The Brothers Lionheart
“If everyone were like you,” said Orvar, “then evil would reign forever.”
But then I said that if everyone were like Jonathan, there wouldn’t be any evil.
Then I didn’t say anything else, for the rest of the evening, except when Mathias came and tucked me in. Then I whispered to him:
“I’m frightened, Mathias.”
Mathias patted me and said:
“So am I.”
All the same Jonathan had to promise Orvar that he would ride around in the confusion of the battle to give other people the courage to do what he himself could not or would not do.
“The people of Wild Rose Valley must see you,” said Orvar. “They must see both of us.”
Then Jonathan said:
“Well, if I must, I must.”
But I saw how pale he was in the light of the one little candle in the kitchen.
We had to leave Grim and Fyalar in the forest with Elfrida, when we had come back from Katla Cavern. But it had been decided that Sofia was to bring them with her when she rode through the main gate on the day of the battle.
What I was to do had also been decided. I was to do nothing, only wait until it was all over. Jonathan had said that. I was to sit all alone at home in the kitchen and wait.
No one slept much that night.
Then the morning came.
Yes, then the morning came and, with it, the day of the battle. Oh, how sick at heart I was that day! I saw and heard more than enough of blood and cries, for they were fighting on the slopes below Mathias’s house. I saw Jonathan riding around, the storm tearing at his hair, and all about him nothing but fighting and flashing swords and whistling spears and flying arrows and cries and cries; and I said to Fyalar, if Jonathan dies, then I want to die too.
Yes, Fyalar was with me in the kitchen. I had thought of not telling anyone about it, but I had to have him there. I couldn’t be alone, I just couldn’t. Fyalar also looked out of the window at what was happened on the slopes below. Then he whinnied.
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There was once an honest journeyman tailor, by name Labakan, who learned his trade with an excellent master in Alexandria. It could not be said that Labakan was unhandy with the needle; on the contrary, he could make excellent work: moreover, one would have done him injustice to have called him lazy. Nevertheless, his companions knew not what to make of him, for he would often sew for hours together so rapidly that the needle would glow in his hand, and the thread smoke, and that none could equal him.
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