“An evil god,” muttered Penkawr. “For more than a million years, Mars has called him the Cursed One.”
“I know,” Carse nodded. “Rhiannon, the Cursed One, the Fallen One, the rebel one of the gods of long ago. I know the legend, yes. The legend of how the old gods conquered Rhiannon and thrust him into a hidden tomb.”
Penkawr looked away. He said, “I know nothing of any tomb.”
“You lie,” Carse told him softly. “You found the Tomb of Rhiannon or you could not have found his sword. You found, somehow, the key to the oldest sacred legend on Mars. The very stones of that place are worth their weight in gold to the right people.”
“I found no tomb,” Penkawr insisted sullenly. He went on quickly. “But the sword itself is worth a fortune. I daren’t try to sell it—these Jekkarans would snatch it away from me like wolves, if they saw it.
“But you can sell it, Carse.” The little thief was shivering in the urgency of his greed. “You can smuggle it to Kahora and sell it to some Earthman for a fortune.”
“And I will,” Carse nodded. “But first we will get the other things in that tomb.”
Penkawr had a sweat of agony on his face. After a long time he whispered, “Leave it at the sword, Carse. That’s enough.”
It came to Carse that Penkawr’s agony was blended of greed and fear. And it was not fear of the Jekkarans but of something else, something that would have to be awesome indeed to daunt the greed of Penkawr.
Carse swore contemptuously. “Are you afraid of ‘the Cursed One? Afraid of a mere legend that time has woven around some old king who’s been a ghost for a million years?”