Free The SteelMaster of Indwallin, Book 2 of The Gods Within by J. L. Doty

both stupid, and for that we must both bear the blame.”
    The words meant nothing to Morgin, and for some moments this beautiful girl kneeling before him was an unrecognizable stranger. The sword demanded too much of him. If his diligence failed for only an instant . . .
    ~~~
    “Morgin . . . Morgin.”
    Morgin opened his eyes again, looked again at the beautiful hallucination kneeling before him. In her right hand she held an empty sheath extended toward him. “Here,” she said. “It will be easier if you cage the beast.”
    She was right. But how was he going to take hold of the sheath when he needed both hands to hold the sword’s hatred in check?
    The beautiful hallucination turned the open end of the sheath toward him. “I will hold the sheath, but I’ll not touch that blade.”
    Morgin looked down at the tip of the sword where it rested in the last gouge it had cut from the floor, then he looked at the distance between it and the open end of the sheath. It might as well have been the distance between heaven and hell, for all it mattered.
    “You must do it now,” the hallucination said, “while you still have the strength.”
    Morgin nodded, lifted the blade slowly from the floor, sensed the evil within it tensing for a struggle, but with his will he clamped down on it mercilessly and it subsided. He held the tip out toward the sheath, though it wavered unsteadily before him. But just when he could go no further the beautiful hallucination moved with lightning speed and slammed the open end of the sheath down over the blade with a loud metallic crash, and suddenly Morgin felt free again. He felt as if he had been carrying a great weight for many leagues, then someone had taken the weight from his shoulders, and now nothing mattered but sleep.
    He let his shoulders slump toward the floor, prepared to curl up right there and sleep for a century, but a hand arced out of the midnight surrounding his soul and struck his face with enough force to rock him back on his haunches. His thoughts were as slow as winter honey, but the hand struck again, and again, and each time it stung more, until finally he saw Rhianne raise her hand to strike him a fourth time, and he raised his own hand to block the blow.
    Rhianne hesitated, withheld the blow, looked at Morgin carefully. “Good. You’re lucid. You must stay that way. When you leave this Hall every major clansman in the Lesser Clans will be watching you, and you must appear to be in control.”
    Morgin nodded. He understood her somewhat, but the fatigue was far too demanding. “Keep talking,” he said. “Don’t stop. It helps me stay anchored to this world. And let’s don’t waste any time.”
    “Then get on your feet. Now.” Rhianne jumped to her feet, stood over him, helped him struggle to a standing position, though he had a tendency to stagger. “That won’t do,” she said. “You’ll have to stand straight, walk straight, look straight.”
    “You sound like Olivia.”
    Rhianne laughed as they started toward the doors of the Hall. “And you sound like me.”
    They waited while the extra timbers were again removed from the doors, then one door creaked open no more than a miserable crack. Morgin thought of Morddon, and decided the angry Benesh’ere’s harshness might act to his advantage here. So with the last bit of strength he possessed he put a shoulder to the door, pushed hard, and at the same time growled, “Out of my way before I lose my temper.” He shoved the door well open and stepped out among the waiting clansmen, who in turn stepped fearfully away from him. He looked at them carefully, as they all looked at him suspiciously. “Well?” he demanded. “What are you looking at?”
    All of them but Olivia stepped back a pace, while she stood her ground and looked through him as if she understood well the game he played. But she did not interfere.
    “Of course I look like hell,” he growled at them, and like sheep they stepped back