The Brothers Lionheart

“This is the place, Fyalar,” I said. “Here we’re safe from the wolves.”

It was true. No wolf could come climbing down from the mountains since they were too high, and no wolf could come climbing out of the depths, for the cliffs were too steep.

If he were to come, the wolf, then he would have to make his way like us along the precipices on that wretched path. But they were probably not that cunning, I decided.

Then I saw something really good. There was a deep cleft right in the mountainside. A cave, you could almost call it, for there were great blocks of rock like a roof. In that cave we could sleep safely, with a roof over our heads as well.

Someone had rested in this glade before me, for there were ashes left from a campfire. I almost like lighting one, but I didn’t have the energy. Now I only wanted to sleep. So I took Fyalar by the reins and led him into the cave. It was a deep cave, and I said to Fyalar:

“There’s room for fifteen like you here.”

He whinnied a little. Perhaps he was homesick for his stable. I asked his forgiveness for dragging him into this kind of hardship, and I gave him some oats and said goodnight to him again. Then I rolled myself up in my blanket in the darkest, darkest corner of the cave and fell asleep like a log, before I had time scare myself one little bit.

I don’t know how long I had been asleep, but suddenly I sat up and was wide-awake. I heard voices, and I heard horses whinnying outside my cave.

It was enough. The great wild terror swept over me again. Who knows, perhaps those people talking out there were worse than any wolves?

“Drive the horses into the cave, then we’ll have more room,”

I heard a voice say, and then two horses clattered inside. They whinnied when they noticed Fyalar, and Fyalar whinnied back, but then they were quiet and they must have become friends in the darkness. They people outside couldn’t have realized that it was a strange horse they had heard, for they calmly went on talking to each other. Why had they come?