and dragged him into the sunlight.
'J-Jewels of Jergal,' Hakiim gagged, 'I thought-'
'Never mind!' Certain that he was free, Amber let go and whirled to dash down the slope. 'Reiver rolled down… all tangled up with more of those monstrosities,' she said.
Jogging, taking long, dangerous skips and praying to avoid holes that might snap an ankle or knee, Amber raced downhill. Setting sun glared in her eyes. Her shadow flew alongside her like an eagle, disorienting and dizzying. Her capture noose whipped and snapped and threatened to unbalance her, yet she saw the wiry thief hop in circles like a kangaroo rat at the bottom of the slope. Why?
Then Amber saw that Reiver hopped because the floor of the trough collapsed wherever he landed. No sooner did his foot touch down than sand puckered and disappeared to reveal a gaping hole ringed with grasping teeth. Five or six holes dotted the trough, and even as Amber watched, Reiver jumped to avoid having his feet nipped off. He hunched like a rat, one hand wide to slow a fall into a hole, the other driving the dagger like a spitting cobra. Reiver's blade and wrist were white with frothy paste, Amber saw, so he must have at least pinked the monsters, but he couldn't hop forever.
Neither could she, Amber realized suddenly, and she'd reach the bottom in a few more long leaps. 'Reiver,' she called. 'Ill snag-whoal-with my noose!'
'Stay up high!' The thief didn't look up but watched and felt the ground as he said, 'They strike at vibrations-'
Too late, Amber flopped backward and skittered to a stop, panting. Twirling her capture staff, she loosed the line and enlarged the noose. Like a pike bursting from a pool, a thunderherder exploded from the sandy bottom and lunged for Amber's foot. Quicker than thought, the slave handler whipped the staff, flipped the noose over the monster's round head, and yanked the rope's end with her left hand. The noose snapped shut around the tubular body, bit into the leathery hide, and sank out of sight.
Amber had snagged a thunderherder, but it felt like a whale bucking a fishing line. She chirped aloud, 'Now what?'
'Hold-it!' A snuffling, flopping figure stampeded to a stop beside Amber, Hakiim was sandy from head to toe, his clothes and rucksack skewed awry and spilling sand. He'd lost his shield but drawn his scimitar. Hoisting the blade in two hands, the rug merchant's son gasped as he struck with all his might. The curved blade, wider and heavier at the nose, chopped through the writhing body as if slicing a sausage.
'Watch the tail,' Reiver yelled. 'The stinger's poisonous!'
'Good work, Hak!' Half a dying sandborer writhed in Amber's capture noose, and its thrashing weight threatened to rip the staff away. She slacked off to loose the beast.
'We should get to solid rock as fast as we can,' Hakiim said, shaking his frothy scimitar at the horizon. 'It's just ahead of us!'
'It's a mile or more,' Amber said as she gauged how to reach Reiver, who was still dancing around holes in the trough. 'We'd never make it.'
'We've run halfway there already,' Hakiim returned. An exaggeration, but Amber remembered seeing rocks to the south, stark gray against the gray-yellow sand.
'We surely can't stay here,' Amber agreed, then took a chance and vaulted a hole and jumped again to land near Reiver. The thief flounced around the hole, his clothes and pack bobbing and shedding sand like a dog shaking off water.
The earth roiled under their joint vibrations.
'Run!' yelled Amber, and they charged the next dune.
'The sand is too soft,' Reiver countered, 'and the herders like soft sand.'
Kicking and climbing, Amber yelped, 'The rocks are ahead. They must run under the sand.'
Ahead, Hakiim reached the crest of the dune and hollered, 'More rocks! Little ones!'
A good sign, but Amber saved her breath for running. The sand behind her already dimpled. Reiver shouted as a bulge chased him. He veered away from his friends and the bulge surged after.
Amber shouted, 'Reive! Stay together!'
The bulge suddenly subsided. Perhaps the monster had hit rock or hard sand. Reiver switched back for the dune's crest, arms and legs pumping, rags, pouches, and bundle flapping.
Cresting the tall dune, Amber dashed down the slope, skimmed across another sandy trough as if it might shatter like glass, plowed up another dune, and trotted on. Hakiim's head bobbed across the dunes, and Amber and Reiver soon caught up, sobbing for air.
Onward the three pounded. Amber's lungs burned as if steeped in hot sand, and a stitch cut her ribs: Treacherous sand sucked at her feet. She imagined borers everywhere, a thousand tunnels honeycombing the desert, burrowing miles after her pounding feet, hungry to bite her legs off and eat the rest of her slowly.
'Do these fiends ever tire?' she gasped. Reiver didn't spare breath to answer. More rocks dappled the sand, which grew harder underfoot.
Running, running, running, up and down dunes, their feet floundered while twilight grew dimmer in Amber's vision. If she blacked out and fell, she'd be herder fodder. She prayed, 'Selune, get us safe and I'll fill a basket with coins at your alta-aahl'
Stampeding down a wide shingle slope, they saw rocks and pebbles plink into the air and two, no, four sandborers burst upward like columns in a mosque. Amber dodged wildly, clattering and skittering on shingle, and fell. Up ahead, Hakiim circled back and ran toward Reiver, his scimitar pumping. The thief was hemmed by the four creatures like a sheep run afoul of wolves.
Reiver scooted and aimed his dagger at the closest borer. Stabbing quick and true, he impaled the creature below its wriggling teeth. It proved too weighty to hold, and Reiver's arms sagged, but he cranked the dagger blade up. The great body tore itself free. Steel carved a furrow in the thing's body then ripped through the jaw. Slime splashed in Reiver's eyes. A tooth flipped down his ragged shirt-and mindlessly tried to burrow into his belly. The thief yelped and slapped it away.
Meanwhile, two thunderherders wriggled from their holes and undulated across the scree toward the thief. Amber saw their wicked stingers flick against stones like obsidian daggers. Reiver had said the stingers were poisonous and even as she ran, Amber shuddered to think of being stung and dying slowly as her organs rotted within her body.
Hakiim dodged two holes that looked like abandoned wells and barely escaped as a borer popped out of an existing hole and nipped at his heels. The rug merchant's son angled toward one creature and hacked with his scimitar. The deep cut made the beast curl into a loop and quit moving. Reiver used the opportunity to jump over it, and all three ran on.
'How many have we killed?' Amber panted.
'I don't know,' Reiver said. He looked behind them and saw two thunderherders turn to pursue them. 'Don't talk… run!'
'That way,' Hakiim hollered.
Together, they pelted down the scree and up another dune. Despite panting, sweating, and struggling for air, they outran the two wriggling horrors. Thunderherders must travel faster underground than above, Amber thought. She plunged on, fearing her lungs would split. Gasping, stumbling, she reached another dune crest and tripped over Hakiim, who lay collapsed.
Scuffing her hands and knees on rock, Amber rolled and cried with pain.
'Hak! You clumsy fool…'
'L-look-h-here!' panted Hakiim.
She looked, then laughed for sheer delight. All around lay solid gray-yellow rock, an oasis of stone, a sanctuary. Grateful, Amber breathed steadily and felt her heart slow its pounding. She chuckled giddily. It felt wonderful just to lie still and watch the sky spin above her.
'Unbelievable!' called a voice.
Amber snapped her head up, frightened of another attack when she felt so weak. Rolling to one elbow, she saw Reiver already on his feet. His survival had always depended on outrunning his enemies, after all. From a bowshot away, where bedrock stopped, he called, 'The thunderherders churn sand all around us. They're still trying to get us!'
'Let 'em churn,' Amber grunted and lay back.
