"Beowulf needed to prove himself, do you see?" Aelfhere said. "King Hygelac still laughed at him. Come with me, Aelfhere, Beowulf said to me. I will kill that troll with my bare hands. And then, when it's over, you and others will say what you saw me do." Aelfhere grimaced.

     "And did you see it?"

     "I have sung it so, many a time."

     "Tell it to me again."

     "When you will listen, for once?"

     Wiglaf grinned. "Did you always listen when you were my age and the old skalds sang?"

     "Eh, then. Listen now!"

     "We were two at first, Waegmundings both. Beowulf needed more witnesses. Thirteen he sought, the keenest of warriors and stout wave-walkers to cross the whale-way to Hrothgar's realm two days to the south."

     "Grandfather," Wiglaf said. "The story would go better with fewer wave-walkers and whale-ways."

     Aelfhere hid a smile. "A warrior you will clearly be, Wiglaf. Agreed then. Less poetry, and less criticism both.

     "What happened," he went on, "is that Beowulf asked King Hygelac's permission to take a ship and oarsmen and go to help King Hrothgar's Danes in their problem with Grendel. Hygelac was obviously sure we would all be killed, but he gave his permission anyway. We fifteen weren't worth much to him on the mead bench, I suppose.

     "We made ready. We embarked. The ship was bright with our armor and weapons. The oarsmen hardly had time to tire before the wind took us up, embracing us like a bird with foamy breast -- do not laugh, boy! -- eh, well, like a boat with a decent sail and the wind in the right direction. By the second day we could see the headlands of the Danish realm shining off our bow. We dragged the boat up onto the beach and anchored it.

     From one side of the hall to the other the hand-linked pair lurched and stumbled, scattering coals from the fire, shattering benches, battering at each other with their free hands, and all the while Grendel howled and Beowulf maintained his grim silence. The Geats forgot what Beowulf had ordered and, weapons drawn, encircled the fighting pair. "Out of the way!" Beowulf shouted, spears and swords came at them.

     This was where I could help. I dropped Beowulf's battle gear and joined the fray, pulling away first one comrade, then another. I shouted to the others, "The fiend cannot be harmed with weapons! It is Beowulf you endanger, not Grendel!" Finally the men saw sense and withdrew to the far corners of the hall.

     Now, still crushing the monster's hand, Beowulf pushed Grendel up against King Hrothgar's throne. Then with both hands Beowulf lifted and twisted the arm attached to the fiend's ruined hand. Grendel screamed. Higher and higher that arm went, the angle horrible to see, Beowulf sweating and groaning with effort, higher and higher -- it could go no further, but it did. With a terrible ripping sound the shoulder tore asunder. "This is for Handscio!" Beowulf shouted, Grendel, shrieking in agony, twisted himself free and headed for the door, leaving his arm in Beowulf's grasp.

     But Beowulf was quicker. Somehow he got hold of her wrists. The curved blade moved up and back. Then, with his hands still gripping her wrists, he squeezed with all his might, hoping that she would be like Grendel, whose bones were his as soon he brought his strength to bear on them. But the hag was stronger than her son, or perhaps it was only that Beowulf was weary from all his battling and sickened by the smell of her breath. The most he could do was to keep her saex away from him. Even at that she did not give up, clenching his ribs with her her bony knees, snarling and coming for his neck with her fangs.

     For the first time in his life Beowulf knew that he was overmatched. This time, without Fate's help, his Waegmunding Gift would not save him. In desperation he brought his knees up to slam against what he hoped would be the she-troll's kidneys. Then as he felt her take the blow, he shoved her backwards and down, rolling to one side before letting go of her wrists and leaping up. Like a snake she twisted the other way, but not before Beowulf saw, hanging on the trophy wall, a gigantic sword gleaming with its own were-fire. He had not seen it before, but Fate showed it to him now, a magical blade certainly -- plunder from the giants' tomb under Heorot, perhaps. It was certainly the biggest, sharpest blade he had ever seen. Beowulf leaped for the sword while the hag scrambled to her feet and came after him with her saex. Now he had the giant's sword, monstrously heavy. Somehow he was on top of a rock nearly halfway across the cave; somehow the she-troll was beside him, her neck within sword-reach. "Fate be with me," he muttered, and swung the sword.

     She died on her feet, her head cut right off.

     "Quick, Wiglaf, behind me! My shield must do for us both!" Beowulf shouted.

     The dragon was an unreal mass blurred by heat waves. But the redhot iron of Beowulf's shield stood out, and Wiglaf jumped behind it. The dragon's tail came round to lash at him, but Beowulf stabbed at it with Naegling, and for once the blade penetrated. It was no mortal wound, but the greasy blood boiled out and the dragon's head came downward in pain. Then, with a speed so swift Wiglaf could only gape at it, the king leaped up and struck with the strength of thirty men -- thirty young men! -- at the dragon's skull.

     It was a blow that would have penetrated the magic corselets of the dwarfs, had the sword been able to bear it. But always there is a Curse for a Gift, and this was Beowulf's, that in the end he was too strong for his own weapons, even Naegling. And so, instead of killing the dragon it should, faithful Naegling shattered. The dragon reeled for a moment only, then shook off the pain and dropped his head still further, clawing away the shield and opening his enormous mouth to bite Beowulf's head off. At the same moment Beowulf lunged forward to butt the dragon with his forehead, so that instead of closing around Beowulf's neck, the poisoned fangs only raked at the exposed part of Beowulf's face. And then he began to take breath to flame again.

     Wiglaf had been training for only one summer in the arts of warfare. He had seen only fourteen winters and listened to steading tales for only ten of those, and none had been about how to kill a dragon. But he knew about animals, and he had observed what happened when the dragon flamed before. And so the dragon prepared for what would certainly be his final attack, Wiglaf looked only for that spot in the lower belly, the place where the furnace must be, and he watched and waited until the dragon's breath reached it, widening the belly there so that the scales parted a little, just a very little.

     Quick, Wiglaf told himself, do it before the air inside turns to fire! One boy and one sword and one thrust only to stop the terrible thing that was about to happen. And Wiglaf leaped forward and with all the strength and weight he could muster he plunged his shining blade hilt-deep into that precise spot in the dragon's lower belly, between the scales, deep into the furnace that made the dragon's fire.

     The dragon gasped. The blaze failed. Bewildered and in pain the dragon arched backward, parting the scales of his belly still more. And Beowulf, poisoned and bleeding and burned almost past belief, took his razor-sharp saex from his belt and joined it with his warrior's training and his Waegmunding Gift in both his hands. And the blade sang he swung it at the monster's belly, and Wiglaf thought his heart had stopped or time had stopped or maybe the world, because instead of destroying Beowulf and himself and the entire Geat kingdom, the dragon fell dead, cloven in two by a mere saex in a king's dying hands.

     "For our people, Wiglaf!" Beowulf roared. "We have killed him together, you and I, we two alone in the world!"

     Wiglaf shook. The dragon was dead. He had helped kill him. The dragon was dead. Tears filled his eyes.