She came running back into Saram's arms and held up her scorched finger for him to kiss.
'Perhaps,' Galt suggested, 'the sword has changed somehow-the time of year may have affected it, or some occurrence in the battle. Perhaps no one can now handle it.
Garth nodded. 'I hope you're right; let us see if it will singe my fingers as it did yours.' He picked up the rope and threw a loop around his neck, handed the ends to Galt and Fyrsh, and then marched toward the sword.
Almost immediately he felt the familiar urge to grab it up, to use it on his enemies. The red glow of the jewel seemed to fill his vision and flood everything with crimson.
As he drew near, any caution he might have felt faded away. He reached down and picked up the sword, easily and naturally, as if it were an ordinary weapon. The flames that had glimmered about the hilt vanished as his hand approached; the grip was warm to his touch, as if. it had been left in bright sunlight for a few moments.
He lifted the sword, and the red haze vanished from his sight. The glow of the jewel faded. He felt none of the berserk fury that the sword had brought upon him in the past; instead he was strangely calm. He turned to face his companions. 'You see?' he called. 'It has a will of its own, and it has chosen me as its wielder.'
'I see,' Galt called back. 'Now put it down again.'
Garth nodded and tried to turn back.
The sword would not move; it hung in the air before him as if embedded in stone.
Garth tried to release his hold and drop it where it was; his fingers would not move.
'I think we have a problem,' he called.
Instantly, Galt jerked the rope tight; with equal speed, the sword twisted, feeling as if it were moving Garth's hands rather than the reverse, and cut the rope through. Before Fyrsh could take any action with his end it flashed back and severed that, as well. The two overmen found themselves holding useless fragments, while the loop around Garth's throat remained slack.
There was a moment of horrified silence; then Galt called, 'Now what?'
'I don't know!' Garth replied. 'I can't let go!' He struggled, trying to pry his fingers from the grip, but could not move them.
He attempted to move his arm and discovered that he could now move it freely. He lowered the sword from the upright display he had held it in; there was no reason to be unnecessarily uncomfortable.
He tried placing his other hand on the grip and then removing it; there was no resistance. He then placed his left hand on the grip and tried removing his right.
It came away easily and naturally.
Now, however, his left hand was locked to the sword.
He switched back and forth a few times, and established to his own satisfaction that whatever power held him to the sword would be content with either hand or both, so long as he retained a hold suitable for wielding the thing. He could hold it with two fingers and one thumb, if he chose; that seemed to be the absolute minimum. Any one finger and both thumbs on the same hand would also work. A single finger and thumb, however, or just two thumbs, would not suffice; when he attempted to use such a grip, his other hand would not come free.
He was about to point this out to Galt as clear proof that there was a conscious power involved-after all, how could any spell, however complex, manage anything so subtle? Galt chose that moment to call, 'Garth, stay there; I will return shortly.'
For the first time Garth realized that while he had been playing with his fingers, the other four had been discussing his situation and had, apparently arrived at some sort of a decision. Galt and Saram were leaving. Fyrsh and, oddly, Frima were staying. He called after the departing pair, 'See if you can find a sheath that would fit this thing! I have an idea!'
It had occurred to him that, if it were sheathed, the sword might behave differently; it was certainly worth trying.
He was frankly puzzled by this new difficulty. He had never before had any trouble in releasing the sword.
But then, he told himself, he had never tried to destroy it before, or tried to abandon it.
Perhaps he could still destroy it, he thought. His previous failure might have been because the sword held some special relationship to stone; after all, he knew almost nothing about it. The standard method for breaking a sword had always been to snap it across one's knee; he could try that.
He turned back toward the stone blocks-the sword seemed to have no objection now that the rope was cut. He placed one foot on a block, raising his knee to a convenient height.
Ordinarily he wouldn't have done something like this without armor. Metal splinters might fly, and the broken ends could snap back and gash his knee badly. He thought such injuries would be worthwhile, though, if he could be rid of this particular sword. He placed it across his knee, his right hand holding the hilt and his left gripping the blade, and pushed down.
Nothing happened. The sword bent not an inch.
He pressed harder. It still did not give.
He put his full strength into it, so that the pressure bruised his knee and the palms of his hands; had it snapped; he knew he would have been thrown forward on the fragments and probably seriously cut.
It did not snap. It did not yield at all.
He gave up in disgust and looked speculatively at the stone block.
Raising the sword above his head in a two-handed grip such as he would have used on an axe in chopping firewood, he swung the blade down at the stone with all the might he could muster.
The stone block shattered in a spectacular shower of sparks, dust, and gravel.
He studied the blade and ran a thumb along it carefully. It was as sharp as ever, with no sign of nick or waver.
Destroying this thing would be a real challenge, he realized. It might take days or even months to contrive an effective method.
It was very curious, though, that it was allowing him so much freedom to try. He knew that it could cloud his thoughts and turn him into a mindless engine of destruction or move in his hands without his cooperation, yet it was doing nothing of the kind. Instead it had displayed this new talent, this refusal to come free of his hold. Why had it not done so before?
Perhaps it had felt no need. He had cooperated with it readily, at first. Only after he realized how disastrous the consequences of the destruction of Skelleth might be had he seriously resisted. When he had actually managed to abandon it, perhaps it had become frightened, aware that it might lose its control of him.
Could a sword be frightened? Or, if the sword were only a tool, could a god be frightened?
Frightened might be too strong a word; 'cautious' would be better. If he could reassure the entity, whatever it was, perhaps he could contrive to slip away and abandon the sword for good. Once he was free of its hold, he would be certain never to touch it again.
If he could pick it up without touching it, with tongs perhaps, and transport it, he could find some way to get rid of it even if he couldn't destroy it. He could throw it in the ocean; no one would retrieve it from the bottom of the sea.
That assumed, however, that he would be able to get it out of his hands.
The Forgotten King would probably be able to make it let go. Judging by the ease with which the old man had darkened the gem and suppressed the sword's power before, he should have no trouble in doing so again. The only problem with that solution was that the King would almost certainly demand something in exchange, and Garth did not care to deal with him further.
Still, if he could not manage something else, sooner or later he might be forced to give in to the Forgotten King. Even that would be preferable to unleashing the sword again, he was sure. He had felt the sword's personality, if it could be called that, and he knew that it sought nothing but death and destruction. It was being canny now, biding its time, allowing him to think, but he was certain that soon its bloodlust would grow and more innocents would die, as they had died in Dыsarra and Skelleth.
Thinking of death, the sword, and the Forgotten King, he began to wonder at the exact nature of the King's immortality. What would happen if the old man were to have a blade thrust through him? Would he live on
