Under the Crimson Sun

CHAPTER TWO

The jerky tasted like ashes in Fehrd Anspah’s mouth. Gamely, he chewed on it anyway. He had little choice. The salt and protein were necessary for when they started walking again. The midday sun was beating down on their white canvas tent. It would be at least another hour before the sun came away from its zenith and the Great Alluvial Sand Wastes would be passable again. Only a fool traveled the Alluvial at midday, and Fehrd and his friends never considered themselves to be fools.

Of course, plenty of other people had different opinions.

“Hurry up,” Gan Storvis said. “I want to get moving.” He was fidgeting, constantly adjusting the silk patch that covered the hole where his left eye used to be. Had the tent more space, Fehrd suspected that Gan would have been pacing, but there was barely room for the three of them to sit in the thing, especially with the layers of wrapped linen that protected them from the elements bulking them all up.

Fehrd blinked. “Are you out of your mind? We can’t go out there for at least-”

“It’s not that bad.”

Throwing up his hands, Fehrd said, “Fine, go ahead, burn to a crisp. I’m gonna stay here in the tent.”

Gan started gesticulating wildly with his jerky, to the point that Fehrd was sure that he’d throw it against the tent flap-which would be a waste of perfectly mediocre jerky, in Fehrd’s opinion. “We’ve already lost a day because of that sandstorm yesterday. At this rate, we’ll never make it to Raam in time to meet up with Feena and the others.”

With a sardonic smile, Fehrd said, “Well, if we had mounts, we might make better time.”

Pointing an accusatory finger, Gan said, “That was not my fault.”

“Really?” Fehrd chewed on the last of his jerky and then folded his arms over his barrel chest. “How is losing our crodlus in a card game not your fault, exactly?”

“I was cheated!”

Fehrd rolled his eyes. “Here we go again.” He looked over at the third member of their party. “Rol, you want to chime in on this?”

Rol Mandred looked up from his canteen and stared as if he’d never seen Fehrd or Gan before. “Hmm? I agree with both of you.”

“We don’t agree!” Gan cried.

Shrugging, Rol said, “Fine, then I don’t agree with either of you.”

Gan leaned forward. “Do you think we should head out now?”

“Are you out of your mind? It’s hot out there.”

Unable to help himself, Fehrd burst out laughing.

“Look,” Gan said, pointedly ignoring Fehrd’s outburst, “we’re only about two hours’ hike from the Great Road. I just want to get on that. The sand will be easier to walk through there, and we might come across some other travelers.”

Fehrd sighed. Gan’s points were well taken. They had been moving generally northward through the wastes, but not on any major thoroughfare. Today, though, was the day they would reach the Great Road. It would lead them to Dragon’s Bowl Road, which would take them northeast to Raam. The Great Road itself continued northward to Urik.

“I don’t want to risk missing Feena.”

That prompted another sigh from Fehrd. “Look, I know you miss your sister, but she’ll wait for us, won’t she?”

“Maybe. I don’t know for sure. And even if she does, I don’t want to hold her up because we moved too slowly.”

“Well, we would move a lot faster if we had crodlus.”

Gan threw up his hands. “I’m telling you, I was cheated. That wasn’t my fault.”

“Some facts, Gan.” Fehrd leaned forward and started enumerating points on his fingers. “Fact: you played a game of frolik in a gaming house that has a reputation for dishonesty. Fact: your opponent in the game was Hamno Sennit, who has a reputation for hustling frolik. Fact: you, bluntly, are dreadful at frolik. Fact: you chose to bet our crodlus when you had a hand that, in your words, ‘could not possibly lose’ which then proceeded to, well, lose. With these facts in play, tell me-how is this not your fault?”

“He couldn’t have had that priest card. He just couldn’t.”

Fehrd put his head in his hands. “Tell you what,” he finally said, “I’m willing to head out early if you’re willing to carry the pack.”

Now Gan did throw his jerky against the tent flap. “It’s your turn to carry the pack.”

“Yes,” Fehrd said slowly, “and I’m willing to give in to your desire to leave early if you’re willing to give in to my desire to not carry the pack.”

Since their crodlus were gone-including the pack mount-they had to carry their own supplies. Rol had contrived a way to pack up the rolled-up tent and supplies into a single backpack, which they took turns carrying. Fehrd was up next, and he had been dreading the notion.

Gan closed his eyes for several seconds. “Fine-but this was not my fault.”

“Yes it was.” Rol rose to his feet as he spoke. “Fehrd just explained to you why it’s your fault. Now, it’s fine, really, because honestly? I wanted to leave Altaruk. It’s a hellhole. A blot that would that would not be missed if it were wiped off the surface of Athas. And I think we were pretty much at the point where nobody was going to hire us anymore.”

“And that is your fault.” Gan pointed an accusatory finger at Rol.

Rol shrugged. “If the girl had simply said she was our employer’s daughter, there wouldn’t have been a problem.”

“Our employer told you that she was his daughter, and you went ahead and-”

“I thought he was talking about the other one.”

“Whom you also slept with.”

“Yes, but he didn’t know that. And besides-”

“Enough!” Fehrd got to his feet. “Can we please just pack up and get moving already?”

The three of them had been traveling for the better part of a month, so the procedure for folding up the tent and packing all their supplies into the pack that Gan would be carrying was fairly well streamlined.

So it was only fifteen minutes later that they were once again trudging through the desert. They walked at a steady pace, adjusting quickly to the shifting ground of the sand beneath them-which, mercifully, wasn’t all that shifting, as it wasn’t windy today-and drank water when needed.

They also didn’t talk, as a way of preserving their own water and ability to breathe, which came to Fehrd as something of a relief. Fehrd understood that Gan just wanted to see his sister, but his anxiousness had been growing ever more annoying over the past few days.

Besides, the arguments between Gan and Rol had gotten more shrill as time went on. Fehrd honestly wasn’t sure if Gan was angry at Rol for costing them bodyguard work or because the women were inevitably more interested in Rol than Gan. Gan even had an eye patch that women often swooned over, but the bloom usually came off the rose the minute he started talking.

Either way, their reputation for being effective as bodyguards but poor at interpersonal relationships had indeed spread throughout most of Altaruk. Such things rarely took too long, and they risked drawing the wrong kind of attention to themselves.

Ironically, Gan’s frolik game was supposed to facilitate getting supplies for the trip. Instead, they had to dip into the emergency fund, which was only enough to pay for food and water, that being a greater priority than new crodlus.

And not even good food. Just a great deal of jerky. The only other food they had was the crodlu chow that Rol had purchased before the frolik game. It was the good stuff too-near-poison to humans and elves, and it made dwarves nauseous, but crodlus couldn’t get enough of the gourmet vittles. It was intended to be a reward for mounts who were going to be riding hard through the desert.

Instead, they were being ridden by rich kids in Altaruk, and the three of them were stuck with bags full of crodlu chow, which Rol had insisted on not selling for whatever reason.

After so much jerky, the crodlu chow was actually starting to sound very appealing to Fehrd.

They walked a bit slower than usual, as the sun was particularly brutal. Rol took the lead, as he often did-he had the keenest eyes of the three of them. Since Gan was carrying the pack, he took up the rear, as his burden slowed him down. His lack of a left eye generally kept him from taking point in any case.

Sweat dripped into Fehrd’s eyes. He had to adjust his headwrap several times, and also had to constantly shift the staff scabbard on his back.

“You’re adjusting the scabbard again.” Gan’s voice was laced with amusement.

Fehrd didn’t even turn around to look at him. “I’m sweating. This is what happens when we walk outside too close to midday as you insisted. The sweat shifts the scabbard.”

“No, the fact that the scabbard was designed for a man half your size is why the scabbard shifts. I know you loved your father and all, Fehrd, but the man was tiny.”

“Yes,” Fehrd said through clenched teeth, “I’m aware of how small he was, having been raised by him and all. He left me the staff and scabbard when he died. The staff is from the leg of the first-”

“-the first anakore he killed,” Gan finished in a singsong voice. “We know. It’s a great staff, Fehrd, really, it is, but you need a better scabbard for it.”

Finally Fehrd turned around. “Well, Gan, you know, I would really love to get a new scabbard. I’ll be happy to do that with all the coin you won at frolik.”

“Very funny.”

From the front, Rol said, “It is a little bit funny.”

A retort died on Fehrd’s dry lips. “Can we not have this argument until nightfall? I’ll be more than happy to tell you both what imbeciles you are when the sun isn’t trying to roast m-”

Fehrd cut himself off as he literally bumped into Rol. “Uhm, do you mind? The whole point of walking is to actually walk.”

Then Rol held up his left arm and Fehrd shut up instantly, his arm reaching for the end of his staff. Behind him, he could hear Gan drop the pack onto the sand.

Rol was half a head taller than Fehrd-who was fairly large himself-so he had to shift to the side to see what got Rol to stop.

Just over a rise in the sand, Fehrd could see a mass of people: four large carriages, a few crodlus and kanks, most of which were being used as pack animals rather than mounts, and a variety of styles of dress. Among other things, it meant they were finally in sight of the Great Road.

At first, it looked to be a simple caravan of people, of a type you often found once you hit the main passageways in the wastes. There was safety in numbers, after all.

At least, in theory-those people weren’t safe. For one thing, they were all out in the open in the heat of midday without moving, which was suicide. You didn’t expose yourself to high sun willingly unless you were accomplishing something, like making forward progress.

For another, the entire group was surrounded by a collection of crodlus whose carapaces had been dyed with distinctive black markings that were visible even at that distance.

“The Black Sands Raiders,” Fehrd muttered.

“I really hate those guys,” Gan said with a sigh.

Fehrd yanked his father’s staff out of the too-small scabbard. The Black Sands Raiders had been roaming the area of the wastes for decades. Once, their raids were all committed by their leader, Zeburon, the so-called “Iron Rider,” but lately their ranks had swelled to the point that splinter groups had been created to do secondary raids and such.

They generally traveled in groups of a dozen or so, all riding crodlus with painted carapaces. Zeburon himself hid his face with an iron helm etched in ancient runes that nobody could read anymore. For his part, Fehrd chose to believe that they translated to, “The wearer of this helm is lost, please return to the Janos family in Gulg,” secure in the knowledge that no one-not even Zeburon himself, in all likelihood-could contradict him. Regardless, they had an appallingly high success rate.

Zeburon’s minions simply wore all black, though some painted copies of the helm runes in silver onto their wraps. The color choice had always struck Fehrd as horribly impractical. Darker colors just made you hotter, which was insanity in the wastes.

But then, Fehrd supposed that sane people didn’t try to make their living robbing caravans.

On more than one occasion, the three of them had been hired specifically to protect caravans just like that one from the iron rider’s band.

Rol continued to stare straight ahead. “Do we get involved?”

Nodding enthusiastically, Fehrd said, “Absolutely. They might be grateful and pay us-or at least feed us something that isn’t jerky.”

From the back, Gan asked, “What if we get hurt-or killed?”

Fehrd snorted without bothering to look behind him. “Please-how many Black Sands jobs have we messed up?”

“Yeah, when we were expecting them and ready for it. This is a little different, especially if we aren’t getting paid.”

“We’re right on the edge of their sightlines,” Fehrd said. “They’re gonna see us soon either way.”

“Fine, we do it,” Gan said. “Frontal assault?”

Fehrd spared Gan an incredulous look. “That’s about as crazy as-well, as playing frolik with Hamno Sennit.”

Gan’s response was a gesture that was a sign of peace in Balic, but was something a bit more rude everywhere else in Athas.

Ignoring Gan with the ease of long practice, Fehrd turned back to look at the caravan.

“Rol, can you get close enough to take care of the crodlus while we distract them?”

At that, Rol just turned and looked at Fehrd.

“Right, stupid question. Get going.”

Rol nodded, and ran back the way they had come.

Then Fehrd turned to Gan. “You’re about to have a broken ankle.”

“Why do I have to be the one who has a broken ankle?”

“Because you’re the one who lost-”

Gan waved him off. “Lost the crodlus, right. Fine.” With a sigh, he got down on all fours, then fell on his back.

Fehrd then turned, took several deep breaths so he’d seem out of sorts, and then ran right toward the caravan. Waving his arms back and forth over his head, he cried, “Hey! Hey! My friend is hurt.”

Several people turned to look at Fehrd as he ran. Some were shocked, most were confused-and the raiders looked angry.

“Who the frip is that?”

As soon as he got fairly close to the caravan and its marauders, Fehrd stumbled forward and fell face first into the sand, thus feeding the perception of him being beside himself with worry over his friend.

“I’m sorry,” he said breathlessly, “I’m really sorry, but my friend, he’s hurt, can you help me, please? I think his ankle’s broken.”

Being closer, he was able to take in the details of the situation. There were indeed four carriages, one of them very large and made of stone rather than canvas. It was sealed tight, except for thin slits in a few spots-which added up to a slave trader, the only people who’d be carrying cargo that might try to escape. Animal carriers would have larger holes for breathing. Unsurprisingly, it had six crodlus reined to it, where a canvas carriage of that size would normally only require two.

The other three were fairly standard, and he noticed several people sitting on the edges of them nervously.

As for the raiders, they had planned their attack well. There were only six painted crodlus surrounding the caravan, evenly spaced and preventing anyone from escaping. Some crodlus had two riders, some one, but there were as many raiders on the ground amidst the caravan members as there were crodlus with only one rider, so obviously each crodlu had two when all was said and done.

A dozen raiders, just like usual. Each carried a bone knife, some fairly long. Based on Fehrd’s experience, they likely all knew how to use them also.

One of the raiders stepped forward, and Fehrd knew instantly that he was the leader of the bunch, because the others on the ground stepped aside for him and all the riders turned to look at him.

“Broken ankle, you say? That’s terrible. We’re having a bit of trouble with one of our carriage wheels right now, but I think we can spare someone.” He turned to one of his men. “Harak, go with him. Check it out, while we finish fixing this wheel.”

“Whatever you say, Draz,” the other one said.

Stumbling to his feet, Fehrd bowed several times. “Thank you, sir, thank you so much, I’m so worried about my friend.”

Harak walked up to Fehrd and indicated the way he’d come with a hand. “After you.”

“Of course, sir, just come with me, sir, thank you so much.” He started jogging through the sand. Harak was able to keep up with long strides.

Gan was lying obligingly on the ground, his pack at his side, massaging his ankle. “Morning glory, but this hurts. If you could help me, sir, I’d really appreciate-”

“Shut up,” Harak said, taking out his bone knife.

Fehrd then clubbed him in the head with his father’s bone staff.

As he fell forward, Gan pulled his own bone knife out of the holster in his not-really-broken ankle and plunged it into Harak’s chest.

Getting to his feet, Gan said, “That’s one.”

The bleating sound of hungry crodlus pierced the air. Fehrd turned around to see that Rol had done his part: spreading the gourmet crodlu chow on the ground. The crodlus immediately picked up the scent and came running, despite the best efforts of the Black Sands riders.

“See? Rol had a good reason for keeping the chow,” Gan said with a grin as they started running back to the caravan.

Fehrd snorted. “He probably slept with the merchant’s daughter or something.”

Chaos was reigning in the caravan, as the raiders tried to get the hungry crodlus under control, and failed rather spectacularly. Fehrd had been concerned that they might have had well-trained crodlus, but that had been unlikely. The Black Sands Raiders lived hard and rode their beasts into the ground. The niceties of training the crodlus were superfluous when they could just steal another if one they had failed in some way.

But that also meant they had no chance of getting them under control when someone spread gourmet chow on the ground.

Rol was taking advantage of the chaos by pulling the riders off their mounts and slitting their throats.

There was a reason why the three of them were some of the best bodyguards in Athas. Rol’s inability to keep it in his trousers gave them entirely the wrong reputation for getting more employment, but they were underestimated at the peril of their opponents.

Two of the raiders saw Gan and Fehrd running back toward them, screamed something that Fehrd couldn’t make out, and then threw their bone knives.

Both of them ducked the throws fairly easily. Fehrd smiled and brandished his father’s staff.

Gripping the staff firmly so that his hands were evenly spaced, Fehrd hit one Raider at the temple with one end of the staff, then twirled it so that it hit another one in the collarbone. The first dropped to the ground, while the other stumbled backward, and Fehrd took shots at his groin and jaw, then he too fell.

Gan took care of two more with his own knife, leaving just the leader, Draz, standing before them.

The man’s smile was visible under his head scarves. “Not bad for a last act.”

Fehrd smiled. “I don’t think so.”

Then Draz took a staff of his own out of a back scabbard.

That just made Fehrd’s smile widen. “You know how to use that thing?”

In response, Draz came at him with a strike to his head. Fehrd blocked it easily, but the move wasn’t meant to harm, but to simply answer the question. The Black Sands leader had been trained-his grip was formal, and his strike swift. It would have been effective against an unarmed opponent.

Gan moved to help Rol with the remaining raiders, which Fehrd barely acknowledged out of the corner of his eye. His attention was entirely focused on Draz.

They circled each other for a moment in the sand, and then Draz whipped his staff in an attempt to strike at Fehrd’s stomach. Fehrd blocked it easily, but Draz pulled back before Fehrd could hook his opponent’s staff in an attempt to disarm him.

Fehrd swung down toward Draz’s ankle, which Draz blocked, but that left his face briefly open as he defended it. Fehrd brought his staff up toward Draz’s chin-which Draz managed to dodge-then swung it around again to try to hit his chin a second time. That time, though, Draz blocked it with his staff, the impact ringing through Fehrd’s arms.

Then Fehrd whirled around to try to hit Draz from the other side, but the sandy ground made it difficult for him to maintain his footing. For a brief moment, he panicked, and Draz immediately went on the offensive, sending the staff right toward his face.

Fehrd managed to deflect it, but he almost lost his grip in the meantime.

Draz snarled and swung the staff around more quickly, and Fehrd was only barely able to get his staff up.

It wasn’t until after Fehrd cried out in pain that he realized that Draz’s staff had smashed into his fingers. It was a struggle to keep those fingers curled in a grip.

So he kicked Draz in the groin.

Expectedly, Draz stumbled backward, making an “ooooohhhh” noise, prompting Fehrd to swing the staff at his head. Draz managed to duck that, but Fehrd kept the arc going, swinging low.

His father’s staff smashed into Draz’s shin, knocking his feet out from under him. He fell onto his back, his staff having fallen to the sand next to him, and Fehrd immediately stood over him, the end of the staff right at his throat.

Smiling, Fehrd said, “Not bad for a last act.”

Draz snarled. “I don’t think so.”

Fehrd never saw Draz’s hand move, but suddenly it was up, having thrown a bone knife right at Fehrd’s chest.

Oddly, he didn’t feel any pain, even though he saw the hilt of the knife sticking out of his chest. But he couldn’t move, though whether from the shock of being stabbed or surprise that Draz would use a knife in a staff fight, he honestly wasn’t sure.

“Fehrd.” That was either Gan or Rol, Fehrd couldn’t tell.

He just stood there like an idiot, the knife sticking out of his chest.

Then he saw Rol beating the unholy crap out of Draz while Gan stood in front of him. “Fehrd.” Gan was saying-but his voice sounded like it was miles away. “Are you all right?”

“I-”

Fehrd swallowed, and it tasted like acid.

“I seem to have a knife in my chest.”

Then he finally fell over.

The last thing he heard was Gan screaming at the top of his lungs.

Somehow it just figured that the last thing he’d ever hear was Gan carrying on about something …

Gan’s left eye itched.

He stood and watched the funeral pyre they’d made up for Fehrd and the members of the Black Sands Raiders who didn’t get away. The flames licked into the night sky.

You didn’t bury bodies in the wastes. Corpses attracted predators, and it was impossible to bury a body deep enough to be hidden from them-not with the way the sands shifted. So you waited until dark when it got very cold, and you burned the bodies. In death, they still served a purpose: to keep the caravan from freezing. It got cold at night, and by the time things settled down in the caravan and all the bodies were gathered in one place, and the possessions of the dead distributed among the survivors, as was traditional, it was near sunset.

As the red sun sank below the horizon, the bodies of the raiders and of Fehrd were set afire.

Gan always used to understand the hard practicality of it. That night, he had a harder time doing so.

For all his bravado to Fehrd earlier that day, the fact was Gan knew that it was his own damn fault that they had been stuck traveling the wastes on foot. And in the privacy of his own mind, he was willing to admit to himself, at least, if not to Rol and Fehrd, that he’d been an idiot. For some reason, Gan had been arrogant enough to think that he would be the one to beat Hamno Sennit at the game that he always won at.

If he hadn’t been such an idiot, they might have had the crodlus. If they’d had the crodlus, they would have been at Raam, and never even encountered the raiders. True, the people of the caravan would’ve been robbed, but people got robbed in the wastes all the time. It wasn’t Gan’s responsibility to help all of them.

It was his responsibility to look out for Fehrd-indeed, it was their mutual responsibility to look out for each other.

He and Rol, they’d failed Fehrd. And it was entirely on Gan.

A man walked up to Gan from his right side, which was the only reason why Gan noticed his arrival, since that was the only side where he had any peripheral vision. He’d been introduced to the man earlier, but had no recollection of the man’s name. That was primarily because the introduction had taken place only a short time after Rol had pried Gan off of Draz’s corpse, Gan having stabbed him several dozen times. Gan’s memory of that particular time was fuzzy at best. The man was human, at least, and had thick black hair and an equally thick beard, both of which were curled into ringlets.

“I, ah,” the man said haltingly, “wanted to, uhm-to thank you again. You and your friends saved our lives. I’m-I’m truly sorry that your friend died.”

Having no interest in discussing Fehrd with a perfect stranger, Gan turned his one-eyed gaze on the man. “Look, uh-I’m sorry, I forgot your name.”

“I’m called Yarro. I’m the caravan master. We’re traveling to Raam-all, that is, save for the slave traders. They’re staying on the Great Road, heading to Urik.”

Nodding, Gan said, “We’re also bound for Raam. And we’re running late. If we could travel with you …”

Yarro breathed a loud sigh. “We were hoping you’d say that. We were already robbed once, before the slaver joined us, and we fear that a third attack will destroy us.”

“Don’t worry.” Gan put a hand on Yarro’s shoulder. “We were caught off guard-Rol and I will be ready this time, and the only people who’ll get hurt are the bastards who try to harm this caravan.”

It was bravado, but it was what they always said when they started a job. Normally, Fehrd was the one providing that reassurance, of course, but Gan figured he needed to get used to it.

“What brings you to Raam?” Yarro asked.

“My sister.” That, for the first time since he was cheated in that damned frolik game, prompted Gan to smile. Thinking of Feena always did that. He adored his little sister, and right then, seeing her ice blue eyes and curly blond hair was the most important thing in his life. “She’s working for some traveling merchants. They’re in Raam for the bazaar.”

Yarro frowned. “I think that bazaar ends for the season tomorrow-or perhaps the next day. And we’re still three days out of Raam.”

“I know. They’ll wait for us.” Despite his words, Gan wasn’t at all convinced that that was the case. Feena would ask, of course, and Komir would probably also speak up for Gan, but Serthlara and Shira hated him, and Karalith didn’t think all that highly of him either. He wouldn’t put it past them to go on without them.

And since Gan had no idea where the Serthlara Emporium was headed next, he and Rol would be in trouble.

Well, not in trouble, precisely-but Gan hadn’t seen his sister in far too long, and he wasn’t too keen on the notion of not knowing where she was. Sure, they could leave a message with someone in Raam, but there was no guarantee Gan and Rol would see it.

Also, Fehrd was the one with all the friends and contacts in Raam …

Again, Gan stared at the flames that grasped upward, the flickering light making it impossible to see the stars, leaving the sky bereft.

With a sigh, Gan turned away. He was getting maudlin, and it needed to stop.

Following him back to the main gathering of the caravan-everyone was clustered around the slave trader’s stone cart, as it was the largest vehicle-Yarro started, “We don’t have much to pay you …”

“It’s okay.” Gan waved him off. “Just feed us something that isn’t jerky, and we’ll consider ourselves well compensated.”

Yarro did better than that. His own carriage had space for Gan and Rol’s pack, and all of the other carriages were willing to let one or both of them ride. Since they were charged with protecting the caravan, they rotated where they sat, each making sure that they had good sight lines for the land beyond where the caravan was.

Even with the caravan forced to move at the pace of its slowest member-in their case, the slave trader-they were making far better time than Gan, Rol, and Fehrd had been on foot.

It was small consolation, but Gan would take what he could get. With Fehrd dead, it was even more important that he reach Feena before Serthlara left Raam.

Early the following morning, just as the caravan was getting underway for the day, a messenger came riding through on an erdlu bound for Raam. Yarro provided him with information to post at the Raam caravan station, including his own name as caravan master and the roster of travelers who would be arriving there in a few days’ time. Gan hoped that Feena would see his and Rol’s names (the messenger refused to put Fehrd’s name, an insistence on brutal honesty that Gan had rarely encountered on the wastes) and make sure the emporium didn’t leave town until they arrived.

“I’m worried,” Yarro said at one point the next afternoon, “that the raiders will return to avenge their comrades.” They were both riding in Yarro’s carriage, which was taking point-the slaver, where Rol currently was, bringing up the rear. It was being pulled by a large crodlu with a particularly bright carapace that reminded Gan of Forna, one of the crodlus that Hamno cheated him out of in the frolik game.

In response to Yarro, Gan shook his head. “There are a lot of dangers out here, but I guarantee that won’t be one of them. Only four of them survived, and their leader, Zeburon-”

Yarro’s eyes widened as he interrupted. “The Iron Rider?”

No, Zeburon the tailor. Gan was barely able to restrain himself from saying that out loud. “He doesn’t take to failure very well. Honestly, they probably won’t even report back to Zeburon for fear of dying. It’ll be weeks before the other raiders even know that this bunch is mostly dead. By then, you’ll be long gone. Besides, they’re more than like to just stay away from this region for a while, if they lost this many people hereabouts. Zeburon’s more about profit than revenge.”

“So we’re safe?” Yarro sounded very hopeful.

Though it was tempting to agree just to assuage the man, Gan couldn’t bring himself to do so. “From the Black Sands, yeah, but there’s plenty more out here that’ll get you, believe me.”

“Yeah.” Yarro suddenly had a faraway look.

“If you don’t mind my asking,” Gan said, “how did you wind up being a caravan master?”

“I’m not,” Yarro said. “Not in the guild, anyway. No, those bastards were charging ridiculous prices to lead us through the desert, but it’s a path I’ve traveled before in my youth. Besides, my brother used a caravan master to get to Urik once, and the man took them to Tyr instead, and then charged double to bring them to Urik. They’re charlatans, all of them.”

In fact, most of them were good at what they did, or they didn’t stay in the guild. Too many people depended on caravan masters to survive for the guild to tolerate incompetence or criminal activity.

Of course, Yarro’s brother’s caravan master might have forged his guild membership too. Either way, traveling without a proper caravan master was imbecilic. However, since Yarro was Gan’s and Rol’s client, he thought it would be impolitic to say so.

Instead, he asked, “Why are you headed to Raam?”

That faraway look got farther. “Let’s just say that my family’s health depended on us no longer remaining in Balic.”

Gan knew that look, and knew that he’d get no more specifics out of Yarro.

Not that he really cared all that much, he just wanted to talk about subjects other than the job at hand. That was the sort of thing that made the clients nervous, and it was easier to protect people who weren’t nervous.

Generally talking about personal things distracted them enough not to worry about, say, the huge sand creatures that could easily jump up and eat them all alive. However, it was equally obvious that Yarro had no interest in discussing why he was traveling through the wastes.

Luckily, he’d provided another topic. “I’m sorry, which ones are your family?”

Yarro’s face brightened, and he proceeded to point out his wife, his son, both daughters, and his “no-good” son-in-law, whom he only took along because his daughter insisted, and the son-in-law’s brother, who was “a much nicer boy-I don’t know why Fatma didn’t marry him instead.”

At the very least, Yarro wasn’t talking about how worried he was anymore. Gan just had to make sure he didn’t attempt that conversational gambit again before the journey ended, since the details Yarro provided were falling right out of his head. Gan had never had a good memory for such personal details …

Eventually, it was time for the evening meal. The food wasn’t great-most of it was overcooked mush-but it was a feast after subsiding on jerky for the better part of a month.

Rol, of course, didn’t bother. He loved jerky. Gan had been openly concerned-before the frolik game made it irrelevant-that Rol would have only provided jerky for the trip even if they’d had excess funds to spend on vittles.

Afterward, Gan sought out Rol, who was gnawing on a piece of jerky and chatting up one of the girls in the caravan. Gan had no recollection of which group the girl belonged to-besides Yarro’s family, and the slave trader, there were three or four other sets of people traveling together-but she was young, short, slender, and had darker hair, all typical for one of Rol’s potential conquests.

As Gan approached, Rol straightened and said, “Apologies, m’dear, but duty calls.”

“That’s quite all right,” the girl said breathlessly as she gazed up at Rol. “I feel so much safer with you here to protect me.”

She wandered off, and Gan just stared at her. “She does know that I’m part of the protection too, right?”

Rol frowned at Gan. “Stop whining, will you? Did you even talk to any of the women here?”

“No, because I prefer to take the job seriously.”

Shrugging while popping the last of his jerky into his mouth, Rol said, “Long as you take it more seriously than you do frolik.”

“Very funny.” Gan sighed. “Look, I think we should do night-guard duty. With the pyres last night, we didn’t really need to, but I don’t think the torches these people are using’ll be much use-”

“I was gonna suggest the same thing, actually,” Rol said, which Gan figured was a lie, but he let it go. “You want first shift?”

Gan was about to agree, then he looked over at the girl Rol had been flirting with. “No, you take it.”

Putting his large hands on his hips, Rol asked, “Why did you look at Tirana before making that decision?”

Impressed that Rol had actually gone to the trouble of learning her name, Gan asked, “Why do you think?”

“You think that if you’re on first shift, that I’ll spend the time you’re on duty with her, and never actually get any sleep, so that I’ll be too tired to properly be on watch for the rest of the overnight. Whereas if I take first shift, I won’t be free to flirt with her until the middle of the night, when she’ll probably be asleep.”

Nodding, Gan said, “That’s pretty much it, yeah.”

Rol grinned widely. “You’re not as dumb as you look. But then, you couldn’t be.”

“That’s certainly true.” Gan chuckled. “I’m going to see which carriage is willing to put up with my snoring.”

“Good luck with that,” Rol said with a chuckle of his own. “I’ll keep the place safe from anakores.”

Gan wandered off, trying to see where Tirana was staying. For some reason, he thought it might be amusing to sleep in the same carriage as her for his first shift …