It broke and came loose in his hand. The android screamed, reaching out. Slag came over the fire with a tremendous bound and his club swung. It caved in the android's head and toppled him forward into the fire.
Thor stared at the dying green fire that spilled from the android's head. That was a part of Aava, that fire. It was the life-force.
He looked at the jewel throbbing soft red fire in his palm. He grinned.
II
The ruby was the size of a small egg. It was cut and polished until its burnished sides threatened to obscure the inner fires with their glimmerings. But deep inside the jewel was a core of flame that would never be extinguished. That flame looked purple.
Thor wondered. Purple heart of red ruby. Suppose Aava had imprisoned a jot of his immortal fire inside the ruby, as he had with the androids!
He turned it over. There was a rocking instant of vertigo, of pitch blackness and cold.
The meadowlands were gone. He was standing on a rocky escarpment that brooded over a small valley. And set in the middle of the valley, like a vision from an Arabic nightmare, was a city of elfin loveliness. Towers pointed slender spires to the sky, and hemispheric domes glowed softly in pale moonlight.
"The City of Aava," murmured Thor. "This is the place they sang the song to the urn, the city the Discoverer showed me."