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to think and wasn t happy about any of this; they didn t have a weapon among
them except a chipped stone knife one of the men had produced. He drained the
juice from the bowl, took a drink from his watersac.
Deadhead, you didn t even think of collecting the guards guns and
bring-ing them along. Proggin jekker, that you, worse than Turkl the
Peabrain.
He cleared his throat, spat.
Zdra, must a been that proggin snake took m mind off m
busi-ness.
A worm of suspicion turned in his mind when he looked at these woolly heads, a
suspicion that said it was them, they didn t want the guns along so they
didn t let him think about them. He watched the
Halathi intently, was so short with his answers to Mithel s endless ques-tions
that the boy went off, and finally curled in his blan-kets to snatch what
sleep he could.
After a few hours into the next day, they d left the grass. The land began
rising more sharply, clumps of trees and brush mixed with areas of thick
groundcover, some vines, some of it short stiff grass with spines that could
cut like needles. Now and then he heard the drums again, but there was a
questioning note in them as if they d lost focus. He dug his fingers in the
incipient beard that was collecting dust and itching like five days bad luck.
Proggin magic.
By nightfall they were in the fringe of a forest, trees all round them.
Kielin, probed around the pink, puckered scar. No heat, good. Does this
hurt?
No.
Ahwu, you haven t done yourself damage this day. Tomorrow will be more
difficult. She pushed at the strands of white hair straying into her eyes,
got to her feet. For all of us. She listened a moment to the drums. They d
changed again, gotten louder and more insistent. They re pushing at us. I
don t know
.... Her shoulders slumped and her eyes looked bruised.
Mp. Hedivy pulled the laces tight, tied them off. How long before we re
into your Forest?
Xosa Pass is two days off. If they ve gotten this close, they know where
we re headed. They ll send a force round to wait for us.
And?
I don t know. She walked away.
Hedivy sat watching the others get the camp set up. They were all tired, on
the ragged edge of falling apart, even young Mithel was subdued. He brooded
about the drums and what Kielin told him, ate what he was given, and
watched the. Halathi go through their enigmatic ma-neuvers. He was
angry and humiliated, shamed by the stupidity and carelessness that had put
him into this mess in the first place.
Twice. Not once. Twice! Stepping in it and rescued by someone else.
Kielin came over to him and stood looking down at him. Whatever you re
planning, she said, don t do it. He looked past her, said nothing.
If you step outside the circle, you ll have that lot, she waved her hand
toward the rumble of the drums, you ll have them down on us before the
night s done.
He glared at her. The guards had guns.
The guns were bound to them.
What?
Have you ever seen chinin trained to lures? He looked away. You know I
have.
They have men called makkhan who can smell out the marks they put on things.
We didn t have time to unmark the guns and taking them would have brought a
makkha straight to us with no need to search for traces.
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So it s wait here, lick arse and beg to stay alive or do the same at the
Pass?
Not quite, foreign man. We re in Forest now and these trees, this earth is
ours. She grimaced.
Ahwu, almost ours. Go to sleep, Hedivy Starab, and keep your plotting for
places and people you understand.
Churning with resentment, Hedivy watched her walk off. He d run his own life
since he was nine.
Didn t mat-ter how he had to scramble or what he had to put up with, it was
him in control; even going with Oram was his choice. He could have run,
started up somewhere else. Now he was as useless as
he d been when the Qilimen were carting him through the swamp in that hammock.
More than useless.
The half-formed plans for taking con-trol again that had been floating in his
head were air dreams. He rolled himself into his blankets and willed himself
to sleep, but he couldn t will the nightmares away, dreams from the old
time he thought he d forgot-ten.
Under the trees the slope was steep enough for the cane to be more bother
than it was a help.
Hedivy considered tossing it away, but it was the only thing he had
approx-imating a weapon so he hauled it along and distracted himself by
figuring how to sharpen and fire-harden the end. A short staff ...
he knew a thing or two about stick fighting ... with a good point on the end
if he got a shot at a throat ....
As they passed through a meadow and the sun hit him full for the first time,
he wiped his sleeve across his face, scratched some more at his beard, then
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