The Brothers Lionheart

I cut thick slices of meat and we ate soup and bread and smoked meat; we ate and ate and ate. No one said anything, not for a long white, then at last Jonathan said:

“Oh, to have had enough to eat! I ‘d almost forgotten what it was like to be full!”

I became more and more pleased that I had come to Wild Rose Valley; it felt more and more right and good. Then I had to tell properly about everything that had happened to me from the moment I had ridden away from home until Veder and Kader had helped me into Wild Rose Valley. I had already told them most of it, but Jonathan wanted to hear it several times, especially about Veder and Kader. He laughed about that, just as I had thought he would. And Mathias did too.

“They’re not all that bright, those Tengilmen,” said Mathias. “Although they think they are.”

“No, even I could trick them,” I said. “Just think if they’d known that the little brother they wanted to get hold of so much was the very one they’d help into Wild Rose Valley and let go just like that.”

When I had said it, I began to think. I hadn’t thought about it before, but now I asked:

“However did you get into Wild Rose Valley, Jonathan?”

Jonathan laughed.

“I leapt my way in.”

“What do you mean leapt...surely not with Grim?”

“Yes,” said Jonathan. “I haven’t any other horse.”

I had seen and knew what great leaps Jonathan could do on Grim, but to leap over the wall around Wild Rose Valley was more than any human being could believe.

“You see, the wall wasn’t quite finished then,” said Jonathan. “Not everywhere. Not to its full height, though it was high enough, you can be sure of that.”

“Yes, but the guards!” I said. “Did no one see you?”

Jonathan took a bite of bread, then laughed again.

“Yes, I had a whole swarm of them after me, and Grim got an arrow in his rump. But I got away, and a kind person hid both Grim and me in his barn. And that night he brought me here to Mathias. Now you know everything.”

“No, you don’t know everything at all,” said Mathias. “You don’t know that the people here in the valley sing songs about that ride and about Jonathan.