invisible until reached. A blur of movement revealed Chelhar as he urged his mount up a slope. At the crest he turned, waved, vanished from sight as he plunged down the other side.
Dumarest heard the scrabble of hooves, the ring of metal against rock, the shout and then, rising above all, the ghastly sound of the animal's scream.
It was lying at the bottom of a gully, legs kicking, head rearing, eyes suffused with blood. More blood lay thick around the intestines which bulged from its ripped stomach. Jagged stone, now smeared with carmine, showed where it had hit on the way down, tearing open its belly and breaking its back. Leaving it to kick and scream in helpless agony.
Chelhar lay limp and silent on the edge, a patch of bright color against the drab stone. One hand was thrown out to reveal the empty palm the other, equally empty, lay at his side. He appeared unconscious. He was also unarmed.
The crippled animal screamed again and Dumarest urged his own mount away from the edge. Dropping over the rim he slid down to a narrow ledge, moved along it, dropped again and, slipping, sliding, braking himself with hands and boots, skidded down the steep slope to the bottom of the gully.
The animal reared as he approached, catching his scent, realizing, perhaps, what he intended to do. A man might have been grateful but a beast knew only the need to survive, the drive to avoid extinction. It snapped as Dumarest knelt behind the head, catching it, holding it as, with one quick movement, he plunged his knife into the throat and sent the edge to slice the pulsing artery carrying blood to the brain.
An act of mercy which showered him with blood from the fountain gushing from the wound. A time in which he held the dying beast, easing its pain, giving it what comfort he could. Only when the eyes dulled and the head sagged did he rise, wiping the blade on the dappled hide, thrusting it back into his boot.
Turning he saw Chelhar.
The man had descended the wall of the gully with the agility of a cat, picking his path and drifting down as soundless as a falling leaf. Now he stood, watching, shaking his head as Dumarest stepped from the dead beast.
'A pity, Earl. That was a fine animal.'
'It's cost will be put on your account.'
'Am I responsible for its death?' The shrug was expressive. 'It started, threw me, jumped for some reason and fell. Something must have alarmed it. Almost it killed me-and you want me to pay?'
'Not I-the Lady Lavinia. It was her animal.'
'But what is hers is yours, is it not?' The dealer's smile was expressive. 'I know the situation, my friend, there are those who have no love for it and they are loose with their mouths at times. How did it happen? A jaded woman, an engrossing stranger-well, such things are common. But do they last, my friend? Have you thought of that? And when the novelty has died-what then?'
Dumarest looked at the man, past him, eyes lifting to study the edge of the gully, seeing nothing but the glowing light of the twin suns. Magenta and violet which blended to cast a strange, eerie light in this shadowed place.
'You do not answer.' Chelhar stepped forward, his right hand lifting, fingers extending as if he intended dropping his hand on Dumarest's shoulder. On the index finger the polished mound of the stone set in the wide band of a ring glowed like a lambent eye.
Glowed and dissolved as something spat from it in a winking thread of flame.
A dart which hummed and sang with a thin, shrilling vibration which grated at the nerves and created a blur of distortion in the air.
One which thudded home in the sleeve of Dumarests tunic as he flung his left arm upwards to protect his face.
Hitting it drilled; the plastic fuming into smoke, the protective metal mesh beneath fusing to rise in searing vapor, the flesh it covered bursting, pulping, oozing into slime.
Dumarest felt it as his right hand snatched the knife from his boot, sent it slashing upward to rip the dart from its seat, to hurl it to one side where, smoking, it vented the last of its energy on the stone. Another had followed, hitting the tunic where it covered the stomach, falling as again the knife jerked it free.
'Fast!' Chelhar backed, his hand rising to his mouth, eyes wide with disbelief. 'I heard you were fast but never dreamed you could move so quickly. I-'
He died as the knife spun through the air to hit, to drive its point into the soft flesh of the throat, to sever arteries and to finally lodge in the spine. A death too quick, too merciful-but Dumarest had had no choice.
He swayed a little as he looked down at the dead man. His arm, and stomach bore pits of disrupted tissue. The fingers of the Jiand which had held the knife were bruised, the nails oozing blood, cells ruptured by the transmitted vibrations of the darts. The ring from which they had spat was empty now but Chelhar wore other rings, some as harmless diversions but at least one other must be carrying a lethal device.
It was on his other hand, the one he had been lifting to his mouth when, by talk, he had hoped to engage his intended victim's attention. An assassin's trick. One which had failed.
Dumarest looked at the walls of the gully. For an active, agile man they presented no real obstacle but he was hurt and knew he could never climb them. The darts had done more than disrupt tissue; toxins had been formed which even now were poisoning his blood and affecting his senses. To shout would be to waste time as no one was within earshot. His mount could have been found but a search for its rider would take time.
He moved, stepping over the body, heading to one end of the gully where a wider patch of sky could be seen. The sides would be less steep there, the chances greater of finding an easy path. Then he halted, remembering, wondering why it had taken him so long to think of a better way.
To try to climb would be to accelerate the action of the toxins, to shout would be to waste strength, but a fire would send up smoke which would attract any searchers.
He lit one, striking sparks from the back of his knife with a stone, feeding them to fragments of frayed cloth from Chelhar's garments, adding more fuel, forming smoke with fabric dipped in blood. As the bottom of the gully there was no wind, the smoke rose high and straight, spreading only when it rose into the upper air. Even so stray wreaths of it flowered from the blaze and stung his eyes and caught at his lungs. Harsh, acrid fumes which held the stench of roasting tissue. Billows of smoke which veiled the area in a noxious haze.
In it something moved.
Delusia? The suns were too far apart for that. A predator? They were unknown in the Iron Mountains. The Sungari?
Dumarest reared up from where he leaned against the wall of the gully and reached for his knife. It was daylight, the Sungari had no right to appear, by doing so they broke the Pact. Then the creature moved again, a foal which whinnied and ran from the smells and sight of death, leaving Dumarest alone to sit and drift and fall deeper into the pit at the bottom of which death was waiting.
Chapter Eight
'You were lucky,' said the physician, 'But then, without luck, how long would a man like yourself continue to live?'
A question Dumarest didn't bother to answer. He stretched in the bed, feeling the tug of newly healed flesh on arm and stomach. His right hand, when he examined it, was clear of bruises. Aside from hunger and a consuming thirst he felt completely well. Slow-time, of course, the converse of the drug which made long journeys seem short. Beneath its influence his metabolism would have speeded so that he lived hours in a matter of minutes. Kept unconscious his body had healed while he slept.
'You've been under for a week subjective,' said the doctor. 'I used hormone salves and gave you a complete blood-wash to remove the toxins. Forced growth of injured tissue and, naturally, intravenous feeding. I've had you resting under micro-current induced sleep for a while-I'm not fond of jerking my patients awake directly from slow-time unless there's a good reason. You're hungry, of course.'
'And thirsty. Some water?' Dumarest drank, greedily. 'Thank you. What happened?'
'You were unconscious when found. I was summoned and fortunately was able to get there in time. I gave you emergency treatment, had you brought into town and here you are.' The doctor frowned as Dumarest helped himself to more water. 'Do you always have such a thirst?'
