Fridleif surprised them while on a reckless raid, and drove them all back for refuge to the stronghold; he also seized the immensely powerful horse, whose rider, in the haste of his panic, had left it on the hither side of the river in order to fly betimes; for he durst not take it with him over the bridge.
Then Fridleif proclaimed that he would pay the weight of the dead body in gold to any man who slew one of those brothers.

The hope of the prize stimulated some of the champions of the king; and yet they were fired not so much with covetousness as with valour; so, going secretly to Fridleif, they promised to attempt the task, vowing to sacrifice their lives if they did not bring home the severed heads of the robbers.
Fridleif praised their valour and their vows, but bidding the onlookers wait, went in the night to the river, satisfied with a single companion.
For, not to seem better provided with other men's valour than with his own, he determined to forestall their aid by his own courage.

Thereupon he crushed and killed his companion with a shower of flints, and flung his bloodless corpse into the waves, having dressed it in his own clothes; which he stripped off, borrowing the cast-off garb of the other, so that when the corpse was seen it might look as if the king had perished.

He further deliberately drew blood from the beast on which he had ridden, and bespattered it, so that when it came back into camp he might make them think he himself was dead.

Then he set spur to his horse and drove it into the midst of the eddies, crossed the river and alighted, and tried to climb over the rampart that screened the stronghold by steps set up against the mound.