“The champion Bödvar went into the hall of Hrolf Kraki, and sat down near the door. When he had been there for a short time he heard a noise from the corner next to it, and saw that a man’s hand, very black, extended from a large heap of bones which lay there. He walked up to it and asked who was in the heap of bones; he was answered, timidly: ‘I am called Hött, good Bökki.’[203] Bödvar said: ‘Why art thou here? and what art thou doing?’ Hött answered: ‘I make me a shield-burgh, my good Bökki.’ Bödvar took hold of him and pulled him out of the heap of bones. Hött shouted loudly: ‘Now thou wantest me to be killed; I had prepared myself so well for defence before, and now thou hast torn my shield-burgh asunder....” Bödvar took him and carried him out of the hall to a lake in the neighbourhood; and few saw it, and he washed him all over his body. Bödvar then went to the seat he had been sitting in before, and led Hött with him, and seated him at his side. Hött was so frightened that all his limbs trembled, but he thought nevertheless that this man was going to help him. Evening approached and the men came into the hall, and the champions of Hrólf saw that Hött was seated on the bench, and they thought the man who had done that had been rather shameless. Hött had a dismal look when he saw his acquaintances the hirdmen, for he had only met with unkindness from them; he wished greatly to live and go back to his bone-heap, but Bödvar held him so that he could not run away.... The hirdmen threw first small bones across the floor to Bödvar and Hött; Bödvar pretended not to see this. Hött was so frightened that he took neither food nor drink, expecting to be hit every moment; he said to Bödvar: ‘My good Bökki, now a large joint-bone is going to hit thee, and it is meant to harm us.’ Bödvar told him to be silent, and parried it with the hollow of his hand; he got hold of the joint-bone, with the leg attached, and threw it back at the man who cast it, and into his face, so strongly that he was slain. The hirdmen became much alarmed. The news reached King Hrolf and his champions in the castle that a tall man had come to the hall and killed one of the hirdmen, and they wanted him to be slain. The king asked if the hirdman had been killed without cause. ‘Almost so,’ they said. When he heard the truth, he said: ‘The man shall not be slain; you have got into a bad habit of throwing bones at harmless men; it is a disgrace to me, and a great shame for you to do such things. I have often spoken of this before, but you have taken no heed; call the man whom you have now assailed, that I may know who he is.’ Bödvar came before the king, and became his hirdman” (Hrolf Kraki’s Saga, c. 43).