long after midnight. Not everyone stayed until the end; even Einar, who had wanted to find out as much as possible, gave up and went to bed when his eyes began to grow heavy.
The morning was surprisingly quiet, although given the amount of alcohol consumed the previous evening, no one would have expected anyone to be up before midday. Einar got dressed, grabbed something to eat from the kitchen and left the house to train. He took both his new sword and his shield with him, keen to try them out.
He set off at a light jog towards the settlement gate and on into the nearby forest to his favourite clearing. By the time he reached his destination, he was only slightly out of breath. He quickly set about his training, just as his father and brothers had taught him. First, a few sword exercises, then training on a log wrapped in ropes, and finally some unarmed drills.
His brothers often helped him with the latter, trying to teach Einar how to fight with his fists and some useful techniques. As it turned out, he quickly mastered every form of combat they showed him. By the time he was able to fight not only with a sword and his fists, but also wield an axe, a spear, a crossbow, a bow, a mace, a dagger, a knife, a glaive, a halberd, a gizarma, a warhammer and a mace, Bragi declared that you couldn’t fool blood and it was immediately obvious that Einar was a Toinen.
Of course, this was not merely a statement of the obvious, but was also regarded as a compliment amongst the Ytrens. Later, the eldest of the brothers laughed and said that he could not be outdone by his little brother and would have to put in the effort himself, for the youngster would soon surpass him. Einar felt proud that his brothers respected his talent for fighting, and he trained hard in secret, away from everyone else.
Furthermore, his brothers’ compliment prompted Einar to seek out more information about his origins, or rather
