Second Night

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Authors: Gabriel J Klein

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G
ABRIEL
J K
LEIN

THE SPEAR

Copyright © 2012 Gabriel J Klein

The moral right of the author has been asserted.

Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study,
or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents
Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in
any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the
publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with
the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries
concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.

Matador
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Wistow Road, Kibworth Beauchamp,
Leicestershire. LE8 0RX
Tel: (+44) 116 279 2299
Fax: (+44) 116 279 2277
Email:
[email protected]
Web:
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ISBN 978 1780881 713

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Typeset in 12pt Bembo by Troubador Publishing Ltd, Leicester, UK
Printed and bound in the UK by TJ International, Padstow, Cornwall

Matador
is an imprint of Troubador Publishing Ltd

www.gabrieljklein.com

For the brave
in whatever time,
in whatever conflict

Contents

Acknowledgments

Four Significant Winter Nights

PROLOGUE

OCTOBER

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 8

CHAPTER 9

CHAPTER 10

CHAPTER 11

CHAPTER 12

CHAPTER 13

CHAPTER 14

CHAPTER 15

CHAPTER 16

CHAPTER 17

CHAPTER 18

CHAPTER 19

CHAPTER 20

CHAPTER 21

CHAPTER 22

CHAPTER 23

CHAPTER 24

CHAPTER 25

CHAPTER 26

CHAPTER 27

CHAPTER 28

CHAPTER 29

CHAPTER 30

CHAPTER 31

CHAPTER 32

CHAPTER 33

CHAPTER 34

CHAPTER 35

CHAPTER 36

CHAPTER 37

NOVEMBER

CHAPTER 38

CHAPTER 39

CHAPTER 40

CHAPTER 41

CHAPTER 42

CHAPTER 43

CHAPTER 44

CHAPTER 45

CHAPTER 46

CHAPTER 47

CHAPTER 48

CHAPTER 49

CHAPTER 50

CHAPTER 51

CHAPTER 52

CHAPTER 53

CHAPTER 54

CHAPTER 55

CHAPTER 56

CHAPTER 57

CHAPTER 58

CHAPTER 59

CHAPTER 60

CHAPTER 61

CHAPTER 62

CHAPTER 63

CHAPTER 64

CHAPTER 65

CHAPTER 66

CHAPTER 67

CHAPTER 68

CHAPTER 69

DECEMBER

CHAPTER 70

CHAPTER 71

CHAPTER 72

CHAPTER 73

CHAPTER 74

CHAPTER 75

CHAPTER 76

CHAPTER 77

CHAPTER 78

CHAPTER 79

CHAPTER 80

CHAPTER 81

CHAPTER 82

CHAPTER 83

CHAPTER 84

CHAPTER 85

CHAPTER 86

CHAPTER 87

CHAPTER 88

CHAPTER 89

CHAPTER 90

CHAPTER 91

CHAPTER 92

CHAPTER 93

CHAPTER 94

CHAPTER 95

CHAPTER 96

CHAPTER 97

CHAPTER 98

CHAPTER 99

Appendix

The Oath of Allegiance

The Rune Lore of Sir Saxon Pring

Extract from The Guardians Book of Lore: Names and Titles

THE MASTER'S LETTER

Acknowledgments

Within the time of the
Four Significant Winter Nights
the historic twenty-nine runes are presented in the original translations from the Anglo Saxon, Icelandic and Old Norse edited by Bruce Dickens in
Runic and Heroic Poems of the Old Teutonic Peoples,
Cambridge University Press, 1915.

The Henry Adams Bellows' translation from the Icelandic of
The Poetic Edda
originally published by the American-Scandinavian Foundation, New York, and Oxford University Press, London, 1923, now as the unabridged republication of the first part including the General Introduction and the Lays of the Gods, Dover Publications, 2004, has provided the quotes from
Hovamol, The Ballad of the High One
and
Vafthruthnismol, The Ballad of Vafthruthnir.

Our grateful thanks: once again to Janette and Martha, and to Jess and Salema, for their constructive criticism of this Second of the
Four Significant Winter Nights;
to Gillian for prompting Team Gabriel J Klein to let
Second Night: The Spear
out of the stable sooner than we had anticipated; to Joan for the copy-editing; to Phil for yet more advice about workshops; as ever to Ian, for the hours of fascinated exchange by phone, email and over Janette's loaded dinner table, pondering the mysteries of astronomy and quantum theory, and still not being put off reading the result; and to Ann and Paula for giving Star, the first of the Galdramerar, a truly wonderful life – we can never thank you enough for being so good for her.

F
OUR
S
IGNIFICANT
W
INTER
N
IGHTS

‘Away from his arms in the open field,
A man should fare not a foot;
For never he knows when the need for a spear
Shall arise on the distant road…'

Hovamol

First Night:
T
HE
G
IFT
& T
HE
S
ACRIFICE

Second Night:
T
HE
S
PEAR

Third Night:
R
AGNA
R
ÖK
, T
HE
F
ATE OF THE
G
OD

Fourth Night:
T
HE
P
ROPHECY OF
S
KULD

PROLOGUE

Meane Manor House
September 23
rd
Year 148,

Quarter Day Memorandum, Autumn Equinox

Guardians,

In view of our failure to achieve visitation during Hag Night, Year 147, I must express my extreme dissatisfaction at your continuing and collective inability to persuade Caspar Wylde to discuss the details of his experience during our first, and only, successful vigil in the final hours of Year 146.

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