sword, but he did not intend to fulfill his vow.
As far as Garth was concerned, that put an end to the matter, save for one detail. He had not been called upon to carry out his promise; he was not yet truly forsworn. He was able to maintain a pretense of honor-a pretense he knew to be false-as long as the King did not demand that he fetch the book.
The King had not made that demand yet only because he had not recalled where, several centuries earlier, he had left the book. Garth hoped that the memory was lost forever; then he might never be forced to break his sworn word.
At the same time, though, he found himself wishing that the affair were over with, that the oath were broken and done, rather than still hanging over him.
He leaned back, his chair creaking a protest beneath his inhuman weight, and could not resist asking, 'Have you remembered yet, O King?' His voice was expressionless, for overmen's emotions were displayed differently from humans'. The mixture of bitterness over his false oath and anticipation of its final ruination that had prompted the question was so well hidden that Garth was not really aware of it himself.
The King said nothing; his head moved very slightly, almost imperceptibly, to one side and then back.
'You must tell me where it is, old man, if you want me to fetch it.'
The King did not reply and moved not at all. Garth felt a surge of anger at this silence.
'Speak, old man,' he said.
No answer came. Garth's annoyance increased.
'Has your tongue shriveled in your head, then, O throneless King? Are you trying to imitate the corpses you resemble, since you cannot rightly join them? Have you now forsaken speech, the better to serve your foul black god?' He did not shout; his voice was flat and deadly, a dangerous sign among his kind.
The Forgotten King moved slightly, as if emitting a faint sigh, but still said nothing. Garth drew breath for another question, but was distracted by the arrival of the innkeeper with a fresh mug of ale. The overman snatched it from him, swallowed half its contents at a gulp, and then ordered, 'Be off, man!'
The taverner risked a glance at Garth's baleful red eyes and inhuman face, then hurried away, wondering if it would be safe to cut the overman's next serving of ale with water. He knew the signs of Garth's anger; rudeness to underlings like himself was one such indication. He did not want to worry about dealing with an overman in a drunken fury-but an overman enraged at being cheated might be equally bad. He looked at Garth's mail-covered back and decided, at least for the moment, that his reputation for honest measure and good drink was worth preserving. He could only hope that the old man would calm the overman down.
Garth was in no mood to be calmed down. When the innkeeper had moved away, he asked, 'Why do you not speak? Is it perhaps that I am unfit to address you, O King of an empire long since dust, monarch of a dying memory, lord of a realm unknown? Is the Prince of Ordunin, a lord of the overmen of the Northern Waste, suited only to serve your whims, but not to speak with you? Does the master of ashes and woe, wearing rags and tatters and dwelling in a single dim room of an ancient inn, not deign to answer the exiled killer, the disgraced berserker? Will the servant of Death not choose to acknowledge the pawn of destruction?' His voice was calm, as still as water pooled on black ice, and laden with far more threat than any shout as he said, 'Answer me, old man.'
The old man answered. 'Garth,' he said in a voice like ice breaking, 'why do you disturb me? You know I prefer not to waste words in idle chatter.'
The overman was wrenched momentarily from his anger by the sound of the old man's voice, a sound unlike any other, dry and brittle and harsh, so unpleasant to hear that it could not fully be remembered. He regained his composure quickly, however, and replied, 'Is everything I say idle chatter? Have I not the right to an answer when I ask a polite question?'
'Hardly polite,' the old man demurred. 'I will answer, however. No, I have not yet recalled where I left the Book of Silence in those ancient days when last I held it.'
'So I must linger here, still waiting?'
'Garth,' the old man replied, 'you are bored, frustrated by inactivity. You are a warrior, given to violent action, not to sitting about a peaceful village. I have told you from the first that you are free to leave Skelleth and that your oath does not hold you here, as long as you return at intervals to learn whether or not I have recalled where the Book of Silence lies. Why, then, do you not find yourself some task to occupy your time, rather than remain here disturbing my contemplation?'
So long a speech was unusual for the King, and Garth knew it well. He realized that he must have seriously annoyed the old man. His own anger, however, had not faded.
'And what task shall I pursue, then? Where am I to go? I am forbidden the Northern Waste and therefore cannot aid my homeland against the human pirates who assail it. What other task awaits me? I have little taste for roaming aimlessly, particularly when the world is strewn about with wars and battles that do not concern me. I have no reason to side with any human faction and no desire to kill merely for my own amusement, so I will not join in these wars. I am welcome no place outside Skelleth. I have seen Mormoreth and left it in the hands of men who comrades I killed in self-defense; will they greet me as an old friend? I have visited Dыsarra and left it aflame and plague-ridden, its every citizen my enemy. The other lands and cities of the south are unknown to me, and overmen are unwanted strangers throughout. Where, then, shall I go?'
'What of the Yprian Coast?'
'And what might I do there, but find another tavern wherein I might sit and be bored? I am no trader, I know that now; I have no desire to seek out new markets and new routes.'
'Think you that is all that may be found there?'
'What else might there be? Farms and villages, markets and men and overmen. The caravans have told us what may be found there, and it does not interest me. Others have gone before me as well; where might I explore that they could not have preceded me?'
'Must you be first, then, as you were first in coming to Skelleth, first to think that overmen might trade here?'
'For all the good that did me, yes. What point is there in doing what has been done before?'
'I think, Garth, that you resent the ingratitude of those who have benefited from the trade you began.'
'Perhaps I do, old man; what of it? Does it matter to either of us that I am scorned by those I have made wealthy? Or that my old companions allow me no responsibilities in the village I gave them? They are no concern of ours. I am sworn to aid you in your death-magic, O King; that is what concerns us. I am waiting for you to tell me how I may fulfill my oath.'
'I have told you that I have not yet remembered.'
'Then I must wait until you do.'
'And plague me with angry questions?'
'Should I so choose, yes.'
The King did not reply immediately; during the pause, Garth drank the rest of his ale and decided against ordering another.
'Garth, I would have you leave me in peace,' the old man said at last, 'so that I might be able to think more clearly and recall more easily what I wish to recall.'
The overman shrugged. 'I care little what you would have, old man. I am not sworn to heed your every whim, only to fetch your book and aid you in your magics.'
'You are bored. What if I gave you a task that could harm no one, but would result in great benefit for many innocent people?'
Garth stared into the depths of his empty mug, then looked up, gazing across the table into the shadows that hid the old man's face.
'What sort of a task?'
'Slaying a dragon that has laid waste the valley of Orgul.'
Garth considered. His anger was fading, but his mind was slightly hazed with liquor. 'A dragon?'
The old man nodded, once.
Garth thought it over. He was bored. He was irritable from inaction. It would be good to travel again; to see new places, to spend each night somewhere different from the night before. It would be good to get out of Skelleth, away from so many unpleasant memories. It would be good to accomplish something useful, and there
