"I'm sorry, I didn't know. What's the Sword of the Sleeping King?"

I'd never heard of it before, which rather surprised me. After Mother made me memorize all those pages of names and titles and peculiar weapons, I'd thought I knew the name of every magic sword in the world.

"You don't know?" The lizard froze in the middle of getting back up on his tail. He looked like a golden pretzel. "No, you don't! Oh, my.

You'd better go to the castle at once. Kazul will know what to do with you. I'd better go there myself, right away." Suz untwisted and darted off into the undergrowth.

"Wait!" I shouted. "What castle? Who is Kazul? And why-" The lizard looked back. "I don't have time for that! And even if I did, I couldn't tell you. You have to find out yourself. Magic swords always work that way. Don't you know anything?"

"Do you want me to recite the names of the Four Hundred Minor Swords of Korred the Spellsmith?… I know lots of things. I just don't know about this. How do I find out?"

"Follow the sword, silly," Suz said, and disappeared among the leaves.

I didn't try to chase the lizard. For one thing, there wasn't much point in it.

Suz was small enough to hide practically anywhere. For another, I didn't want to go running through the Enchanted Forest. People get killed that way, or enchanted, or other unpleasant things. Besides, I wanted to think.

I settled back against the tree and looked down at the sword, a little unhappily. "Follow the sword," Suz had said. But Mother had told me not to draw it unless I meant to use it, and I didn't think "following" it was the kind of use she meant. Besides, I wasn't sure I wanted to draw a magic sword in the middle of the Enchanted Forest, especially one I didn't know anything about. I decided to try something else.

I stood up and looked around. Over on my right there was a little gap in the trees, not enough to call a clearing, just a place where the trees were farther apart than usual. I went over to the middle of it and stood there while I tried to unfasten the sheath. That was a lot more complicated than it looked, and in the end I had to take the whole belt off. I wrapped the belt around the sheath and set it down in the middle of the open space. I backed up a couple of steps and sat down on the ground with the hilt of the sword close to me and the end of the sheath pointing away from me.

The woods had gone very, very quiet. I didn't like that, but after all the trouble I'd had getting out of the belt, I would have felt stupid if I'd just picked up the sword again without doing anything. Besides, I'd started setting up for a spell, and leaving things like that half-finished can be awfully dangerous.

I took a deep breath and spoke as steadily as I could:

"Sword of the Sleeping King I conjure thee: By stream and starlight, By sun and shadow, By song and storm wind, Show me thy tail!"

It was the simplest spell I knew-almost the only one, in fact. It's supposed to let the spell caster know more about the nature of whatever object is named in the first line of the chant. I didn't think the spell would work quite the usual way on a magic sword, but it wouldn't do any harm, and I was hoping to find out something useful.

I finished the spell, and everything was quiet for about two heartbeats. Fast heartbeats. I was nervous. Then the world turned over.

That's what it felt like. The ground started shaking, and the part under the sword pushed up until it made a mound taller than I was. I didn't have much of a chance to look at it, though, because I was rolling all over the open space and trying to grab hold of something.

Then everything went dark, and I was falling, and a huge, deep voice said solemnly, "All hail the Bearer of the Sword!"

And then it was over and everything was back to normal. I was lying on the ground in the Enchanted Forest, trying to dig my way through the moss. I stopped and waited. Nothing else happened, so I sat up and looked around. I was still sitting in the same not-quite-a-clearing, with the sword and sheath in the middle. The sword…

The sword was standing upright, half-buried in a knee-high mound that hadn't been there before. The blade was about a handspan out of the sheath, and it glittered when the sun got far enough through the trees to hit it. I stood up and walked over. The mound was covered with moss, just like the rest of the forest floor. It could have been there forever. I shivered, wondering how I was going to get the sheath out of the ground.

I put one hand on the hilt, intending to shove it back down into the sheath. When my hand touched it, my whole arm started to tingle. I jerked my hand away and stared at the sword. It just sat there. I reached out again, this time for the sheath.

As soon as I touched it, the sheath slid out of the ground. The belt was still wrapped around it, and no dirt clung to either of them. I touched the hilt again. My arm tingled, but this time I was ready for it, and I shoved the sword back into the sheath. Then I stuffed the sword belt under my arm and started walking. I was sure somebody must have noticed what had just happened, and I didn't want to be around when they came to find out what was going on.

I didn't stop again until midafternoon. By then I was hungry as well as tired.

I hadn't brought any food with me, and even if I'd known how to get home it was much too late to go back for some. I sighed and sat down under another tree to rest and think, but I didn't get much thinking done. Mostly, I stared at the sword.

Finally, I gave up. Sitting under a tree wasn't going to teach me anything. I stood up and buckled on the sword belt. As I adjusted it, my hand touched the hilt of the sword again. Three little tingles ran up my arm before I pulled my hand away. I looked at the sword for a moment, then shrugged and reached for the hilt with my right hand, as if I were going to draw it.

As soon as my hand touched the hilt, I felt the tingling. This time, instead of letting go, I concentrated on the way it felt. I got three distinct impressions. One was a low sort of background vibration, like a kitten purring in its sleep; one was a deep rumble; and one was a bright buzz, like a bee in a jar. Almost as soon as I figured them out, they started to fade. In another minute they were completely gone, and they didn't come back.

I took my hand off the sword's hilt, then put it back. I didn't feel anything. I tried a couple more times, but whatever it was had stopped. Finally I gave up and started walking again. I wasn't getting anywhere trying to figure out the sword, and I had to find somewhere to spend the night.

At least I didn't have to worry about giants; they live farther east, in the Mountains of Morning. It occurred to me suddenly that I didn't know where I was. I might be in the Mountains of Morning. It wasn't a particularly cheerful thought. I started walking more quietly.

I'd been walking for nearly half an hour when I realized that I knew where I was going. Unfortunately, I didn't know where I'd be when I got there. It was very odd, and I was a little uneasy until I realized that I didn't have to go that direction. I could have turned around and walked the other way, or gone sideways. In fact, I did go sideways for a while, just to prove I could.

After that I felt better, so I stopped avoiding whatever it was and started walking toward it again. I wasn't going to get anywhere if I kept avoiding things, and I might miss something important. Besides, there isn't any way you can avoid everything in the Enchanted Forest.

This way, at least I knew something was coming.

I was still walking very quietly when I heard somebody crying. I headed toward the sound, wondering what I was getting myself into.