“At the least, as ye are honourable men, save me this dishonour. Let me not die as a pig, but as a man. I have dropped my magic wand; therefore, O Brian, I pray of thee to take thine, and with it restore me to mine own form.” “That shall be done,” said the chief, adding scornfully, “for sure it is an easier thing for me to kill a man than a pig.” But no sooner was Kian a man again than he laughed mockingly. “Why do you laugh thus?” asked Ur. “I laugh because I have outwitted ye at the last, ye sons of Turenn. What is death to me who have a dust of grey hairs over my once black locks, or is death indeed a thing at any time to fear overmuch? Ill as it would befit me to die as a pig, still more ill would it be because of that which follows death.” “Speak,” said Ur, though in his heart both he and his brothers knew what Kian was about to say. “I have outwitted ye, as I have said; for if as a pig I had been slain by Brian of the Oak Shaft, then ye would have had no other eric to pay for me than the eric of a pig, but now ye shall have to pay the eric of a man, and upon that the eric of a father of grown sons, and upon that the fatherhood eric of each son, and upon that the eric of a great lord, and upon that the eric of the broken honour of my son Lu of the Long Hand. And I tell ye this, that never has there been, nor ever will be, so great an eric as that which ye shall have to pay for this deed of thine, so that in the years to come men shall speak of the eric of the sons of Turenn as the most difficult and the worst that was ever paid in Erin.” “That may be,” said Brian sullenly, “but we shall slay thee here, in this waste place, and none shall know when death came to thee, or where thou liest, and for all that thy son Lu is Lu the Ildanna, he shall seek in vain to know where the worms make merry upon thee.” “In the shadow of death I see clearly, and I see that death will not put his silence upon me till Lu has learned the evil deed that has been done.” “Spare him,” urged Urba, “for of a surety he is already sore wounded, and he did no more than seek to escape us. It would be well, Brian, not to have this man’s blood upon us.” “Spare him,” pleaded Ur, “for innocent blood is an ill thing to spill. This man did not come upon us with lifted spear or sword, but, seeing that we were three and he one only, sought to escape. It is not a knightly deed to take the life of a stricken man, and of one who asks for mercy.” “We will slay him,” said Brian sullenly. “Remember this,” pleaded Ur, “that if we slay him, Urba and I must pay the penalty along with thee, and that it is a hard thing upon us who would fain spare this man.” Brian laughed. “If ye and Urba fear the eric, ye may go hence at once. I will do my own slaying. But ye forget that the sons of Turenn are under _geas_ to have no quarrel that is not the quarrel of each, and to fight no fight wherein each doth not front it in the same hour and place.”