When it does, I said to Flora, throw me at it. Wherever I hitI'll stick--and I'll go for the throat.

"All right," she said, "and there's one other thing."

What's that?, I asked.

"Help! Help!" she cried.

It began crawling out through the silver, flower-bordered mirror.Flora unwound me from her ankle and threw me at the thing. It had noreal neck, but I wrapped myself about its upper extremity below themouth and began tightening immediately.

Flora continued to call out, and from somewhere up the hall I heardthe sound of heavy footfalls.

I tightened my grip, but the creature's neck was like rubber.

The sorcerer was moving to exit the room when the door burst openand the tall and husky, red-haired form of Luke entered.

"Flora!" he said, and then he saw the guisel and drew his blade.

On my recent journey with Merlin in the space between shadows I hadgained the ability to converse at complex levels. My perceptions--whichseem quite different--also became more acute. They showed me nothingspecial about Luke, the sorcerer, or the guisel, but Werewindle nowburned of an entirely different light. I realized then that it was notmerely a blade.

As Luke moved to position himself between Flora and the guisel, Iheard the sorcerer say, "What is that blade?"

"'Tis called Werewindle," Luke replied.

"And you are...?"

"Rinaldo, King of Kashfa," Luke said.

"Your father--who was he?"

"Brand--Prince of Amber."

"Of course," the sorcerer said, moving again toward the door. "Youcan destroy that thing with it. Command it to draw energy while you'reusing it. It has a virtually limitless supply to draw upon."

"Why?" Luke asked.

"Because it isn't really a sword."

"What is it then?"

"Sorry," the sorcerer said, regarding the guisel, which was nowmoving toward us. "Out of time. Got to find another mirror."