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prayers.”
    â€œPoor soul,” sighed Rhona. “Was anyone with him when he died?”
    â€œI was at his bedside, my lady,” the monk answered. “He did not awaken from his sleep. I thought to rouse him at sunset to give him a drink of the potion, but his spirit had flown.”
    We went in to find a veritable crowd around the dead man’s bed—serving-men and -maids mostly, a few vassals, and half a dozen monks in attendance with Emlyn. They were standing with their heads bowed, hands folded, as the good abbot softly intoned the prayers for the soul of the newly departed. Rhona and I came to stand behind the monks, and listened until Emlyn concluded his prayer, whereupon the brothers arranged themselves in order around the dead man’s bed, raised it, and began carrying it from the hall.
    Moving to my father’s side, I said, “I am sorry he’s gone. I cannot help feeling we should have done more for him.”
    Murdo shook his head. “He wanted nothing from us in his life, but to be allowed to die in peace. As he asked, so he was given.” He appeared about to say more, but turned away abruptly, following the monks out into the yard.
    My mother laid her hand on my sleeve as she passed by.“There is an end to all things,” she whispered, giving my arm a comforting squeeze. “Let this also end.”
    I wondered at her words, and would have asked her what she meant, but she moved on quickly, and Rhona came up beside me. “It is sad,” she sighed.
    â€œOnly a few days ago, no one cared whether he was alive or dead,” I reminded her. “Nothing much has changed.”
    Rhona looked sideways at me. “But everything has changed,” she said.
    Women, I think, feel these things differently. I do not pretend to understand them.
    Torf’s body was taken to the nearby monastery where it was washed and wrapped in a shroud of clean linen, and prepared for burial. I had long heard it said—and now know it to be true—that the Roman Church is bereft in the face of death. The rites attending a soul’s passing are solemn and severe; the Roman priests make no effort to lighten the burden of grief to be borne by the mourners. It is almost as if they view death as a punishment for the audacity of having accepted the Gifting Giver’s boon of life, or as the sorry and inevitable end of sinful flesh.
    The Célé Dé, however, see in death a friend whom the All Wise has entrusted with delivering his children from the pain and travail of mortal existence into the eternal paradise of his gracious kingdom. When bodies and hearts become too sick or broken to go on, Brother Death comes to lead the suffering spirit away to its rightful home. Accordingly, this journey is accompanied with laments and dirges for those left behind, but with songs of praise and happiness also for the one who has gone ahead.
    While the body was being prepared for burial, Murdo determined that a grave should be dug in the corner of the churchyard. Although, as he said, Torf-Einar had not been one of the Lord’s better sheep, he was still a member of the flock. I offered to help with this chore, but my father would not have it any other way but that he should dig the grave himself.
    At dusk, the corpse was brought out and borne to thegravesite in the churchyard where most of the settlement’s inhabitants had gathered. The sun had set with a fine and radiant brilliance, touching the clouds with fire, and setting the sky alight. In the golden twilight, the linen grave clothes gleamed like rarest samite, and the faces of both monks and mourners glowed. We sang a lament for a departed warrior, and then Abbot Emlyn led us in a Psalm; he said a prayer, following which he invited those closest to the deceased to toss a handful of earth into the grave. Murdo stepped forward, picked up a fistful of dirt, and let it fall; and I followed his example. I suppose, despite our