Half-assed idea, but since belts are currently a rather useless item right now, make it more useful by making a sword belt. A belt that obviously fits a single one-hand sword, and with a key, allows you to drop what you have on hand (into inventory or on the ground) and lets you draw it out.
Helps out inventory issues a little... and uh, that's about all I can think of it helping out with D: There's probably more, but I'm throwing this out there at random cause its gnawed on my mind a little.