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were gathered. However, it was not meant to. The junior initiates, Ravens, Occults, Soldiers, did not attend the holiest of the rites. They joined their seniors in hymning the sun as it departed.
    Flame glimmered across a green southwestern heaven, and went out. More and more stars gleamed forth, and lights along the blackness of Wall and fortress. Elsewhere the world sheened phantom grey. The song ended. The three underling ranks formed their squad and saluted while Lions, Persians, the Runner of the Sun, and the Father whom he attended went inside.
    There was no space for a pronaos. There was, though, a vestibule, where Gratillonius and his fellows changed into their sacred garb. For him it was robe, mask, and Phrygian cap, because in the past year the elders had promoted him to Persian. Solemnly, they entered the sanctuary.
    Lamplight amidst restless shadows picked out the altars that jutted into the narrow nave. At the end of the chamber, reliefs depicted Mithras slaying the Bull and His cosmic birth with the signs of the zodiac around. Thestone was pierced so that illumination behind created the halo about his head. Flanking were the graven Dadophori, the brother figures, one with torch held high, one with torch down and guttering out. It was very quiet. After the chill outside, air felt merely cool. The sweet smoke of pine cones breathed through it.
    The celebrants crossed the floor of oak planks and birch logs to their benches along the walls. The Father took his place before the Tauroctony. He was an aged man, as was the Heliodromos who served him. Their deaths would surely spell the end of worship here.
    Gratillonius raised up his heart. However men blundered, Mithras remained true to His world; and meanwhile he, Gratillonius, had his own victory ahead of him.

II
    Imbolc marked the season of making ready for the year’s work, the lambing that would soon begin, spring sowing later, fishing whenever Manandan and the merfolk would allow. People took stock of what supplies remained in household and farmyard. On the coasts they gathered seaweed to cut up and strew on their fields, as well as shellfish when the tide of Brigit stood at its lowest. Yet the day itself and the vigil of the day were hallowed. Along the shores of Condacht and Mumu, live periwinkles or limpets were buried around each house for luck on strand and water. Many tuaths elsewhere did no work that called for the turning of a wheel, such as carting; it might bewilder the sun on his homeward course. Families wove new talismans of straw and twigs and hung them about dwellings for protection against lightning and fire. They celebrated the eve with the best feast their stores could provide, putting some outside for the Goddess, Who would be travelling that night, and grain for Her white cow. They reckoned, however, that Brigit was also pleased if the food went to the needy, or to those parties of youths and maidens that carried Her emblems from home to home across the land – as long as the gift was given in Her name.
    Anxiously they watched for weather signs. Rain was welcome, to soften the ground and hasten growth of new grass; but storms were ominous, and if the hedgehog did not appear, that meant he was keeping his burrow in expectation of more winter followed by a hard summer. This year, what happened was so shifty across Ériu that no one knew what to await. Wisewomen said it portendedstrange doings and great changes; druids generally stayed silent.
    On Temir was the most splendid of all festivals, for it was the King’s, and Niall maqq Echach bade fair to become the mightiest since Corbmac maqq Arti, or even to outreach that lord. Not only his household and following were on hand, learned men, ollam craftsmen, warriors, their women and children; not only free tenants of both his and theirs, and families of these, from end to end of Mide; not only kings of the tuaths over whom he held sway, and their own attendants and underlings. From Condacht,