God demanded they make good on their promise. And He was punishing Sigrid for her ambivalence in that matter. What had happened could not be interpreted any other way.
The next day, sorrow hung heavy over Arnäs. In the farmyards and the castle courtyard, no laughter or squabbling was heard from playing children. The house thralls moved like silent forest beasts in the hall, and several of them had a hard time hiding their tears.
Magnus was at a loss as to how he would present the weighty news to his youngest son. But while Sigrid was busy packing for the journey, he took Arn up to the tower where they could be alone. Arn, who still did not understand what was going to happen to him, looked more pensively curious than afraid.
Magnus lifted him up onto one of the arrow slits so he could look at his son face to face. Then it occurred to him that Arn might be afraid of this high ledge from which he had plummeted all the way into the realm of the dead.
But Arn showed no fear. Instead he leaned out over the parapet so he could look straight down at where he had fallen, since his father seemed to be lost in his own thoughts.
Magnus carefully pulled Arn back and embraced him, and then began his difficult explanation. He pointed out over the district, where as far as the eye could see work was being done on the spring planting. Then he said that all this would be Eskil's realm one day when he was no longer alive, but that Arn's inheritance would be an even greater kingdom—the kingdom of God here on earth.
Arn didn't seem to understand his words. Perhaps to the young boy's ears it sounded like the usual church talk when people wanted to sound solemn and said things that meant nothing for a while before they ventured to say something that really did have meaning. Magnus had to start over.
He talked about the difficult time when Arn was not with them among the living, and how he and Sigrid in their despair had promised God to give their son to God's work on earth if only he would be allowed to come back to life. Then they had hesitated in fulfilling their promise, but now God had punished them harshly for this disobedience, so the promise had to be honored at once.
Arn slowly began to sense that something unpleasant was coming. And his father immediately confirmed this when he revealed what was going to happen. Arn must now travel to Varnhem with his mother and Erlend. There he would enter the cloister as an oblate, which is what children were called who entered the service of God. God would assuredly watch over him, just as his patron saint, Saint Bernard, always did, for God most certainly had great plans for him.
Now Arn began to understand. His parents were going to offer him to God. Not like in the olden days, not like in the sagas from the heathen times, but they would still offer him to God. And he could do nothing at all about it, since children always had to obey their father and their mother. He started to cry, and no matter how ashamed he was to cry in front of his father, he could not stop.
Magnus took him in his arms and tried awkwardly to console him with words about God's good will and protection, about Saint Bernard who would watch over him, and anything else he could think of. But the boy's little body shook with sobs in his embrace, and Magnus felt that he too, God forbid, would eventually show his sorrow.
Then the wagons came driving up and the retainers reined in the horses as they waited in the courtyard before the door to the longhouse. Sigrid came out first with her face covered and went over to the lead wagon. Then Erlend emerged, looked about shyly, and slipped into the second wagon.
Last came Magnus with the two small boys, who were holding each other and crying, clinging to each other as if the strength of their little child-arms might prevent what was going to happen. Magnus separated them gently but firmly, lifted up Arn and carried him over to Sigrid's wagon and set him down next to his mother. Then he took a deep breath and slapped the horses so that the wagon started with an abrupt lurch while he turned around and walked back toward the door, making a vain attempt to catch Eskil, who managed to escape.
Magnus went inside and closed the door behind him without turning around. Eskil ran behind the wagons for a while, crying, until he fell and helplessly watched his brother vanish in the dust from the road.
Arn cried bitterly as he knelt in the wagon and looked back toward Arnäs, which grew smaller and smaller in the distance. He understood that he would never see his home again, and it was impossible for Sigrid to console him.
Sigrid's visit came at an inopportune time for Father Henri. His old friend and colleague from Clairvaux, Father Stéphan, who was now the prior in Alvastra, was visiting so that they could discuss the difficult situation that had arisen with Queen Kristina, who was stirring up trouble and inciting the people against the monks at Varnhem. Naturally Stéphan was the one with whom Father Henri most wanted to discuss complicated questions. They had been together ever since their youth, and they were part of the first group that had received the terrible orders from holy Saint Bernard himself, that they should depart for the cold, barbaric North to start a daughter cloister. It had been a long journey, horrendously cold and gloomy.
Father Stéphan had already read the account of the miracle from Arnäs and was familiar with Sigrid's problem. To be sure, both at Alvastra and Varnhem, as well as in the mother cloister in Burgundy, they had stopped accepting oblates, and the thought behind the change was logical and easy to understand. The free will of a human being to choose either God's way or the path of perdition was eliminated if they accepted small children and raised them in the cloister. Such children would already be molded into monks by the age of twelve, since they knew no other life than that of the cloister. Such an upbringing might rob the children of their free will, and therefore it was a wise decision no longer to accept oblates.
On the other hand, the miracle at Arnäs could not be ignored, because it was definitely no small event. If the parents had promised their child to God at the most critical moment, and they did so clearly and openly, and God had then let the miracle happen, the parents' promise had to be construed as so sanctified that it would be impossible to break.
But what if they, God's servants, now made the promise impossible to fulfill by refusing to accept the boy because the custom of oblates had been abolished?
Then the parents might be released from their promise. But in that case, the monks at the same time would be placing themselves, knowingly and willingly, above the clearly manifested will of God. That could not happen. So they had to accept the boy.
And how should they respond to Fru Sigrid? It seemed that God had punished her severely for her ambivalence, and now she was here wanting to do penance. There was also the much bigger question of whether the monks might simply have to abandon Varnhem, return home to Clairvaux, and from there seek to have Kristina and even her husband excommunicated so that they could be rid of the problem and start over again. Factoring in travel time and everything else, that process might take a couple of years.