Eyes were now used to the shifting twilight, the pale gray dazzle of the doorway. Eodan and Tjorr stood side by side, just in front of the rear support timber they had erected. Blood ran from their arms and painted their breasts; blood stained the sweat on them, and it was not all Roman this time. But men lay stricken before them; Eodan did not count how many. He looked across three slippery red yards of trampled earth and saw five men still on their feet. None were unwounded. But weariness shuddered in him. His sword, nicked and blunted, had not bitten well; it was an iron bar in his hand, heavy as sorrow. He could barely hear the deep hoarse breathing of Tjorr, his own heartbeat and thirsty-throated breath were so loud. Now that all the hunters were inside his den, it was time to destroy them. Flavius crouched by the door. "Form a line!" he rapped. "Wall to wall! Drive them back and cut them down!" Four Roman shields filled that narrow room, Flavius standing behind. Eodan raised his weapon and called, "Will you not try the edge of this even once, murderer?" Flavius screamed. For one blink of time, over the advancing shields and helmets, through the wintry gloom, Eodan looked upon madness. It came to him that he should not have taunted an unbearable grief. The gods are too just. Flavius raised his sword and flung it above the soldiers. Eodan felt it strike him in the head. He staggered back, suddenly blinded with his own blood. The pain seared through his skull until he stood in a world that was all great whirling flame. He thought as he toppled, This also must a king have known, what it is to be slain. The Romans cried their victory and moved in on Tjorr. The Alan threw down his shield, picked Eodan up with one arm, and swung his hammer. Even as it hit the pillar he had raised, he leaped into the pit and the tunnel beyond. The timber slipped sideways. The piece it had helped carry, running lengthwise, fell. The thin branches cracked, and the roof of stones came down. Eodan heard it dimly, from far away. Now the sky has been shattered, he thought, and gods and demons die in the wreck of their war. A star whirled by me and hissed into the sea. He lay in the tunnel, as though in a womb, while the stones buried his hunters. There followed a silence that tolled. He heard Tjorr and Phryne calling to each other in utter night. Her hands groped for him. He lay in her hands and let the pain reach full tide. It ebbed again. Tjorr dug a few feet upward. Breaking out into the open, he reached down, hauled forth Eodan and Phryne and whistled at what he saw. "Best I catch the horses," he said awkwardly. "You can see to him, can you not?" She kissed her man for answer. Eodan looked up at the sky. "Lie still," whispered Phryne. "Lie still. It is well. We are safe." The wind blew softly, almost warm. The first snow fell on his face. "Have I been badly hurt?" he asked.