and I am another year older, too many to count any more. The hearth fire burns low in the great hall of Niafer on this warm and drowsy evening. I have told the last story for the night, a long and winding tale all about the King of Cats. Only one child is still awake, wide-eyed with wonder. The others have been bundled away by their mammas, one by one, to nest in their cozy huts or in one of the niches along the sturdy wall.

The wee one tugs at my shawl and in a language all his own asks for another story, just one more. Then his little mouth gapes wide with a huge yawn.

"Tomorrow, I promise, and it will be your favourite. Now it is time for you to dream! If you start to make up a story as you go off to sleep, perhaps you will have a tale to tell ME next time."

His gap-toothed smile, so much like mine, is the sweetest of replies. There comes his auntie to take him off to bed. A kindly lass, she puts a warm bowl of milk on the table beside me before disappearing with her sleepy nephew into the soft shadows.

The taste of the milk takes me back to my own childhood, so distant yet so near. I sip and stare into the embers while the murmuring rustle of settling sleepers whispers good-night all around me. As I feel myself drifting home across the sea to Pictland, as I always do at night, I remember, remember, remember.