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joyfully to listen. ‘your fathers were not much to crow about,’ he said, ‘but they did at least know what a javelin was for . Now you!’ and he continued to tell them
about themselves in detail, until they turned pink and scuffled. ‘But since something must be made of you, lest the Clan lack hunters hereafter,’ he finished wearily, ‘we will now begin.’
    And begin they did. There were four new straw targets—one daubed with red stain, one with black, one with green, and one left the natural gold of the straw—and the older boys threw their javelins at these, Pridfirth crying out the colour so that they never knew until the last instant which of the four they were to aim at. But the new-comers had only one target, and that first day they seldom got as far as aiming even at that, for they were learning how to stand, how to swing forward, at what instant to send the javelin free so that swing and throw were one perfect curve of movement. They had all handled their father’s weapons since they could stagger, but they had had no particular training, save what they had picked up in imitation of their elders, and some of them were slower than others to get the feel of what they were trying to do. But Pridfirth was very patient with them, showing them over and over again … . ‘Set this foot farther out; now—over and forward. That was better; now again. No, no, child, do not jerk the thing away as though it were a hornet; smoothly—smoo-oothly, I said … . It is not enough to stand like a tree-stump and throw with one arm; you are one curve, you and your javelin, springing right from your big toe to the tip of the blade. Try again.’
    And Beric watched and listened and obeyed, working as he had never worked before; so that by the end of the lesson he was really beginning to have some idea of what it was all about. And then he was happy.
    But after the lesson was over and Pridfirth had gone about his own affairs, with the appalling swiftness of a nightmare in which familiar things suddenly become strange and horrible, Beric’s whole familiar world turned traitor.
    It began when he looked up from slackening the strap round his middle, to see several of the boys crowding in on him with jeering, hostile faces.
    ‘Beric has been working very hard,’ said one.

    ‘He need not waste his sweat. Everyone knows the Red Crests are as much use as cows on the hunting trail!’ said another.
    ‘Red Crest!’ chanted a third; and they began to jostle him. ‘Ya-ee! Red Crest! Why don’t you go back to your own people?’
    Beric faced them, panting a little. All his life he had played and fought and tumbled about with these boys, his pack-brothers; and neither he nor they had had any thought of his not being one of them. But that was all over, since two nights ago. He knew now what old Ffion had meant when he said: ‘If he can hold his own with the pack, after this night’s work, he will make a warrior worth the having.’ He understood perfectly what was happening. He had seen the hound-pack turn on a strange dog before now, or one that was hurt, or different from themselves in any way.
    A second-year boy, Cathlan by name, came thrusting through the rest, and gave him a casual buffet on the side of the head. ‘We don’t want little strutting Red Crests in the Spear Brotherhood,’ he said.
    Beric staggered, for the blow had been a heavy one; then, with his ear ringing, he recovered himself. ‘Don’t you? But you are going to get one!’ he shouted, and hit Cathlan full on the mouth with all the strength that was in him.
    There was a long-drawn gasp from the rest, and Beric, watching the surprise and rage on Cathlan’s face, expected the whole lot of them on top of him next breath, pulling him down like hounds on their quarry. But the rush did not come, and vaguely, as Cathlan flung himself upon him, he realized that the others had drawn back a little, leaving an open space around the two of them. It was to be