you without ever actually saying anything that sounds remotely related.”
I nodded. “Murph. Used for the right reasons, in good faith, the Sword is in no danger. You’re the only one who can know if you’re doing it for the right reasons. But I’m begging you. Take it. Help me save my daughter, Karrin. Please.”
Murphy sighed. “You don’t play fair, Harry.”
“Not for one second,” I said. “Not for something like this.”
Murphy was quiet for a moment more. Then she stood up and walked to me. She took the Sword from my hand. There was an old cloth strap fixed to the sheath, so that the weapon could be carried over one shoulder or diagonally across the back. Murphy slipped the weapon on and said, “I’ll carry it. If it seems right to me, I’ll use it.”
“That’s all I can ask for,” I said.
Then I picked up Amoracchius, a European long Sword with a crusader-style hilt and a simple, wire-wrapped handle.
And I turned to Susan.
She stared at me and then shook her head slowly. “The last time I touched one of those things,” she said, “it burned me so bad I could still feel it three months later.”
“That was then,” I said. “This is now. You’re doing what you’re doing because you love your daughter. If you stay focused on that, this Sword will never do you harm.” I turned the hilt to her. “Put your hand on it.”
Susan did so slowly, almost as if against her will. She hesitated at the last moment. Then her fingers closed on the blade’s handle.
And that was all. Nothing happened.
“Swear to harm no innocents,” I said quietly. “Swear to use it in good faith, to return your daughter safely home. Swear that you will safeguard the Sword and return it faithfully when that task is done. And I don’t see any reason why you shouldn’t be able to wield it.”
She met my eyes and nodded. “I swear.”
I nodded in reply and took my hands from the weapon. Susan drew it slightly from its sheath. Its edge gleamed, and its steel was polished as smooth and bright as a mirror. And when she moved to buckle it to her belt, the Sword fit there as if made for it.
My godmother was probably going to feel very smug about that.
“I hope that the Almighty will not feel slighted if I carry more, ah, innovative weaponry as well,” Susan said. She crossed to the table, slid one of Martin’s revolvers into her holster, and after a moment picked up the assault rifle.
Sanya stepped forward as well, and took the tactical shotgun with its collapsible shoulder stock. “If He exists, He has never given me any grief about it,” he said cheerfully. “Da. This is going very well already.”
Thomas barked out a laugh. “There are seven of us against the Red King and his thirteen most powerful nobles, and it’s going well?”
Mouse sneezed.
“Eight,” Thomas corrected himself. He rolled his eyes and said, “And the psycho death faerie makes it nine.”
“It is like movie,” Sanya said, nodding. “Dibs on Legolas.”
“Are you kidding?” Thomas said. “I’m obviously Legolas. You’re . . .” He squinted thoughtfully at Sanya and then at Martin. “Well. He’s Boromir and you’re clearly Aragorn.”
“Martin is so dour, he is more like Gimli.” Sanya pointed at Susan. “Her sword is much more like Aragorn’s.”
“Aragorn wishes he looked that good,” countered Thomas.
“What about Karrin?” Sanya asked.
“What—for Gimli?” Thomas mused. “She is fairly—”
“Finish that sentence, Raith, and we throw down,” said Murphy in a calm, level voice.
“Tough,” Thomas said, his expression aggrieved. “I was going to say ‘tough.’ ”
Martin had gotten up during the discussion. He came over to me and studied the map I’d marked. Then he nodded. As the discussion went on—with Molly’s sponsorship, Mouse was lobbying to claim Gimli on the basis of being the shortest, the stoutest, and the hairiest—Martin explained what they knew of the security measures around the ruins.
“That’s why we’re going in here,” he said, pointing to the eastern-most point of the ruins, where rows and rows and rows of great columns stood. Once, they had held up some kind of roof over a complex attached to the great temple. “Now,” Martin continued, “the jungle has swallowed the eastern end of it. They’re only using torchlight, so movement through the galleries should be possible. There will be considerable shadow to move through.”
“Means they’ll have guards there,” I said.
“True. We’ll have to silence them. It can be done. If we can move fully through