Sometimes at night he would take from his bosom the piece of magic glass which the wizard had given him and would gaze through it at the star which still looked a bright crimson colour.
"Why have you led me here, cruel star," he asked sadly, "if you cannot help me more? Are you shining over my home and my Princess, and does she remember me? The seven long years will soon be passed, and they will wed her to another king, and it will be all of no avail that I have given up everything to find her heart, since I have only broken my own."
So the time passed. Michael worked hard by day, but by night he lay and wept. One day, when the seven years had nearly worn themselves away, he bent over a pool of water, and in it saw his own form, and he saw that his hair was thin and streaked with gray, and his face furrowed and seamed, and his eyes dim with crying, also his shoulders were bowed with hard work, and his clothes, once so gorgeous, now hung mere rags upon his bent form.
"Now all is in vain," said he, "for if even I returned to my own home no one will know me, so changed am I. I will go and kill the snake that has caused my misery, and then I will slay the old man who has deceived me."
So he went up to the snake, who lay motionless coiled over its eggs as usual, and reached out his hand to grasp its throat, but as he did so his tears fell and dropped upon its head, and it writhed fearfully and then glided away so fast that he could not see where it went, and left the heap of gray eggs bare beneath his hand. The old man lay beside them as still as usual, and did not move or open his eyes, even when the snake glided hissing past him.
"If the snake has escaped me," cried Michael, "then at least I can destroy the eggs;" and lifting his heel he struck them with all his might, but his foot left no mark upon them, nor even moved them from their place. They might have been made of iron, and each one nailed to the ground, so hard and firm they stood.
Michael burst out weeping afresh. "How foolish I am," he said, "Yes, and wicked too. It is not the fault of the poor snake that its eggs are not hatched. Perhaps it is enchanted like me, and waits as patiently for them;" and he bent his head till his tears fell upon the eggs. No sooner did they touch them, than the shells broke, and the pieces fell asunder, and from each egg came a small moving thing, though what it was Michael did not see, for he leaped to his feet with a shout of joy, which filled the air, and echoed again from the castle. At this the old man opened his eyes, and raising himself gazed, as if thunderstruck, with astonishment at the eggs.
"Tis a miracle," he cried, chuckling with joy.
But out of the eggs, there came no one fully formed animal, but from one egg came a foot, from another a leg, from another a tail, and from one a head, and each looked as though it belonged to some different beast, yet all these drew themselves together, and joined so well that the join was not to be seen. And they made a hideous monster of many colours. Then the manacles on Michael's wrists burst asunder, and the chains fell to the ground.
"Now," he cried, "I will go and take for myself the sword from the wall, and win my way into the castle, and nothing shall hinder me more." And he turned and rushed into the hut. There, upon the wall hung the shining sword, and Michael reached out his hand and seized it firmly, and drew it down from its place.