Only Huntsman of the sharp eyes and Forest of the fleet foot could even guess where he was. Cruel, pretty Forest ran after Crooked but just missed catching him, pulling off a piece of his tunic. Huntsman fired a magical arrow that actually flew into the lost paths where Crooked walked and nicked his ear, so that blood dripped on his shoulder and his hand of ivory. But they could not stop him and soon he was deep in Sky Man's palace, where the lord of the house slept his drugged slumber. Crooked bolted the door behind him.

" 'Wake up!' he cried to sleeping Sky Man. He wanted his enemy to know what was happening and who had done it to him. 'Wake up, Loud Voice-I bring your ending!'

"Sky Man was very strong, even after drinking the potion Crooked had created. He sprang from his bed and took down his great hammer Crackbolt, big as a hay-wain, and swung it at Crooked. He missed and broke his own gigantic bed into splinters.

" 'That is nothing to worry about,' Crooked told him. 'You will not need that bed again. You will sleep in another, soon-a cold bed in a cold place.'

"Sky Man roared that Crooked was a traitor, then he threw his hammer as hard as his mighty arm could manage. If any other god or man but Crooked had been its target Crackbolt would have smashed him into bits and scorched those bits to charcoal. But the hammer stopped in mid-flight.

" 'Did you think I would make a weapon for you that you could use against me?' Crooked asked him. 'You call me traitor, but you attacked my father-your own brother-and threw him down by treachery. Now you will get what you deserve.'

"Then Crooked turned Sky Man's hammer against him, and the clamor of the blows were like the rumbling-tumble-roar of the lightning. Sky Man Perin cried out to his family and servants to save him. All who lived atop the Staff came running to his aid.