[Nogrod]

“If I get your meaning right, you are trying to tell me, that an old silly legend just materialized to burn my home?”, Rían asked, behind his words, dead serious now. “I don’t know what was there between your father and mine, but I know, it was a man who grinned just like you and had the stature like yours, who burnt my home and whom we run away from – and whom my father called with both names: as Grimgor the Bearhand and as the “Owl’s Eye” or “The One That Runs at Dusk”.”

Rían noticed, that the pitch of his voice had climbed up a little too high, and so his voice was breaking. He tried to ease himself, taking a long sip from his pint, trying to sort out his head. What is this all about? After all the years of hide and seek, I’m sitting here in front of a man whose father has been one of the main reasons to my life’s tragedy. And what am I doing? Squeaking like a pre-teen! He had planned this one so many times! But where was his action now?

He leaned back again, trying to appear secure – which he truly wasn’t! His wits seemed to have deserted him totally. What to say, how to continue? Attack or defence, action or reaction? Keep talking or do something?

In the end he opted for some more talk. He needed time now, and if he could make the giant talk, he would have it. He could think.

“Well, you have not done any harm to me, either I to you. Let’s talk this over like sensible human beings. Tell me about your father. Maybe we can work this out together?”