For a wonder, Brian found that the chamber was lighted with candles, which Cathbarr examined with no little awe. Also, it contained a very good bed, on which the giant looked with suspicion. The hard stone walls were hung with tattered tapestries, and before they had settled well into their chairs two men entered with food and wine of the best.
"Not so bad," smiled Brian as they ate. "How come your wounds, brother?"
"Those scratches? Bah!" And the giant gurgled down half a quart of Canary at a stretch. "You are not going to sleep on that bed of cloths?"
"That I am," laughed Brian, "and soon, for I am overweary with riding. Try it, Cathbarr, and you will be glad of it."
"Not I! Since there is no bracken here the floor is good enough for me. Eh, but this sea-woman will have a thought in her mind over your message, brother!"
Brian chuckled, but he was too weary with that day's work to talk or think, and when the remnants of their meal had been removed and their door shut, he gratefully sought the first bed he had known for weeks. After some laughing persuasion he prevailed on the suspicious Cathbarr to blow out the candles, and upon that he fell asleep.
When he wakened it was broad daylight, and Cathbarr was still snoring with his ax looped about his wrist as usual. Brian, feeling like a new man, went to the open casement and looked out.
He found himself gazing through a three-foot stone wall, and as he was doubtless in one of the towers, this argued that the lower walls were twelve feet thick or more. The lower castle was hid from him, but his view was toward the upper bay and included the harbor. The two larger ships, which were small caracks, but large for the west coast in that day, bore six guns on a side, and Brian saw that they were being scrubbed and made shipshape. The Bird Daughter must be a woman of some scrupulousness, he reflected. Beyond the brown sails of two fishing-boats, and low, storm-boding clouds over the farther hills, there was nothing more in sight.
As Cathbarr still wore his long mail-shirt, Brian kicked him awake, and after his first bellowing yawn their door opened and men brought in jars of water. When the giant's wounds had been dressed, under protest, and they had broken their fast, the seneschal appeared.
"Chieftains," he said respectfully, "the Lady Nuala has received your message and will have speech with you this afternoon. Until then she wishes that you keep your chamber, since she knows not your mind in this visit."