Max Allan Collins

Now the warlord brandished the knife, preparing for a sideways slash across the prisoner's throat.

'Stop!'

The sorceress's voice was as sharp as the blade itself; all eyes turned toward her.

'Wait!' Her voice carried authority, as did her stance, chin up, beautiful eyes narrowed yet hard, glittering like dark precious jewels. 'Mathayus shall not die tonight.'

'If that is your prophecy,' Memnon said, poised to slash, 'perhaps I need a new occult adviser. ...'

And yet the warlord stayed his blade.

'Change your future,' she said coolly, 'if you wish.'

Memnon looked quickly toward her.

'Should Mathayus die by your hand,' she said, 'or by any hand you command . .. misfortune will fall upon you. The gods are watching, my king.'

The red-turbaned guards—these mighty warriors who had slain so many, and spilled so much blood— were cowed by the musical voice of this witch. Ma­thayus was almost amused by the awe and even fear on their faces. Memnon noticed this, too ... and the warlord knew, as his soldiers knew, that his battle­field successes had been advanced, in part at least, by the supernatural wisdom of this woman.

Memnon lowered the knife, but his eyes locked with those of his prisoner. 'A puzzle, then ... how to kill you, without using my hand ... or any hand I command . .. What was it you said, Akkadian? Die well?'

Mathayus said nothing, but his gaze conveyed all the contempt he could muster.

The warlord responded with an air of mock con­cern. 'Dying well, a noble death, that's important to you, eh? ... I will do my best to serve you.'

Mathayus watched as Memnon turned, moving toward the sorceress, and the Akkadian did not see the blow coming, when Thorak swung his fist into the prisoner's jaw, knocking him not into the next world, but a dark mind-chamber of this one.

When the assassin came to, the sun was bright above—Mathayus had been unconscious for many hours, because the night had been replaced not by morning, but day—and he knew at once he was im­mobilized. His vision, low to the ground, took in a view of a gully of sand and rocks and the occasional sun-bleached skull, sticking up out of the desert floor.

Those skulls, disconcerting though they might be, were not the worst of it: surrounding him in the shallow pitlike gully were at least a dozen earthen hills, cones ranging from three to six feet in height, with openings at the top. Into and out of these por­tals scurried large insects—fire ants—scampering with the intensity of their well-focused existence.

And by now the Akkadian realized he was buried in the sand—up to his neck.

A pair of red-turbaned guards sat on rocks along the lip of the gully. One of them rose from his boul­der perch and made his way through the cones and rocks, carrying some oily rags in one hand and bear­ing a torch, flaming like the sun, in the other. Method­ically, the guard began setting fire to the rags ... and dropping them down into the cones.

A reedy voice to his right spoke to the Akkadian, almost casually: 'Fascinating, isn't it?'

Turning his head slightly to one side was about the only movement Mathayus was capable of mak­ing, and he did so, taking in the sight of that horse thief, the one who'd been suspended over those flames last night, also buried up to his scrawny neck, beside the Akkadian.

'The smoke spooks the ants,' the horse thief was saying, in a detached manner, 'making 'em abandon their homes. You see?'

The guard was jumping back, as the huge insects, thousands