"I see what you mean," he said. "This was something I hadn't figured on." He sat down on the limb, letting his legs dangle.
Whatever had them hemmed in wasn't intangible. It was real. His foot had touched it. It had felt cold and gave slightly. Jarl Gare brought the foot up and looked at the toes. They looked unharmed, but seemed numb.
He pinched them and felt no more sensation than if they had grown numb from loss of circulation. They were cold to his touch.
Was that force thin-skinned like a balloon or solid as a plasticine ball?
"Waltk," he said, "Break me off a good-sized branch."
The Jovian slid farther out on the limb, snapped off a branch the thickness of his wrist and about three feet long and brought it to Jarl Gare.
"Watch it closely," he ordered Waltk.
He dropped the heavy branch. It fell about twenty feet, and stopped abruptly. Then slowly, like a ruptured duralloy canoe, it started downward again, but gaining speed. It struck the ground, but neither Waltk nor Jarl Gare could hear it strike.
Then the force wasn't solid.
He became aware that the foot which had touched the force was beginning to tingle. The power it released to numb was only temporary then.