But even if we never set foot on Samavian
soil, we must give our lives to it. I have given mine since I was
sixteen. I shall give it until I die."

"Have you never lived there?" said Marco.

A strange look shot across his father's face.

"No," he answered, and said no more. Marco watching him, knew he must
not ask the question again.

The next words his father said were about the promises. Marco was
quite a little fellow at the time, but he understood the solemnity of
them, and felt that he was being honored as if he were a man.

"When you are a man, you shall know all you wish to know," Loristan
said. "Now you are a child, and your mind must not be burdened. But
you must do your part. A child sometimes forgets that words may be
dangerous. You must promise never to forget this. Wheresoever you
are; if you have playmates, you must remember to be silent about many
things. You must not speak of what I do, or of the people who come to
see me. You must not mention the things in your life which make it
different from the lives of other boys. You must keep in your mind
that a secret exists which a chance foolish word might betray. You are
a Samavian, and there have been Samavians who have died a thousand
deaths rather than betray a secret. You must learn to obey without
question, as if you were a soldier. Now you must take your oath of
allegiance."

He rose from his seat and went to a corner of the room. He knelt down,
turned back the carpet, lifted a plank, and took something from beneath
it. It was a sword, and, as he came back to Marco, he drew it out from
its sheath. The child's strong, little body stiffened and drew itself
up, his large, deep eyes flashed. He was to take his oath of
allegiance upon a sword as if he were a man. He did not know that his
small hand opened and shut with a fierce understanding grip because
those of his blood had for long centuries past carried swords and
fought with them.

Loristan gave him the big bared weapon, and stood erect before him.

"Repeat these words after me sentence by sentence!" he commanded.

And as he spoke them Marco echoed each one loudly and clearly.

"The sword in my hand--for Samavia!

"The heart in my breast--for Samavia!

"The swiftness of my sight, the thought of my brain, the life of my
life--for Samavia.

"Here grows a man for Samavia.

"God be thanked!"

Then Loristan put his hand on the child's shoulder, and his dark face
looke