So the mother arose and baked not one cake but two, a big one and a little one.
‘Choose, my son,’ said she. ‘Will you have the little cake with your mother’s blessing, or the big one without it, in that you have set aside your father and taken on yourself to make a vow?’
‘I will have the large cake,’ answered the youth; ‘for what good would my mother’s blessing do for me if I was dying of hunger?’ And taking the big cake he went his way.
Straight on he strode, letting neither hill nor river hinder him. Swiftly he walked—swiftly as the wind that blew down the mountain. The eagles and the gulls looked on from their nests as he passed, leaving the deer behind him; but at length he stopped, for hunger had seized on him, and he could walk no more. Trembling with fatigue he sat himself on a rock and broke a piece off his cake.
‘Spare me a morsel, Ardan son of Gorla,’ asked a raven, fluttering down towards him.
‘Seek food elsewhere, O bearer of ill-news,’ answered Ardan son of Gorla; ‘it is but little I have for myself.’ And he stretched himself out for a few moments, then rose to his feet again. On and on went he till the little birds flew to their nests, and the brightness died out of the sky, and a darkness fell over the earth. On and on, and on, till at last he saw a beam of light streaming from a house and hastened towards it.
The door was opened and he entered, but paused when he beheld an old man lying on a bench by the fire, while seated opposite him was a maiden combing out the locks of her golden hair with a comb of silver.
‘Welcome, fair youth,’ said the old man, turning his head. ‘Sit down and warm yourself, and tell me how fares the outer world. It is long since I have seen it.’
‘All my news is that I am seeking service,’ answered Ardan son of Gorla; ‘I have come from far since sunrise, and glad was I to see the rays of your lamp stream into the darkness.’
‘I need someone to herd my three dun cows, which are hornless,’ said the old man. ‘If, for the space of a year, you can bring them back to me each evening before the sun sets, I will make you payment that will satisfy your soul.’