ set out, attended by twelve knights and squires, as ambassador to the Swedish court, with a letter which inspired him with secret anxiety for his king and country.

Among the twelve knights appointed to accompany Drost AagÉ to Sweden, was Sir PallÉ's brother-in-law, the brave knight, Helmer Blaa, who had made himself famous by gaining his bride by dint of arms, and vanquishing Sir PallÉ and her six brothers, who had all fallen upon him at once. He was young, of a tall and well-proportioned figure, with sparkling brown eyes, and remarkably light and agile in his movements. He was a native of Fyen, of high birth; a great friend of the Drost's, and devoted heart and soul to the king.

"He rides in the saddle so free--"

was wont to be carolled forth by the lower orders whenever they saw Helmer riding his handsome Arabian horse, which flew with him swift as the wind, and was the gift of royal favour to him on his marriage-day the preceding summer.

Drost AagÉ rode for an hour in calm silence by the side of this gallant knight, on the road to KiÖge, from whence he was to embark for SkanÓr on the Swedish coast.

"Count Henrik goes with the king of course?" said Sir Helmer, at last breaking silence. "If one would visit a bishop's nest in these times, it must assuredly be with sword and coat of mail."

"Count Henrik stirs not from his side," answered AagÉ--"that he hath promised me with word and hand--I now go hence unwillingly; Grand's thirst for revenge, and the boldness of the outlaws know no bounds."

"That accursed KaggÉ! He made an end also of my fat seal of a brother-in-law--that lump of flesh, indeed, I accounted not much of; his miserable death, however, I have vowed to St. George to avenge, chiefly for my dear wife's sake. She had but that one brother left since I came to mishap with all the others; but it was done openly, and in honourable self-defence; she hath not even loved me the less either for that affair--but to fight by stealth, and with a poisoned weapon--faugh! 'Twas an accursed Italian trick--such was never before the usage here in the north. Are you quite certain the wretched assassin is dead and buried in good earnest, Sir Drost? The people have divers tales to tell. He who hath had no shame in his life would not die of shame, I should think--One hath seen ere this a cunning fox run from the trap and leave his tail behind him."

AagÉ started. "I saw him not after death," he answered; "but his end was certainly announced by the provost and Commendator of the monastery. There can surely be no doubt of the truth."

"The Commendator is a holy man of God, doubtless," replied Helmer, with an incredulous smile; "one ought not, indeed, to suspect him of deceit and treason, even though he be a good friend of Master Grand's, and might have wished to save the dishonoured life of one of so high and holy a race. I first heard that unbelieving gossip when the body was thrown into the carrion pit, and consumed with unslacked lime; it doubtless showed great caution and good care for the public health; but they will have it it was a corpse from the hospital of the monastery, with beard and eyebrows of good Danish boar bristles."

"Can it be possible!" exclaimed AagÉ. "Should he be alive and at liberty, he would then become a more pestilent foe than all the outlaws put together--Yon dishonoured miscreant is capable of any crime; he hath now hardly aught more to lose."

"Be that as it may," answered Helmer, "if KaggÉ be above ground, so is my arm and my good sword also--the Lord be praised for it!--and wherever I meet him, I am his man."

"If the miscreant is alive, and falls into our hands, we can but bind his hands and wash our own of the matter," answered AagÉ.

They now continued their journey in grave silence for another hour. Each time AagÉ thought of the unfortunate daughters of Marsk Stig in the maidens' tower a sigh burst from his heart; and whenever he felt the king's important letter within his vest it seemed to him as if he was oppressed by the future fate of king and country.

"We received but scanty orders," resumed Helmer Blaa again, seemingly wearied by the long silence and the Drost's reverie. "We were to learn the rest from you, Drost; but you seem to have left tongue and speech at Wordingborg."

"You know what is of most importance," answered AagÉ. "It concerns King Eric's highest happiness in this world. As matters stand now with the archbishop and pope, you may easily imagine there are great difficulties about the dispensation for his marriage; if we cannot prevail on King Birger and his state council to permit the marriage to take place ere St. John's Day, and that despite both pope and clergy, then--more should not be said," he added, in a lowered voice; "then I fear matters will stand badly, Sir Helmer."

"Not worse surely than with me when they threw hindrances in the way of my marriage!" answered Helmer. "How such difficulties may be got over our bold king knows full as well as I--" So saying, he gaily struck upon his clanking sword.

"That did very well with your brother-in-law, brave Helmer," said AagÉ. "It concerned only half a dozen of our worst knights. HERE state and kingdom are in question. The king is of a hasty temper, you know; he is only but too ready to imitate your bold manner of wooing; but if he is to win his bride by war and battle, there will be a bloody bridal here in the summer, to as little pleasure for Denmark as for Sweden."

"There you may perhaps be in the right, Drost," answered Helmer. "There is a difference between my brothers-in-law and the king's, I own; but if honour and our king's fortune in love are now at stake, assuredly no Danish knight will hesitate to become his bridegroom's man with sword and lance, however hard one might be put to it. This much we must allow to the Swede--he ever fights like a brave fellow. Swedish knighthood yields not to us in manhood; but when we sing,

'For Eric the youthful king!'

the heart of no Danish man will sink below his belt, I know, were the Swede ten times as strong, and had they ten Thorkild Knudsons in council and camp."

"Let us not talk too loud of these things," said AagÉ, in a low voice, and allowing the other knights to pass by, while he and Helmer slackened their pace. "Honourable warfare is indeed ever to be preferred to a deceitful and shameful peace," he continued; "but the Lord and St. George forbid it should come to a breach now, just when love and good will seem in truth desirous to make us and our brave neighbours friends. Could these unhappy scruples be removed I should deem both Denmark and Sweden fortunate indeed. If a noble Swedish princess sits on the throne of Denmark's queens, and a Danish one on that of Sweden, we might then hope to see extinguished the last spark of ancient national hate and fraternal enmity. We may say what we please in our pride, and boast of Danish greatness in the days of Canute the Great and the Valdemars; Scandinavians were, however, brethren in the beginning; we have shared honour and fame with each other all over the world, among Longobards and Goths and Northmen; and we must combine together again, if aught great is to be achieved by the powers of the north."

"It may be so," answered Sir Helmer. "I am well nigh of your opinion, especially since it hath now come to something more than mere state policy and cold calculations with these betrothings of royal children. This one at first was but a politic scheme of Queen Agnes and Drost Hessel; in such plans there are seldom any truth and honesty. Strange enough it should turn out as it hath done; for every man, both here and in Sweden's land, knows that our young king is almost more enamoured than a Sir Tristan or Florez in the new books of chivalry; and the fair Princess Ingeborg--here they already call her our second Dagmar--although we have but heard she is pious and mild, and hath pretty blue eyes and beautiful golden hair, like Dagmar. I shall be well pleased to see her," he added. "No Swedish or Danish knights can ever commend her sufficiently, and she is, indeed, well nigh praised to the disparagement of our own lovely ladies--that vexes me I own."

"I saw her at Helsingborg, at the bridal of Count Gerhard and Queen Agnes," said AagÉ, and his pensive eye sparkled. "She was then still almost a child; but she hath since ever seemed to me like one of God's holy angels, destined to diffuse the blessings of peace and love through this land and kingdom. There is but one female form in the world which I could compare with her, or perhaps even exalt above her in fair and noble presence," he added with emotion; but suddenly paused and cleared his throat with some embarrassment.

"Now, out with it, Drost AagÉ; I am not jealous," said Sir Helmer, with a pleased and proud look. "You mean doubtless my fair young wife--It is worthy a true knight to admire the beauty of a young and fair woman in all reverence and honour. She hath well nigh the fairest presence of any woman here in the country; every one says so who sees her, both here and in Fyen; and I have nought against it. I know assuredly she holds me dearest of all, although I came to mishap, as you know, both with her uncle and those stiff-necked brothers. She is now at my castle, longing to have me back again; if it please the Lord and St. George, she shall soon hear a good report of me, if there is anything to be done in earnest."

Drost AagÉ's usually pale cheek had become crimson. "You guessed wrong, however, this once Sir Helmer"--he said, with a smile; "the lady I thought of was another, without disparagement to your fair young wife. But, if we would reach KjÖgÉ ere midnight, we must ride faster. In a steady trot, and at the long run, I think my Danish horse will be a match for your Arabian." He spurred his horse, and Sir Helmer hastened to redeem the honour of his favourite Arabian, while he shook his head at the Drost's want of discernment in the matter of female beauty.