The elf's form blurred; it grew amazingly, becoming very heavy very quickly. Rod dropped it, but it kept on growing—and changed form as it grew. In seconds, it towered over Rod, tall and cadaverous with a long white beard, whole body a mass of tremors. With shaking hands, it lifted the diminutive crossbow and levelled it at Rod's eyes.

Eighteen

ROD QUAILED WITHIN BUT SUMMONED THE courage to slap the crossbow aside. "Who are you, and why did you try to give me epilepsy?"

"Not the falling sickness, but the one-sided stiffness," the rasping, shaking voice told him. The ogre peered down at him through rheumy eyes.

"A stroke?" Rod shuddered at the thought. "But why?"

"Because you have come within my domain," the ogre-elf answered. "You are aged as much as most who die in this land, and you have no wish to live "

"That makes me subject to elf-shot?" Rod frowned. "Just because I'm sixty and grieving? I know most medieval people die in their forties and fifties, but that doesn't mean they have to have strokes!"

"They age quickly," the spirit reminded him. "It is a hard life, to be a mortal in a world where all work is done by hands and horses, and wars are fought with sword and spear."

"Okay, but I grew up far away, in a world where people had sound nutrition and medicine, and robots did everything but the brain-work! I should be good for another twenty years of good health."

"Logic may say so," the ogre said. "Your heart knows better." It levelled the crossbow again.

"Now, stop that!" Rod slapped the weapon away. "Step aside and let me pass! I don't want to have to hurt you."

"I cannot say the same." The creature stepped back, lifting the crossbow again. "It is my nature to loose my points against your kind."

"Hold!" Rod raised a hand, palm out. "Remember, you're made of witch-moss—and I'm very good at melting the stuff down."

The creature swelled, its head shooting up twenty feet, its body widening to fill the whole trail. "Do you truly think you can melt all this?" it thundered.

"Sure, but why bother?" Rod mounted again and kicked his heels against Fess's sides. "If you're stretching the mass of an elf into the volume of a giant, you've made yourself so tenuous that you couldn't stop a songbird." With that, he rode straight through the ogre.

The creature cried out as Fess plowed through its legs. Rod felt as though he were riding through a screen of cobwebs—nasty clinging stuff that he had to brush aside. "Cold Iron!" the creature screeched.

"Only sixty percent," Rod called back. "He's magnesium and tungsten, too—not to mention a lot of carbon compounds."

He rode out the other side, and the creature's wailing soared up the scale, until it seemed a marsh bird's piping. Turning, Rod saw it shrink into an elf again—but also saw the crossbow rising, heard the thrum as the creature loosed. He threw himself down against Fess's neck, but not far enough; pain lanced through his forehead, and his whole right side went numb. "Run," he told Fess—or tried to, but the words wouldn't come out right. "As fast you can!"

Fortunately, Fess's voice-recognition program was able to accept substitutions and relate them almost instantly to the sounds they were supposed to have been. He leaped into motion and shot through the forest, and was far from the shooting elf in minutes.

GEORDIE HEAVED THE dead buck up over his shoulders and turned his steps homeward—but he hadn't gone a dozen paces before a man in green tunic and brown hose stepped out of the leaves onto the trail ahead of him, a bow in his hands with an arrow nocked, but not drawn. "Hold, squire."

Geordie stared at the man, his heart sinking. Then he summoned his nerve and grinned. "Come, fellow, I've no wish to harm you. Step aside."

"You bear your guilt on your shoulders, squire. You must answer to the reeve now. Put down the buck and hold out your arms."

"If I put down my load, it shall be atop you," Geordie said evenly, "and if I hold out my hands, there shall be sword and dagger in them. Step aside—I have folk who will need this meat."

"They shall have to find it somewhere else."

Battle-lust rose; Geordie's friendly smile turned into a savage grin. "Do you truly think you can take me alone?"

"I do not think I will have to."

Branches rustled; two other men stepped up at either side, and Geordie could hear more stepping out onto the roadway behind him. His hackles rose, but he brazened it out "You've not the right to arrest a squire, especially one born to nobility!"

"They have." The branches parted; a man wearing a black doublet and hose with crimson piping stepped out be-mnd the first keeper. "But even if they did not, I surely do. As reeve of this shire, I arrest you in the Queen's name!"

Geordie stared into the reeve's face and felt his heart sink down to his boots.

FESS SLOWED, AND Rod slid down from his back—but his right leg buckled and he fell. He tried to stand again, but the leg wouldn't cooperate. He turned to catch the stirrup with his left hand and pulled himself up to his left knee, then with a titanic effort pushed himself up to stand. He started to fall but flailed at the saddle, caught the pommel, and managed to balance on his left foot.

"It is only projective telepathy, Rod," Fess told him. "Your muscles are doubtless as good as ever. It is merely your mind that has been convinced of paralysis, by the power of myth made seeming flesh."

"Maybe," Rod said, but his ears heard a hoarse caw that said, "Maeh-hih;" he shuddered. He directed his thoughts toward Fess. "Time to meditate again." He let himself fall into the trance—difficult, because of the uncertainty of meditating on his feet, but it was necessary this time. When he knew his hindbrain was at its most suggestible, he began to put weight on his right leg and withdrew it in a slow but regular rhythm, as though he were strolling. As he practiced the movements, he imagined the deadened area of his brain coming alive, beginning to regrow neurons, synapses firing more and more normally until it was restored to full function. When his right leg could feel his weight again, he knew the neurons had really regrown, that his brain had repaired the damage—if there had actually been any. It was, as Fess had said, probably only a very convincing telepathic illusion—but if it had been, it had managed to convince his neurons they were burned out. They had recharged now, recharged and were firing with every mock step, more and more until, greatly daring, he finally let go of the saddle and stood alone.

The leg held.

Rod gripped the pommel again and began to swing the leg as though he took a step with every shift of weight. At first it refused to budge, then twitched, then swung a little, then wider and wider. When he had achieved a normal length of stride, he began to put his weight on it at the end of the forward swing, then lifted and swung it back. When it held his full weight, he let go of the pommel and began walking in place, then stepped away from Fess and back, then away and around in a circle.

"Well done, Rod," the robot said. "You have recapitulated two years of physical therapy in an hour."

"Is that how long it's been?" Time seemed to pass differently when Rod was in a trance. "Now let's work on the arm." He heard his voice say, "Nahwehwhirahdah."

"Then you will begin work on your speech?"

Rod glanced at the sun's rays, where they laid their path through dust-motes to the leaves below. "Won't be time before dark. I'll have to finish that tomorrow."

By sunset, he had the right arm and hand back to full function and was quite unreasonably proud that he was able to brew up a stew of jerky and dried vegetables.