Her servants asked the reason why she fell so suddenly; and she declared that the refuge of the sons of Harald was inscrutable; for their wondrous might qualified even the most awful effects of her spells.

Thus she was content with a slight benefit, and could not bear to await a greater reward at the king's hands.

After this Ragnar, finding that the belief concerning himself and his wards was becoming rife in common talk, took them, both away into Funen.

Here he was taken by Frode, and confessed that he had put the young men in safe keeping; and he prayed the king to spare the wards whom he had made fatherless, and not to think it a piece of good fortune to be guilty of two unnatural murders.

By this speech he changed the king's cruelty into shame; and he promised that if they attempted any plots in their own land, he would give information to the king.