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he faithfully served, King Uabhar of Slievmordhu. Thorgild’s son had been privy to certain tales of savagery, and he was not blinded to Uabhar’s character by filial loyalty, as his friend Kieran was. The King of Slievmordhu, Halvdan privately judged, was two-faced; dangerously so.
    Continuing to ponder these matters, he returned to the warmth of the lodge’s main chamber.
    Illuminated by radiance brightening through the cracks of the shutters in addition to the flicker of lanterns and firelight, Conall Gearnach was stillseated at the table, finishing the last crumbs of breakfast. Halvdan rested troubled eyes upon the man who had rescued him from harm and avenged his abduction. Gearnach’s unhesitating altruism had moved him profoundly. As the knight rose from his seat and made to ascend the stairs to his bed-chamber, Halvdan addressed him quietly, his voice steady.
    “Conall Gearnach, I shall never forget your deeds of this past night,” said the prince. “I will be your friend for my life.”
    The knight hesitated, clearly taken aback. His cheeks reddened. “I pray thee sir, say no more!” he murmured. “There is no need for gratitude. I merely did my duty.”
    “I saw also how valiantly you fought throughout the entire skirmish,” Halvdan continued, his visage graven with earnestness, “and I have not forgotten that from my boyhood days you have upheld fairness and justice without faltering. When I was a lad I wished to be such a one as you. That, I still hope for. In my judgment there is no man more just and valiant, more honorable and skillful than you. In my childhood you tutored me, and all the lessons you taught me are the ones I now know best, and love best, such as the names of the trees, the most cunning dueling tricks, the way to tame horses without violence, how to find food in the wild forest.”
    “Nay,” Gearnach said, executing an awkward bow. “Nay, lord, you have the wrong man. It cannot be myself you are speaking of.” He did not add,
When I was about to die under the Marauders knife you risked your life to save mine. No man has ever done me such a service
—
no peasant, let alone a prince.
The warrior did not utter these words but Halvdan read them in the depths of his eyes. He gave a small nod, and an unspoken understanding passed between the two men.
    The prince made himself smile at the knight’s halfhearted jest. “Pray go now to your rest, Gearnach. I will detain you no longer.”
    Having bowed a second time, the knight departed.

    Whether brought on by recent tribulations, or by the continual thunder of wind-churned waves upon the cliffs and the rattling of shutters and panes, or by the rich sauces served at dinner, that night the slumber of Prince Ronin of Slievmordhu was greatly disturbed by visions of the past.
    Some weeks before he had set out for Grïmnørsland, thousands of his countrymen had assembled just outside the city of Cathair Rua, at the commandof his father. King Uabhar had been inspired to create a new feast-day in Slievmordhu—the Day of Heroes. As the first of these feast-days had dawned, the cadets, the reserves and the standing army had gathered in the Fair Field, lining up behind the ranks of the famous Knights of the Brand, to renew their oath of allegiance to king and country. The troops were outfitted in dress uniform, the harness worn only for parades; ornate, brightly polished, never dented by battle—indeed, during the last couple of centuries or so of peace in Tir they had only waged real conflict against Marauders or unseelie wights. The locks of the Slievmordhuan soldiers—ranging in tone from light brown and chestnut to the color of walnuts—streamed from beneath shining helms. Their gauntletclad fists firmly gripped the poles of their numerous standards, which bristled into the blue sky like a mass of gigantic bulrushes. From the tops of these poles long, tapering pennants rippled, as bright and lively as fishes swimming upstream. The