I did not remember seeing this man come in, but that was the business of the hall steward, unless there was trouble that needed the house-carles.
Ina frowned at this unmannerly coming at first, but his brow cleared as he heard the cry of the man.

He signed to Elfrida to wait for a moment, and looked kindly at the thrall before him.
"Justice, Lord," the man said again.
"Justice you shall have, my poor churl," answered the king gently.
"But this is not quite the time to go into the matter.

Sit you down again, and presently you shall tell all to Owen the marshal, and thus it will come to me, and you shall see me again in the morning." "Nay, but I will have justice here and now," the man said doggedly, and yet with some sort of appeal in his voice.
"Is it so pressing?
Well, then, speak on.

Maybe the vow that I shall make will be to see you righted." And so the king sat down again, and the lady Elfrida waited, resting one hand on the table at the end of the dais farthest from me, and holding the golden cup yet in the other.
"What shall be done to the man who slays my brother ?" the thrall cried.
And the king answered: "If he has slain him by craft, he shall die; but if in fair fight and for what men deem reason, then he shall pay the full weregild that is due according to my dooms." Then said the man, and his voice minded me of Owen's in some way: "But and if he slew him openly in cold blood, for no wrong done to himself ?" "A strange doing," said the king--"but he should die therefor." The king leant forward, with his elbow on the table to hear the better, and the man was close to the lowest step to be near him.

It seemed that he was very wroth, for his right hand clutched the front of his rough jerkin fiercely, and his voice was harsh and shaking.
"It is your own word, Ina of Wessex, that the man who has slain my brother in this wise shall die.