'With the small, dark pores, thus,' Duwan said, brushing the sole of Tambol's foot with the tip of his longsword.
'I—I—don't know,' Tambol said.
'Have them sit upon the ground and lift their feet,' Duwan ordered, and it was done, and he saw the pores on all and then stood, facing them.
'You have escaped the slave pens of the enemy?'
'Only a few living have,' Tambol answered. 'Most are sons of those who escaped long ago.'
'Are you many?' Duwan asked.
'No, not many, Master,' Tambol said.
'And do you kill the Enemy?'
Tambol shivered. 'No, Master. In fact, we must run from this place, but first we must bury the masters, and their sniffers, hoping that they will never be found, for to kill a master brings the army of Farko. This has not happened in my lifetime, but once it did, and only a few free runners survived.'
Duwan looked thoughtfully at the sky. Du was nearing the midpoint.
'Do it, then,' he said. He walked to the slope and called up to Jai, who descended nervously. The runners were busying themselves in digging. Tambol, seeing Jai, came hurrying to bow before Duwan and cast suspicious glances at the female.
'This is a pong female, Master,' Tambol said.
'This is a Drinker female,' Duwan said.
'She was being chased by the masters with sniffers,' Tambol said. 'We are in great danger. We must run, and we will have to abandon our homes to flee farther into the west.'
'I escaped long ago,' Jai said. 'Those whom my master killed were not chasing me, but him.'
'Master,' Tambol said, 'I know not who you are. Now I think you are Devourer, and again not. You are mighty, and I beg your mercy. There are those among us who fear that you are a pong-catcher, and that your actions are designed to trick us, to influence us to lead you to our homes so that all free runners may be taken to be peeled on the stakes of Farko.'
'He came from the earth,' Jai said, 'as in the prophesy of old.' Tambol's eyes widened.
'It is true,' Jai said. 'For as he grew from the earth like a divine flower I guarded him, and even kept him from being devoured by a farl. Is this not true, master?'
Duwan hid a smile. 'It is true.'
Tambol bowed low. As the digging to hide the bodies of the Devourers had begun, he had received much whispered advice. 'We must kill him,' he'd been told. 'Obviously he is a Devourer,' another had said. 'That he has not killed us means nothing. He waits to ensnare all, our females, our young.'
'And who will face one who can kill four masters with such ease?' Tambol had asked.
'All will leap upon him at once,' someone said.
'And many will die,' Tambol had said.
Now the bodies were buried, branches had been used to erase tracks and the signs of struggle, and the free runners were moving uneasily toward the point where Duwan and Jai faced Tambol. Tambol turned to face his fellows. 'We will run swiftly now,' he said, 'to put distance between us and this place of death.'
Duwan and Jai found it easy to keep the pace set by Tambol. Behind them, however, the weaker members began to straggle, so that when Tambol called a halt, in a hidden valley where there was water, it took some time for all twenty of the free runners to join the main group.
'Now I will speak to you,' Duwan said, standing on a rock beside the stream. 'You need not fear me. I am Drinker, and I come from far to the north. There we, too, are free. I am not of the Enemy.' He lifted one foot.
'Look. See the small, black pores that mark the Drinker, then examine your own feet. We are of a blood, you and I. There are secrets I will tell you, secrets hidden from you by your masters, the Enemy. Listen to me, and hear me with an open mind, and you will no longer be hungry. Listen to me and it may be that in the future we, the Drinkers,
