Sintram and His Companions

MP3 Audio CD. Sintram and His Companions

CHAPTER 1



In the high castle of Drontheim many knights sat assembled to hold
council for the weal of the realm; and joyously they caroused together
till midnight around the huge stone table in the vaulted hall. A rising
storm drove the snow wildly against the rattling windows; all the oak
doors groaned, the massive locks shook, the castle-clock slowly
and heavily struck the hour of one. Then a boy, pale as death, with
disordered hair and closed eyes, rushed into the hall, uttering a wild
scream of terror. He stopped beside the richly carved seat of the mighty
Biorn, clung to the glittering knight with both his hands, and shrieked
in a piercing voice, “Knight and father! father and knight! Death and
another are closely pursuing me!”

An awful stillness lay like ice on the whole assembly, save that the boy
screamed ever the fearful words. But one of Biorn’s numerous retainers,
an old esquire, known by the name of Rolf the Good, advanced towards the
terrified child, took him in his arms, and half chanted this prayer: “O
Father, help Thy servant! I believe, and yet I cannot believe.” The boy,
as if in a dream, at once loosened his hold of the knight; and the good
Rolf bore him from the hall unresisting, yet still shedding hot tears
and murmuring confused sounds.

The lords and knights looked at one another much amazed, until the
mighty Biorn said, wildly and fiercely laughing, “Marvel not at that
strange boy. He is my only son; and has been thus since he was five
years old: he is now twelve. I am therefore accustomed to see him so;
though, at the first, I too was disquieted by it. The attack comes upon
him only once in the year, and always at this same time. But forgive me
for having spent so many wo