"Take them up and make ready to cast them into the water." Now I wondered where Ottar was.

Surely he must be back with more men soon.
"Aye, throw them in, and let us be going," said one or two, for they had been asking Brand many questions, and now were eager to leave the place and its terrors.
So one brawny Dane took my feet and another my shoulders and began to lift me; while I could not so much as struggle, so tightly was I bound.
"Hold!" said the leader.

"Will you throw away a sword like that ?" It was certain now that they were in haste, for they had forgotten to strip me in their wish to have done.
They set me down again, and that was the saving of us.

For even as they loosed their grip on me, one who stood near the water cried out in a sharp voice: "Listen--what is that!" And they all stayed motionless as had we when the bird scared us.
There was a sound of wondrously sweet singing from away across the mere.

Such a voice it was as I had never heard before, neither like the singing of man or woman, nor had the song words that I could catch.
The Danes forgot us as they heard that, and huddled together in twos and threes, looking out to whence the sound came.