Read The Wizard for Free Online

but if he's here I want you to find him and make sure he's been cared for. Tie him next to Cloud. Make sure his tether's plenty long enough to let him lie down, and make sure he has clean straw." Toug started to leave, but stopped. "You did all those things for Cloud before I got here, didn't you? Looked at her feet and everything." I nodded. "I thought so. If I'm going to be knight, I have to see about the man who knocked me off, too, don't I?" I nodded. "Sooner or later." "I want to do it before I sleep. I will if I can, as soon as I've seen to Laemphalt." As Toug vanished among the milling animals and men, I called, "Wash his legs when you've seen to his hooves. Warm the water." Some time after that, when I lay on the floor in what had been Bymir's front room, Mani left Idnn to stretch on my chest. "Are you awake?" Gylf raised his head to look at him, but did not speak. I said, "Yes. What is it?" "Do cats ever get to Skai?" I thought awhile. "Maybe. The Lady of Folkvangr's got four. How'd you know I'd been there?" "Oh, I know such things." I thought about that, too, and since I had been more than half asleep when Mani came, the thinking took a while. Finally I said, "I won't try to make you tell. I know you'd ignore an order. But if you won't tell me, I won't answer any more questions." "I probably shouldn't." "Then don't." I yawned. "Go away." "I have important news." Gylf yawned, too, and laid his head between his paws. I said, "What is it?" "Why should I answer your questions if you won't answer mine?" "You didn't answer mine," I reminded him. "Go away." "I wanted to. It's a delicate matter." "Better not to touch it. You cats are always knocking over cups and stuff, and I've got to sleep. We won't ride early unless I'm up with the sun." "It was my old mistress who told me, you see." Mani paused, studying my face. "Surprised you, didn't I?" "Of course you did. She's dead." Mani grinned; his teeth, which were white and as sharp as heck, looked red because of the firelight. "So are you, Sir Able." "Hardly." "I won't argueit's beneath me. Is it a nice place?" "Skai? Very." "Maybe I'll see it someday. This isn't. I mean, it's nice sometimes. But in general ..." "It isn't," I muttered. "No argument." "You can't have been there very long." "Twenty years or so." "You only rode away a few days ago." I sat up, catching Mani and settling him in my lap. "Tell me how you talked to your mistress, and I'll tell you a little about my time in Skai." Looking at Toug, who lay with his eyes tightly closed, I added, "I'll tell you some anyway. Nobody can cover twenty years in a conversation." "You must be explicit," Mani hedged. "Okay. I will be." "If you'll tell me about the cats there, I'll give you my important news too. But you first. Agreed?" "No, because I don't know much about them. Suppose I tell you everything I know. Will you say it's not enough?" Mani pressed an inky black paw to his inky black chest. "Upon my honor as a Cat, I will not. That is the highest oath I have. But you have to tell about Skai as well." "All right. Time is different there, just like it is in Aelfrice. I'm not a learned man, but it seems like time runs really quick in Skai. A month there is a few hours here, or less. Something like that." "That's not like Aelfrice." "I think it is," I said. "Time goes slow there. Toug over there spent a few days in Aelfrice, or that's what he thought. But it had been years here. The rule seems to be that time runs down, slower and slower as you get deeper and deeper. Skai's the third world, Mythgarthr's the fourth, and Aelfrice the fifth." "I knew that. How did you get to Skai?" "A nice girl named Alvit brought me. The Valfather collects heroes more or less as some men collect armor. His daughters and some princesses get them for him, princesses who've died nobly and been picked by the others. Alvit's one of those. The Valfather accepted me and gave me the cloud-colored mount you probably saw me riding today and my shield,