have to move all of you out here.”
Linsha felt a chill slide down her spine. More prisoners from where?
The general swiveled away from her and stalked down the line of prisoners, studying each one like a wizard eyes his next experiment, then he turned and came back to stop in front of Lanther.
“Ah, yes. You. You have been a thorn in my foot for some time. You’ll do.”
Two guards came forward at his word and grasped the Legionnaire’s arms.
Lanther’s eyes met Linsha’s, and she thought she saw a flash of something in his bright blue eyes, but before she could understand what it was, he was forced to walk to the wall behind them. Linsha and the Legionnaires turned and saw for the first time a narrow metal cage made of heavy woven wire strips lying on the paving near a tall wooden gibbet.
The Tarmaks opened the cage, shoved Lanther inside, and locked the door. With little effort they lifted the cage upright and hung it about three feet off the ground. It was barely big enough for Lanther to stand upright and too narrow for him to turn around. He couldn’t even lift his arms. He looked as if he had been bound in a metal coffin. Much worse, the cage hung in the full sun.
A few hours in that cage would be misery, Linsha knew. Half a day would leave him badly weakened, and a full day with no water in the hot sun added to the complications of his head injury would probably kill him. She took a step toward him.
A forceful blow from a whip sent a sharp pain across her back and caused her to stagger. Furious, she turned to face her tormentor then caught herself before she leaped to attack him. The Brute guard grinned and lashed her again, this time across the wound on her arm. Linsha cried out in pain and outrage.
She knew better than to attack the guard. He was a head taller, many pounds heavier, and he was goading her. Yet she couldn’t help taking one short step in his direction, her hands raised, her eyes hot as green fire.
The Tarmak general stepped in front of her. His hand gripped her shoulder and jerked her closer. Before she could stop him, he reached beneath her tunic, grasped the gold chain, wrenched the dragon scales off her neck, then clamped his hand to her face, the thumb and middle fingers pressing in on her temples.
Linsha had only a moment to remember that one night in his tent when he had bound her to a tent pole and burst into her mind with a power she could not resist. A scream rose in her throat. Before the sound reached her lips, the general pressed his fingers into her face, and an agony of pain exploded in her head. Her breath failed her; her scream exploded in her chest. The power he used took the pain of her headache, expanded it into a white-hot dagger, and stabbed it into her brain just behind her eyes.
Linsha fell to her knees, clutching her throbbing skull and sobbing. Somewhere, from far away, she thought she heard someone shouting her name, hut she could not respond. Her strength was gone; her body was beyond her control. There was only the excruciating pain that thundered in her head to the exclusion of all else. She sagged forward to the dust-covered stone pavings and banged her head on the stone. Anything to end this agony.
“The other prisoners are coming,” someone said above her. “As soon as they’re here, put them all in the cells.”
The words meant nothing. The only thing she realized was the hand had gone from her face, and the brutal pain was slowly ebbing. Gentler hands gripped her arms and lifted her to her feet. She felt her body moving, but she could do nothing to help. She could find no strength left in her muscles. Her aching head lolled forward, and she watched as a line of filthy, pathetic looking men were led into the court. She could not see well enough to recognize any of them.
The Tarmaks shouted an order, and the two groups of prisoners were herded into the ancient storehouse.
Linsha staggered as best she could between the two Legionnaires who helped her, but as soon as they reached the shade of their prison, her legs buckled and she could not stand. Dizziness overwhelmed her. She had a vague feeling she was being laid down on cold stone, but she didn’t care. She was lying down and didn’t have to move.
The pain and dizziness eased just a little. Someone put a folded cloth under her head, and she to rolled her side, curled into a ball, and wept.
8
By the time night returned to Scorpion Wadi, the silence had been replaced by the sounds of scavengers. Vultures, magpies, crows, wild dogs, jackals, and an old lion too lame to kill his own food had found their way to the Wadi and the ample supply of decaying bodies. When darkness came, the birds settled on nearby roosts to wait for the sun and another chance to feed, while the ants, the carrion beetles, the lion, and the wild dogs helped themselves. Their snarls, yaps, and growls jarred the quiet of the canyon.
A particularly loud ruckus between the aged lion and a small pack of dogs erupted near midnight near the smoldering ruins of the camp. The noise bounced from the canyon walls and reverberated into the caves where many of the dead lay. Faint echoes of the barking and roaring reached deep into several caves and finally found the ears of a small girl. Shaking with fear, she reached out in the intense darkness and clutched the arm of her companion.
He came awake with a start, his hand automatically fumbling for his sword. Only when his fingers touched the empty space at his side where his belt usually hung did his memories come hack of the nightmare. The slaughter. The pain in his side.
“Oh, dear gods,” he groaned. He pushed his back up against the rock wall until he was sitting up, then he gathered the small girl close. “What is it? What’s wrong, Amania?”
She whimpered something and pushed herself deeper into his arms. “Sir Hugh,” she whispered. “There’s things out there.”
He listened to the distant sounds long enough to recognize them and realized it was time to go. Still holding the girl, he leaned over and felt for the third person in the crevice. “Fellion, wake up,” he hissed.
The Knight he called moaned and sagged toward him. “Hugh, fetch me an ale. There’s a good fellow.”
Sir Hugh wished he could oblige. He couldn’t think of anything that sounded better to his parched throat. But they’d have to settle for water, if they could find it.
“Let’s go.”
“Go?” Sir Fellion boomed. “Go where? I want an ale.”
His voice rang in the narrow space and startled the girl. She cowered back, her small body trembling in fear.
Sir Hugh held her close as he reached his hand out in the blackness and found his friend’s arm. He touched the sling that supported the broken arm close to Fellion’s body and the bandages that covered the skin torn by the bad break. That break worried him. A mystic healer in the camp had tried to mend the bone, but his power failed him, and he had been forced to use the crudest poultices and rough splints. Sir Fellion had been healing well enough the past few days, until he’d taken a heavy fall on his arm during their frantic escape into the depths of the cave. There was no telling what further damage had been done. Hugh’s fingers traveled up Fellion’s shoulder and found the man’s bare neck. He winced when the heat of Fellion’s skin registered on his fingertips. The young man was burning with a fever.
Hugh knew he could not leave the girl or the man alone in the cave. The girl was too terrified, and Fellion was delirious. Mindful of his own wound, he climbed over Fellion’s legs and, with Amania’s help, he hefted the Knight to his feet and led him out of the crevice where they had sought refuge. Taking both by the hand, he guided them through the narrow, twisting passage that returned to the main cavern. He had to feel his way out with his feet and his elbows, and twice he slammed his shins against sharp protrusions of rock.
When they reached the front cave that opened out to the Wadi, Hugh halted to listen and to catch his breath. The animal sounds of fighting had ended, and now all he heard was the rustle of carrion beetles and an occasional distant yap. About thirty feet away he could just make out the cave entrance, filled with a misty
