City Under the Sand

XIV Ambush

They’re coming!” Amoni shouted. She took a battle stance, cahulaks at the ready. Sellis drew both of his swords. Aric’s broadsword filled his hand, and Ruhm prepared to use his club. Myrana had only a dagger, Aric noted, but she looked ready to use it.

Still, they were only five, against nearly forty. Aric would not have said that it couldn’t be done. Sellis in particular cut a heroic figure, and he might have actually enjoyed the odds. Aric, although strong, was not yet an accomplished warrior, and it didn’t look as if Myrana was either. Sellis, Amoni, and Ruhm would have to do the bulk of the fighting.

The raiders came on fast. Their insectlike kanks and flightless erdlus tore across the plain, sending up a plume of yellow dust. Aric raised his sword and prepared for battle.

Then Myrana surprised them all by sheathing her dagger. “Weapons down!” she said.

“They’ll kill us!” Sellis cried.

“They’ll kill us if we fight,” Myrana said. “If we don’t, at least we have a chance.”

“Myrana, there’s always a chance,” Sellis argued.

“This is our best one,” Myrana said. “Trust me.”

The raiders came closer, so close Aric could see the honed edges of carrikals and spears, swords and gythkas, and the faces of those wielding them, set in masks of fury. He and his friends had never done anything to those raiders, but people seemed to need to embrace anger against those they would strike down. Anger burned in him, as well—somewhat more justifiably, he believed, since these raiders seemed intent on killing people whose only offense was walking across open desert.

He slowly lowered his sword, then pushed it back into the makeshift scabbard he had crafted. Myrana had a point—the raiders were too many to fight. Even if they won, they would certainly suffer some losses, and they hardly had enough to spare.

Amoni let her cahulaks dangle from her hand. Ruhm didn’t release his club, but rested the end on the ground. Finally, when the raiders had almost reached them, Sellis scabbarded his pair of swords.

Puzzled looks replaced rage on the raiders’ faces. “Are you cowards, to face us without weapons?” one asked. He was a full elf, lean, tall and broad-shouldered, his hair long and wild, and he arched an eyebrow at them in wonder. He and three other elves among the raiders were the only ones on foot, but in spite of the hard sprint he did not seem winded in the least. “Or wizards, perhaps, meaning to destroy us through magic rather than fair combat.”

Myrana stepped to the group’s front. Reasonable, Aric thought, as this approach had been her idea. “You speak of fair combat? Attacking five with forty or more?”

The elf chuckled. “Perhaps only five of us at a time would have engaged you. Under those terms, would you fight? Or do you surrender your lives and possessions now?” Other raiders joined in laughter at that, a few of them hurling curses and epithets at the five companions.

“We would surrender our possessions gladly, to spare our lives,” Myrana told him. Not exactly answering the question the elf had asked, Aric noted. “But we have precious little to take. A handful of weapons, I suppose. The skins we use to keep ourselves warm at night. A little water, though not much, and less meat. We are but poor journeyers, a long way from anywhere. And as you can see, without mounts or wagons. What is it you would take from us?”

“I suppose we’ll settle for your lives and what little you carry,” the elf said. “Better than naught.”

“Is it?”

“You have something better to offer, girl?” Some of the other raiders dismounted, walking around their prey, eyeing their few belongings. “And are the rest of you mute? Or too stupid to speak?”

“I speak,” Ruhm said. “I’d fight you in a second.”

“I might have something to offer,” Myrana said quickly, lest Ruhm embroil them all in an unwinnable battle. “We are but five lonely travelers, but I am a daughter of House Ligurto. Surely you’ve heard of it—once of the richest trading houses in the Tablelands.”

“Oh, I’ve heard of House Ligurto,” the elf said, his interest piqued.

“I’m away from them for now, but I’ve been on the road with them my whole life. I know their route and schedule as well as I know my own name.”

“How does that help us?”

“I said I’m a daughter of the house, I didn’t say that I was a contented one. You spare us, and I’ll direct you to a place where you can wait for the caravan. The riches you could acquire there would be far more than you can take from us.”

The elf rubbed his chin. Black tattoos snaked up from under his faded red shift, climbing his neck and etching a false black beard on his smooth skin. “An ambush, eh?” He huddled with some of the other raiders.

“Myrana, this is a dangerous game you play,” Sellis whispered.

“It’s no game, it’s our lives. I know what I’m doing.”

“We can still take them,” Sellis insisted. “Myrana, I—”

Myrana cut him off. “Do not forget that I’m a trader, from a long line of them. I’m doing what we do. I’m bargaining. Now hush.”

Aric hoped she was right. Ever since that moment he had known Kadya meant to kill him, life seemed composed of one narrow escape after another. As if the burning sun and sands and the infinite cold of night weren’t bad enough, they’d had to stave off one attack after another. He was starting to despair of ever seeing Nibenay again, much less saving it from the demon-possessed templar.

The raiders seemed to have reached a conclusion. They faced the travelers again, the elf at their center, flanked by three humans, a halfling, and a goliath, doubtless brought up from the ranks in case Ruhm tried anything. They were a hard-looking lot, showing the scars of many a struggle, their faces grim. Aric was glad they weren’t fighting, but suspected that had only been postponed by Myrana’s action. And possibly not for long.

“Very well,” the elf said. “We’ll take the girl at her word. For now. Girl, you’ll lead us to this place, where we can set an ambush for your family’s caravan.”

“And you’ll leave me and my friends alone and unharmed, until you get what you can from the caravan,” Myrana insisted. “If even one of us is mistreated in any way, then you’ll have to kill us all, because I will never breathe a word of that location.”

The elf looked disappointed. Perhaps he’d hoped only to spare Myrana. “You’ll have to give up your weapons, of course.”

“And be utterly defenseless against whatever horrors the desert springs upon us? Nonsense. You already know we have no illusions that we could beat all of you in combat, else we would be fighting now, not talking. But we give up nothing—no water, no food, no weapons. Then, when you’ve attacked the caravan and stolen your fill, you let us go.”

“Let you go? Ha!” the halfling said. Standing fully erect, she might barely reached the elf’s waist. But she stood with back and shoulders hunched, a slender javelin in her hands, so she only seemed as tall as his thighs. She was thin, seemingly young, but as battle-worn as the others. She wore a vest and loincloth of some sort of pale, almost yellow skin, and sandals against the heat of the desert sands. Her brown hair was knotted once at the back of her head, and otherwise untamed—in that sense, it matched her attitude.

The elf shot her a glare. “Of course we’ll let you go, once we have those riches,” he assured them. Aric had seen five-year-old children who were more proficient liars.

“Very well,” Myrana said. “Then we have a deal.”

“A deal,” the elf echoed. He turned to face the rest of the band. “Nobody’s to lay a hand on these,” he called. “To save their own miserable hides, they’re helping us to ambush a wealthy caravan.”

This news was met with some cheers but much grumbling, several members of the band seemingly more interested in murder today than riches tomorrow. But the elf and those he had consulted ran things, apparently, and general agreement was voiced by all.

Then they were off again, the travelers still on foot, herded along at a rapid trot by mounted raiders. Aric wasn’t sure this was any improvement over a quick, bloody death in battle—keeping pace with the raiders seemed sure to kill them anyway.

As night fell, the raiders stopped and made camp. They built fires, over which they cooked erdlu eggs. The aroma made Aric’s mouth water and his stomach growl. He still had a little of Amoni’s lirr, dry and flavorless compared to the erdlu smell, and diminishing stores of water to wash it down. The raiders drank ale and wine, screamed with laughter at jokes they told one another, sang songs.

The raiders allowed them a fire, in the middle of camp where there were raiders on every side, preventing any escape. When it appeared that none of them were paying close attention to the captives, Aric tore off a chunk of lirr with his teeth. “I hope you know what you’re doing, Myrana,” he said as he chewed. “They’ve no intention of letting us go alive, even after the ambush.”

“I know that, Aric. Just as I know that if we’d tried to stand and fight, we’d all be food for the carrion-eaters tonight, and they would have what little we own.” She drank from her water skin. “Besides, I would not betray my own house to such as these. The place I’ll take them is well off House Ligurto’s trading route.”

“Then they’ll kill us for certain!”

“They’ll kill us either way,” Sellis said. He had accepted Myrana’s plan, but grudgingly.

“True enough. I know this won’t keep us alive forever,” Myrana admitted. “I just hope it works long enough to find a way to escape.”

“Looks hard,” Ruhm said.

“Impossible, or close to it,” Amoni added.

“For now, yes. Over the next few days, perhaps they’ll relax their guard,” Myrana said. “Every day we live is one more chance for us. Dying today would have meant no chances. I’m sorry I didn’t have time to discuss it with you before I spoke up, but I honestly just thought of it at that moment.”

“And saved us all,” Aric said. “Thank you, Myrana. Now that I understand what you had in mind, I think you made the right decision.”

“Let’s hope,” Ruhm said gloomily.

“Apparently that’s all we’ve got left to us,” Sellis said. “Hope, and empty stomachs. Tomorrow, Myrana, you’ll have to remind them that not mistreating us requires giving us food and water, else we’re not likely to live long enough to reach the ambush spot.”

“I’ll work on it,” Myrana promised.

Aric ate the last of his lirr, staring into the fire, turning every now and then to let it warm the side of him facing the night’s cold.

She found a chance to bring it up the next day, on the trail. She was near the front of the procession, riding a borrowed erdlu. She had been loaned it so that she could keep up with the leaders of the long line of raiders, since she was supposed to be directing them to a spot only she knew. The elf from the day before, whose name was Ceadrin, jogged beside her. He had a certain roguish charm, and he had been true to his word, so far, keeping other raiders who might have been disinclined to honor his deal from laying hands on her or the others.

“Either my friends and I must be allowed to hunt our own game,” she said, “or you’ll have to feed us.”

“Was that part of our bargain, girl? Somehow I disremember that.”

“It’s part and parcel. If you let us starve, that’s mistreating us. The deal was no mistreatment.”

Ceadrin regarded her—approvingly, she thought, although she wasn’t the least bit interested in his opinion of her. His eyes had a light orange cast to them. “You drive a hard bargain.”

“It’s in my blood.”

“And yet you’re willing to betray that blood?”

“Family ties aren’t always the strongest bonds,” she said, hoping that was vague enough to get by. If she needed to, she could make up an argument, but she hoped it didn’t come to that. “As you must know, since I see a scattering of other elves among your band, but not an entire tribe’s worth.”

Ceadrin shrugged. “You’re right. I was of the Starspeeder clan, but there were … difficulties, let’s say. You wouldn’t want to hear more than that.”

“I’m sure you’re right.”

“There are more of my clan, back at the fort. But not many, I grant you.”

“What fort is that?”

He waved a hand behind him, encompassing the whole lot of raiders. “Oh, we’re just one raiding party,” he explained. We’ve a fort, once called Dunnat. There we’ve three times this number. Almost too many, really. Although we go raiding in smaller bands, it’s still a lot to share with. And I’ve never been fond of sharing.”

“Well, you’ll be a hero when you return with the goods you’ve stolen from House Ligurto,” Myrana told him. She allowed herself a slight grin, then pretended to try to hide it. “And I’ll have achieved a small measure of vengeance, myself. It should work out well for us both.”

“You—what’s your name, girl? Myrana?”

“That’s right.”

“You might just have the spirit of a raider. Perhaps when this is done …”

“Then I’ll want to be on my way with my friends. Aric, the half-elf, he’s from Gulg, and longs to return there. The others and I vowed to accompany him that far, and I mean to keep that promise.”

“Gulg?” the elf asked. “I’d never have guessed it.”

“It’s been a long voyage, Ceadrin. We’ve all made some changes, or had them forced upon us. There was a day you’d have looked at him and known exactly where he was from, but that was ages ago.”

“And you, Myrana? Where’s home to you?”

She indicated the desert before them. No harm in telling the truth on this score. “Anyplace there’s a tent pitched and a blanket to go over me. And a bargain to be struck—the lot of a trader’s life. All I know are the stars and moons and the shifting sands.”

“Pity you’re so determined to honor that vow,” Ceadrin said. “There’s much about you that makes you fit to join our group. I think I’d like that a great deal, in fact.”

“Even though I’d be one more to share with?”

“Even though.”

“Well, my word is not given lightly,” she said. Never mind that she had been lying to Ceadrin since they’d met. It was a simple matter of survival. And he was lying to her, too, which made it easier. “But we’ll see what the next days bring, won’t we?”

“We will, at that,” Ceadrin said. “I suppose we will indeed see.”

That night, they had erdlu eggs and wine, along with the raiders. Their guard was no more lax than it had been the first night, but they seemed to be growing more accustomed to the captives, and in addition to including them in their meal, the raiders engaged them in conversation.

For two more days they journeyed with Myrana riding most of the time. Given her damaged leg, Aric was thankful for this, but the others had to hurry to keep up with the raiders.

Finally, they reached a spot that indeed seemed ideal for an ambush. Two tall ridges formed a wide canyon that converged at one end to a narrow pass through which perhaps six or seven mounted people could ride abreast. The hills on either were covered in large rocks and scrubby plants that would offer both cover and weapons. The gap wasn’t tight enough to make travelers anxious, but it was so slim that raiders could flank them from both sides and easily cut them down from above.

“Why would your family’s caravan pass through here?” Ceadrin asked Myrana when she showed them the place. “It’s far from the main trading routes.”

“Which is exactly why,” Myrana said. “The main trading routes are where most of your kind would look for them. And they’re where our competitors also travel—sometimes competing caravans are more dangerous than the most bloodthirsty raiders. You also won’t find a faster route between Urik and Nibenay.”

“Interesting,” Ceadrin said. “When will they be here?”

Myrana looked to the sky, as if it could provide the answer she sought. “Two days, perhaps. Maybe three, depending on how hard the craftsmen of Urik are dealing. But when they come, they’ll have plenty of rich obsidian in their wagons: weapons, carvings, jewelry, and raw stone. Plus, of course, whatever they acquired in Draj and Raam, and a certain amount of gold.”

“That sounds fine,” Ceadrin said.

“So let’s kill ‘em now!” the halfling female they’d met before said. “We’re here, we know when the caravan comes.”

“There’ll be no killing,” Ceadrin countered.

“No killing?” the halfling echoed, her disappointment clear. “But—”

Ceadrin raised a hand, to silence her and the other raiders who had already chimed in on her side. “No,” he said. “We don’t know what’ll happen when the caravan arrives. This looks like a good place for a successful ambush. We’ll be on both sides of them, with elevation on our side and boulders we can tumble down upon them. But it’s possible that a hostage will come in handy, as well, and for that we’ll need the girl.”

“Kill the others, then! All they are now is more mouths to feed!”

Ceadrin looked as if he were giving the idea some consideration.

“Kill them, and I kill myself,” Myrana warned. “Then there’s no hostage. But let us live, and I know I can help in one other way.”

“How?” the raiders’ lone goliath asked.

“If I show myself, as they’re reaching the narrowest part of the pass, they’ll stop. Then you can make your attack, and even if they try to run, it’ll be from a dead halt. You’ll have a much easier time of it if I’m here. And cooperating.”

“She makes sense,” Ceadrin said. He turned toward Myrana and her friends and lowered his voice. “You always make sense, Myrana. It causes me to be suspicious of you. If I find that you’ve deceived us in any way, you’ll wish you had died that first day. I’ll let my friends kill yours, slowly, while you watch. And your own demise will be excruciatingly slow and painful. I promise you that.” He grinned at her, his orange eyes boring into her. “And like you, I take my promises seriously.”

Two days passed. The raiders and their captives waited in separate groups, high on the twin ridges overlooking the pass. Aric, Amoni and Myrana had been kept with Ceadrin’s group, while Ruhm and Sellis had been made to climb the opposite slope with a group commanded by the halfling. Aric was still working out the hierarchy of the raiders, but he gathered it had much to do with an individual’s ruthlessness and skill in battle. The halfling, for all her diminutive size, appeared tough, with no sense of fear or mercy.

Three raiders had taken the mounts and wagons to a point outside the hills to wait out of sight from the caravan regardless of which approach it took.

On the third morning, Aric woke up to find that most of the raiders had taken up their positions on the hillside. Myrana was nearby, sitting on the skins she slept under. Amoni stood close to her, staring into the southeast. They couldn’t escape from here, but none of the raiders paid them any attention. Their gazes were fixed, instead, on something that might have been a cloud of dust in the far distance. “How long do you think we have, Myrana?” Aric asked. “Sooner or later, they’ll figure out that the House Ligurto caravan isn’t coming through here after all.”

“They will,” Myrana agreed. “What I didn’t tell you is that this pass is indeed used for transit—just not by us.” She nodded her head toward the smudge on the horizon. “I’m not sure who that is coming this way, but it’s not House Ligurto.”

“Someone’s really going to be ambushed?” Amoni asked.

“So it would appear,” Myrana said. “And we’d better be ready to take advantage of it, because I doubt we’ll get another chance.”

“I wish we could tell Sellis and Ruhm.”

“Sellis will figure it out. I don’t know Ruhm well, but I expect he will, too.”

“You’re probably right,” Aric agreed. “I just hope we decide to take advantage of it in the same way.”

“Me too,” Amoni said. “And I hope our captors don’t figure out that’s not a House Ligurto caravan until it’s too late. Because they are going to be very, very angry when they do.”

They watched the approaching party, more than just a plume of dust at this point, but not yet discernible. Aric’s fingers rested lightly on the hilt of his sword, tapping against it. His left foot was twitching.

“Can you be still?” Myrana asked him.

“I’m anxious,” he admitted. “Since we were captured, we’ve been living under the threat of imminent death, any time they tired of us. But now … now death is more imminent than ever. Even I can tell that group isn’t a caravan. They’re moving too fast. Once the raiders figure that out, they’ve no reason to let us go on living.”

“I have a feeling that once they figure that out, they’re going to be a little busy,” Myrana said. “Those are thri-kreen.”

“You can see that far?”

“Far enough to make that out. Nothing else moves quite like thri-kreen.”

She was right, Aric realized. He remembered seeing individual thri-kreen in Nibenay—not often, as their insectlike race was drawn to be part of their birth clutch, and failing that to join any other pack available—and their odd build, taller than all but the tallest elves, with powerful legs and four arms and sand-colored carapaces sweeping behind them like cloaks, gave their gaits a unique and noteworthy strangeness. Their heads seemed oddly unbalanced on slender necks, and their antennae were constantly in motion as well.

More notable still was the sight when two or more walked down the street together. While each thri-kreen individual looked awkward, each step an unlikely series of jerky motions, in combination they moved exactly the same. Whether there were two or six, the largest group Aric had observed for any length of time, their motions matched exactly, as if there were only one mind operating all six bodies, all six sets of arms and legs.

“I’ve never seen them in combat,” he said. “But I know what you mean.”

“That’s them, all right,” Amoni said. The sun was still climbing into the sky. Sunlight gleamed off Amoni’s copper skin from the knees up, and below that her legs were shaded. “In combat it’s not quite the same, because they’re fierce fighters and they’ll take any advantage.”

Aric had an idea. He rose and stood next to Amoni. The raiders on the far hill were still completely in the shade, but he was, like Amoni, half lit by the sun. Soon enough the raiders would tell them to sit, because they would give away the ambush if they were seen.

So he slipped his sword a few inches out of its scabbard, facing into the sun and tilting it slightly. Sunlight winked from the steel blade. He directed that wink toward the southeast, toward the oncoming thri-kreen.

“What are you up to now?” Myrana asked.

“I’m letting them know someone’s up here. Stand between me and the other slope, Myrana, so they don’t see.”

Myrana hurried to do as he bade her. In her position, Amoni was already partially blocking him. “Clever,” she said.

“It’s my turn, don’t you think?”

“I don’t know about that. But this is an excellent time for it.”

The compliment made him beam almost as much as the sun flashing off his blade was.

He couldn’t keep it up for long, he knew. If he wasn’t careful one of the raiders on his side of the hill would see what he was doing, and then the three of them would likely be slain before the thri-kreen even made it this far. He had no way of knowing if the insectlike humanoids had spotted him, but he knew if he’d been in their place, looking toward where the canyon funneled down, he would have seen such a sign.

He let the blade sink back into its scabbard and sat down again. Still, his fingers played about the hilt, nervous as ever. He had done what he could do. Now it was just a matter of time.

You there!” one of the raiders shouted. He was another halfling, this one a male and no bigger than the female. He looked younger still, but Aric knew it was hard to tell with that race—from any distance at all they all looked like children. This one had wisps of dark hair growing from his chin. “No one said you could stand.”

“No one said we couldn’t,” Amoni replied.

“I’m saying it.”

“Fine,” Aric said. He sat down, and Myrana and Amoni joined him.

“I’m keeping my eye on you,” the halfling warned them. “So don’t think you’ll be able to try anything, when we attack that caravan.”

“It’s no caravan,” Ceadrin corrected. “I think it’s thri-kreen. We’ll let them pass, they’ve nothing we want. But keep an eye on the prisoners just the same—I’ll be wanting a word with the crippled girl when this is done.”

“Do your raider friends on the other side know you’re letting them pass?” Myrana asked. Her jaw was thrust toward the elf, her eyes narrow slits. Aric knew she didn’t appreciate being called a crippled girl—true as it might be, she got around fine, if more slowly than some, and didn’t feel crippled in any serious ways.

“They will when I don’t make the first move,” Ceadrin said. “I still command this party.”

The halfling shot him a look that Ceadrin didn’t see because he was eyeing Myrana. Aric wondered if the little man thought he—or more likely the female halfling who seemed to be second in seniority—should be in charge of the band. Perhaps she had even challenged Ceadrin in the past. Some of her scars had seemed of recent vintage.

Ceadrin moved off down the hill to join others watching the approaching thri-kreen intently. He spoke quiet words to them, most likely telling them not to engage the group. The halfling watched the prisoners for a couple more minutes before his attention also wandered back toward the thri-kreen. By now they were clearly visible, racing up the valley floor on those powerful legs.

“Do you think they saw your signal?” Myrana whispered.

Aric shrugged. “We’ll find out soon.”

As the thri-kreen came closer, movement from the raiders ceased. They had taken their places behind boulders and bushes, as if prepared for ambush, but they didn’t want to attract the attention of a group of thri-kreen numbering more than they had. They would wait and watch and hope.

Aric made his extremities stop jittering around. He rested his hand on the sword hilt, drawing comfort from its steel. Amoni seemed on edge as well, her muscles tense, ready for a fight. Only Myrana appeared relaxed, now that Ceadrin was gone.

As the sun rose high enough over the far hills to flood the canyon floor, the thri-kreen started to pass below them. Aric could make out individual faces, but to him the thirty or more imposing insect men all looked the same. Huge black multifaceted eyes glittered in the sunlight, antennae bobbed as they ran. The clicking of their mandibles was audible even far up on the hill. They wore no clothing to speak of, although some had harnesses or belts from which they suspended weapons and belongings. Every one of them carried weapons in their upper limbs, the middle set of arms being far the weakest of their six limbs. They were especially fond of gythkas and chatkchas. Many also carried shields of wood or shell.

Every raider’s gaze was riveted on them. The halfling and another raider, a muscular, heavily tattooed human with only one eye and a nasty scar snaking down from his empty left socket to the corner of his mouth, sat behind the captives, so that even while watching the thri-kreen they could see if Aric, Myrana, or Amoni tried anything. Aric wondered if he should make a move anyway. If they could take out those guards quietly, perhaps he, Amoni and Myrana could go up over the crest of the hill and come down on the other side, then capture some mounts.

And then what? Go back into either a battle or a troop of thri-kreen warriors for Ruhm and Sellis? Abandon them? Neither option was a good one. Myrana would have a hard time on the uphill sprint. If they were seen, the raiders need not call attention to themselves, at all. A few could chase them over the hill and catch them on the other side of the hill without the thri-kreen seeing anything.

No, there was nothing to do but hope and wait until an opportunity presented itself.

“They’re going,” the one-eyed human said softly. “Thank Ral and Guthay, they’re passing us by.”

At that moment, the thri-kreen attacked.

They broke formation without notice, many of the insect men sprang off their strong legs, some landing thirty or forty feet up the hillside.

As they charged, the raiders responded, knowing they hadn’t gone unseen after all. They shoved over huge stones, fired arrows, hurled javelins. Most of the weapons clattered off thri-kreen shields. A hurtling boulder smashed into one, who gave a chittering wail as it died. Others simply leapt over the oncoming rocks and kept swarming up the hillside.

With howls and battle cries, the raiders left their hiding places and rushed to meet the thri-kreen. A crystalline chatkcha arced through the air and crushed one raider’s skull. A thri-kreen engaged a half-elf raider, gythka to sword, the gythka’s crescent blades at each end spinning around and the stabbing blade in the center keeping the raider at bay until the mantis man finally cut the half-elf’s leg, then pierced his heart.

“Aric, look!” Myrana said, grabbing his upper leg. She pointed to the ridge across the canyon. Aric saw nothing, at first, then realized that was the point.

“They’re staying hidden,” he said. “The thri-kreen don’t know there’s anybody up there, and the raiders like it that way.”

“They’d rather see their fellows slaughtered than take a chance on joining the fight,” Amoni said. She spat into the dirt. “Cowards.”

“The fight won’t take long, then,” Aric said. “With the raiders at full strength, we might have a chance. But with half, we’ll be swiftly dispatched.”

He stood suddenly and drew his sword. “What are you doing?” the halfling guard demanded.

“They’ll be up here any moment,” Aric said. “If you think we’re not defending ourselves …”

“Oh, let them come,” the halfling said. “There’ll be more than a bug or two slain before they get here.”

Amoni and Myrana followed suit, rising and drawing weapons.

And across the way, a boulder sailed from the hillside, crashing to the canyon floor behind the startled thri-kreen who hadn’t yet climbed the slope.

Surprised shouts followed in the boulder’s wake.

Thri-kreen peeled off from the first wave of attack and started up the opposite hill. The battle was fully engaged, on both fronts. The raiders had the edge of height, but the ferocity of thri-kreen warriors couldn’t be understated. Aric watched one grab a raider and plant its mandibles into her arm, injecting venom that froze her in place. The thri-kreen dispatched her with a quick stab from its gythka and turned to face its next opponent.

The time had come. Aric spun around without warning and buried his sword in the one-eyed man’s chest. The raider’s single eye bulged, his jaw dropped open, and blood burbled out. Aric withdrew the blade and more blood spurted from the wound.

The halfling started toward Aric. Amoni blocked his way, her cahulaks whipping through the air. One four-bladed head sliced through the halfling’s arm, then the other sliced up his chest and chin.

Aric grabbed Myrana’s arm and hoisted her to her feet. “Come on!” he urged. “Over the hill!”

“But.… Sellis and Ruhm!”

He hadn’t yet figured out that part of it. Ruhm and Sellis were capable. Even now they had to be fighting their own way clear.

An elf raider bounded toward them with a bone axe in both hands. “Stop where you are! We’re not done with you!”

“Yes, you are,” Amoni said. She met the elf’s advance. Aric took advantage of the moment to lead Myrana up the slope. The soil was loose, sliding under his feet. They had to dig in, sidestepping up. It was hard for Myrana, so Aric took a step, braced, and hauled her up beside him, then moved on to the next.

Before they reached the crest, two more raiders raced to intercept their escape. One was a brutish human or part-human of a breed Aric didn’t recognize, the other a stout, bronze-skinned man who looked to be from Draj.

Aric released Myrana’s hand and slashed at the brute, who blocked the blow with a chitin shield and stabbed with the short spear he carried. Aric sidestepped the spear thrust. His foot came down awkwardly on the uneven ground and slid out from under him. The second man jabbed with a dragon paw. Swinging his heavy sword, Aric caught the dragon paw’s jab, deflecting the weapon and continuing his blade’s sweep toward the man’s skull.

The man raised the dragon paw to parry the sword. Aric’s heavy steel blade crashed through the paw’s wooden shaft and bit into the man’s head, carving a deep gash above his ear. The man cried out, hurled his weapon aside and clapped his hands to his head as he fell to his knees. Aric kicked him in the chest and he went down.

But the kick unbalanced Aric again. He caught himself on his hands, just as the other fellow drove his spear’s keen obsidian tip at Aric again. Aric tried to dodge but his foot slid on the rocky slope, and the point scraped his ribs. Aric, still unbalanced, batted the spear away with one hand and shoved his sword point-down toward the ground to keep from falling. Only the sword’s length kept him from tumbling down the slope.

The brute charged, spear outthrust for the killing blow. When Aric tried to turn to face the man, his weight on the ancient sword bowed and snapped it with a loud crack. Most of the blade’s length skidded down the hill. Aric dropped to one knee, ducking under the thrusting spear and bringing the remains of his weapon, about four inches of blade, up at the same time. The brute’s momentum carried him past Aric’s shoulder, and those four inches of steel sank into his gut. Blood drenched Aric’s hand and arm. The brute spun away from him, tearing the stub of a sword from Aric’s grasp, and rolled down the slope.

Aric picked up the fallen spear. It was not a weapon he had any familiarity with, but he’d rather learn it fast than be without any.

Amoni had finished off her elf opponent, and with those enemies dispatched, the way to the hilltop was clear. Below, the thri-kreen had cut a swath through the raiders. A glance at the far ridge showed the same thing happening there, but Aric was moving too fast, he and Amoni helping Myrana up the steep, treacherous crest of the ridge, to see if he could spot Ruhm or Sellis.

Then they were over the top and working down the other side, panting from the hurried climb. On this side the sunlight seemed brighter and hotter, the sky a brighter olive, the sounds of battle dimmed.

They rushed as much as they could down the slope, balancing between trying to move quickly and not wanting to send cascades of rock and dirt down to announce their presence. Somewhere on this side, three more raiders waited with the mounts.

Once they neared the bottom, they smelled the animals, then saw their guards. They raiders had corralled the beasts in a makeshift pen. Using a natural cutaway in the hillside, they blocked the open side with branches and brush. One raider slept while the other two gambled with fragments of white bone. Aric, Myrana and Amoni cut across the slope toward them.

When they were almost directly above the guards, one of the erdlus sniffed the air and gave a warbling cry of alarm. The guards dropped their bits of bone and snatched up weapons. Aric and Amoni took a couple of running steps and launched themselves into the air.

Amoni crashed into one of the guards, bowling him over. Aric landed hard, a couple of feet before his man. He bent his knees upon landing and sprang up fast, thrusting with the unfamiliar spear.

His opponent, a battle-scarred veteran wearing vestiges of a Tyrian military uniform, moved away from the thrust and swung a fang-spiked morningstar at him. The heavy weapon whistled inches above Aric’s head, as he ducked the blow and lost his footing. He sprawled on the ground, spear under his belly. The wound he’d suffered earlier sent darting pains though him, but he rolled over quickly and jabbed the spear’s obsidian point into the veteran’s ankle.

The man screamed. He put his weight on his good leg and tried to raise the morningstar again. He went off balance and stumbled to correct himself, giving Aric time to push to his feet and drive the spear into the veteran’s chest. The veteran looked at him with a shocked expression, and slowly sank to the ground.

Aric snatched away the morningstar as the man fell, with Aric’s new spear locked in his chest. The guard who had been sleeping was sitting up. Amoni, having slain her foe, spun her cahulaks on their rope, and the guard dodged right and left to avoid them. He lunged for a crossbow he had set aside before going to sleep. Aric hurled the morningstar. It struck the guard’s hand, cutting him and bouncing away. The guard snatched back his hand, and one of Amoni’s cahulaks’ heads drove into his abdomen.

The mounts were stamping and squealing, but all three guards were dead. Aric helped Myrana down from the slope.

“Grab some erdlus!” he shouted. Amoni was standing in the midst of them but had not yet moved to secure any. “We need five of them.”

“Five?” Amoni asked. “We are only three!”

“For Sellis and Ruhm?” Myrana speculated. “Yes. We have to go back for them.”

“Why?” Amoni asked. “They’re our friends.”

“But they’re—”

“What? Probably dead? They might be. But they might be alive, too. Until we find out …”

“What of the demon? Warning Nibenay?”

“We need to see if they’re alive.” Aric said. “We can’t just leave them.”

Amoni didn’t argue further. Despite the talk he’d had with her, she was still more comfortable taking orders than questioning them. Within a few moments, each was mounted on a sturdy bird, taller than Aric and slightly heavier. They’d tied ropes around the necks of two others, which Aric and Amoni held. Aric leaned over the guard he had killed, grabbing his spear’s shaft and tugging it free.

Myrana led the way out of the makeshift corral. They left it open behind them and nudged the erdlus into a sprint. Aric glanced back to see kanks and erdlus emerging from the corral and wandering into the desert.

The erdlu’s feathers tickled his legs and arms. He tilted forward, holding onto the thing’s thick neck, a scent like almost-spoiled meat filling his nose. He directed the creature by applying pressure with his hands and knees, and after a few minutes he began to feel like he and the bird were in sync. The thing moved at a brisk but ungainly trot, swaying Aric from side to side with every long stride.

Once they were moving at full speed, Aric’s beast passed Myrana’s. He led them around the line of hills, to the canyon’s narrow end. As they neared the pass they could again hear the sounds of battle. The big bird didn’t want to enter the pass, but Aric kept up the pressure. They went into the canyon, cooled suddenly by deep shade.

To Aric’s delight, the raiders had given up fighting and were trying to escape. Thri-kreen warriors gave chase. Many had fallen, on both sides, but more raiders than insect men.

Scanning the scene, he couldn’t see Ruhm or Sellis. “Where are they?” Myrana shouted. “Sellis!”

“Quiet, Myrana!” came a hushed voice from behind a thick stand of brush. “You’ll give us away!”

Sellis emerged, then Ruhm, looking as if he’d had to fold himself in quarters to hide behind the bushes. “We hid,” Ruhm said.

“So I see,” Aric replied. “Here, we brought you mounts.”

“The thri-kreen went after the raiders,” Sellis explained. “So we decided to make for the pass. When we saw you three go over the top, we guessed that’s where you’d end up.”

“If you made it,” Ruhm added. Eternally optimistic.

“We made it,” Myrana said. “But if you don’t get on these birds we might not make it far.”

Ruhm and Sellis climbed the rest of the way down the hill and took over the erdlus. Ruhm’s staggered under his weight, then righted itself, as if considering the half-giant a challenge to which it would not concede defeat. They turned the birds around and rode back out of the pass and into open desert.

“We’ll give a wide berth to these hills,” Aric called. “Then make for Nibenay again, and pray this whole encounter hasn’t delayed us overmuch.”

Ruhm got a look at the obsidian-pointed spear Aric was still carrying. “Where’s your sword?” he asked.

“It broke,” Aric explained. “Last I saw it, I’d buried it to the hilt in one of the raiders, but there wasn’t much left of the blade by then.”

“Too bad,” Ruhm said. He showed Aric his greatclub, which the erdlu no doubt would grow to resent if they rode for long. “Still have this. Wood’s better.”

“If that club was as old as my sword, it’d be nothing but wood chips by now,” Aric said. “There’s nothing wrong with steel, but any weapon a thousand years old is going to have some problems.”

Ruhm smiled at his club and laid it across his lap. “Let you know,” he said. “In about nine hundred and ninety-six years.”