Then sweetly Regin answered: "Hard task-master art thou, But lo, a blade of battle that shall surely please thee now! Two moons are clean departed since thou lookedst toward the sky And sawest the dim white circle amid the cloud-flecks lie; And night and day have I laboured; and the cunning of old days Hath surely left my right-hand if this sword thou shalt not praise." And indeed the hilts gleamed glorious with many a dear-bought stone, And down the fallow edges the light of battle shone; Yet Sigurd's eyes shone brighter, nor yet might Regin face Those eyes of the heart of the Volsungs; but trembled in his place As Sigurd cried: "O Regin, thy kin of the days of old Were an evil and treacherous folk, and they lied and murdered for gold; And now if thou wouldst bewray me, of the ancient curse beware, And set thy face as the flint the bale and the shame to bear: For he that would win to the heavens, and be as the Gods on high Must tremble nought at the road, and the place where men-folk die." White leaps the blade in his hand and gleams in the gear of the wall, And he smites, and the oft-smitten edges on the beaten anvil fall: But the life of the sword departed, and dull and broken it lay On the ashes and flaked-off iron, and no word did Sigurd say, But strode off through the door of the stithy and went to the Hall of Kings, And was merry and blithe that even mid all imaginings. But when the morrow was come he went to his mother and spake: "The shards, the shards of the sword, that thou gleanedst for my sake In the night on the field of slaughter, in the tide when my father fell, Hast thou kept them through sorrow and joyance? hast thou warded them trusty and well? Where hast thou laid them, my mother?" Then she looked upon him and said: "Art thou wroth, O Sigurd my son, that such eyes are in thine head? And wilt thou be wroth with thy mother? do I withstand thee at all?" "Nay," said he, "nought am I wrathful, but the days rise up like a wall Betwixt my soul and the deeds, and I strive to rend them through. And why wilt thou fear mine eyen? as the sword lies baleful and blue E'en 'twixt the lips of lovers, when they swear their troth thereon, So keen are the eyes ye have fashioned, ye folk of the days agone; For therein is the light of battle, though whiles it lieth asleep. Now give me the sword, my mother, that Sigmund gave thee to keep." She said: "I shall give it thee gladly, for fain shall I be of thy praise When thou knowest my careful keeping of that hope of the earlier days."