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Again he deliberately paused. ‘
You
are the Graynelore.’
    This formal announcement was the signal for every man there to lift his own arm: his sword or his staff, his axe or his spear, and return The Graynelord’s cry.
    ‘I am the Graynelore!’ We all bellowed as one.
    ‘Upon Graynelore there is
no
king. You will find
no
queen, here. There is no law, but that which the strength of your own arm can impose upon another. It is the sword you carry. Upon Graynelore you answer only to the grayne…your surname, your family, your blood-tie. Make no idle friend here. Make no common ally. Make no enemy, unless he is a dead man. For either is as likely to stab you in the back.’
    ‘I am The Graynelore!’ cried our gathering to a man.
    Emboldened, the Old-man swung his sword about his head and bellowed ever louder. ‘Upon Graynelore we take what we need or else leave well alone. We do not kill the poor wretch for the sake of the killing. Why would we? And if, all things considered, we do not live long, at least we all live well! Eh? At least, we all live well!’
    Another silence. Who among us would have dared to argue with him?
    Banners began to flap noisily, attacked by a sudden breeze. Above us, far above us, the black birds had turned about and turned again, swooping impatiently across the sky. They were eager for the Riding to begin.
    If it was I who spoke then, it was a muttering under my breath meant only for myself. ‘We are not so much at constant war with everyone, my Graynelord…only there is never a day when we are quite at peace with ourselves. Where does that leave our tomorrow?’
    ‘I suppose things might look differently tomorrow.’ The retort came from my elder-cousin, my Headman, Wolfrid, who was sat upon his hobb close by. I might have answered him, only never got the chance. The Old-man’s ranting was not quite done with:
    ‘And on this day,’ he cried, ‘on this day, we are to go a-courting, you and I. There is a wild lady in want of a Graynelord’s close company, who must be taken well in hand. And there are Elfwych in need of a reminder of their faithfulness.’
    Our jeering laughter in reply; our contempt for our enemy, was real enough. The Wishards hated the Elfwych. I hated the Elfwych. The Elfwych hated us. Why? Perhaps there was no reason good enough. None better than this: it is convenient to hate the men you are about to steal from, the men you are about to kill. Though in truth, it was an endless blood feud, come out of time, and without redemption. This was ever the Graynelore.
    The Old-man’s address ended there without further explanation or demand. It was obvious he had enjoyed his own speech, its grandeur and its pomp. He also believed in it implicitly. At least, he had to be
seen
to believe in it implicitly. Without that he knew he could not command men. That was the real trick of his leadership.
    Others might pretend that The Graynelord ruled by right of birth, or because he was bequeathed the symbol of power that made it so. The Eye Stone…the favourite of the Beggar Bard’s tales. The stone tablet that so many men here believed rested within the walls of the Old-man’s Stronghold at Carraw Peel (though not a single one – outside of his trusted Council – claimed to have seen it with his own eyes). In truth, symbols were just that: symbols. Made of stone, or cloth, or paper: symbols. Solid reality or simple belief: symbols. He was only one man. His rule was a mortal fact, and he knew it.
    Old-man Wishard lowered his sword arm, but did not sheath his sword (another symbol). He took the reign of his hobby-horse and, turning the animal about, began to ride out slowly, off Pennen Fields. He made a display of checking the sky for the position of the sun before turning to face the West March: the homeland of the Elfwych.
    At my back, to the rear of our gathering many of my kinsmen had not heard a word of the Old-man’s speech; only the sound of his voice carrying across the