25/34 As for the vow you made, the ealdorman says that it could not have been better done. Forgive me for troubling you about it at all." He held out his broad hand, and for a moment I hesitated about taking it. He bore his father's name, but in a flash it came to me that I was wrong. We were both children when the ill deed was wrought, and I was no heathen to hold a blood feud against all the family of the wrongdoer. He did not even know that one of us lived, and, as the king had told me, I knew that he was prepared to make amends. |