The lonely hall of Eiriksstadhir burned long into the night. The hall had been sturdily built, and seemed reluctant to collapse even as it groaned and snapped in the fires that consumed it. The flames leapt and played and danced, reflecting off the snow and ice that blanketed the nearby wilderness. The glow glinted off the waters of the nearby Lake Tornathraesk in darkness of midnight, and both the light and thick black smoke from those flames blotted out the beauty of the Nordhurljos, the “North-Light” aurora that painted the Northern night sky with sheets of translucent, glowing colors. Two young men, two brothers, watched Eiriksstadhir burn in grim silence. The light of that burning hall reflected in the brothers' eyes, and somehow the intensity of the flames seemed even greater t...

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