Brianna obeyed. She listened in terrified silence as the shaman's heavy feet scraped down the ravine and stomped toward her, knowing that she could do nothing except hold very still and wait for Goboka's wrath.
The shaman kneeled at Brianna's side, then reached under the mountain lion. He slipped a filthy talon down her breast and hooked it under Hiatea's amulet, then broke the silver chain and pulled the blood-flecked necklace from around her neck.
'Nasty magic.'
The shaman tossed her amulet aside, then pushed the dead beast off the princess. He summoned one of the survivors of the ambush, then said something in their own guttural tongue that made the warrior's purple eyes widen. The brute picked Brianna up and tucked her under his arm with such force that she feared he would crack her ribs.
Goboka grunted his approval, then went over and sat down cross-legged among the scattered remains of the traitor. 'Bad man,' he said. 'Get what he deserve.'
The shaman grabbed an arm and began to eat. * 5* The Border Mountains
A small hand tugged gently on Tavis's cape. 'I see Morten and the earls down in the valley,' came Avner's hushed voice. 'We'd better go.'
'In a minute,' Tavis replied, not bothering to look down the mountainside. The boy's news was no surprise to him. After raising Bear Driller to the king, the scout would have been shocked only if Camden had failed to send someone after them. 'As long as you can see them, we have plenty of time.'
Tavis and his companions stood just below timberline, on a windy shelf of tundra where they had come across a smoldering funeral pyre. Thin ribbons of greasy, rancid smoke still curled up from the scorched bones, vanishing into the gray dawn like the last vestiges of departing spirits. The skeletons were so large that a raven had crawled inside one rib cage to peck at the charred remains of a heart, while the femurs were the size of verbeeg club's. The skulls were brutish and huge, with sloping foreheads, massive brows, and jutting jaws with long, curved tusks. Some of the heads even had the charred remnants of topknots clinging to their crowns.
'They're ogres,' Tavis announced. As he spoke, the scout's eye fell on a shoulder blade lying near the base of the pile. It was much smaller than the others, and the fire had not cracked or scorched it nearly as much. 'At least most of them are.'
Tavis picked up the scapula. There were several long gouges in it suggesting that an ogre had used his tusks to scrape the meat off the bone.
'Whose was that? Avner gasped. Both the boy's stolen gelding and Blizzard stood behind him, their nostrils flaring at the acrid stench of the charred bones. 'Brianna's?'
Tavis's heart began to pound, hut he tried to remain calm. 'I can't tell from a single bone,' he said. 'But it's clearly too small to have been an ogre.'
'Then perhaps we should concentrate on our own escape.' suggested Basil. 'There's nothing we can do for Brianna now.'
'We don't know that.' Tavis's voice was sharper than he intended. 'The bone might belong to someone else.'
'What makes you believe that?' Basil asked.
'Every now and then, I've noticed partial tracks of what looks like a soft-soled shoe or boot,' Tavis replied. 'The ogres have been sticking to hard ground and the sole is smooth, so the print doesn't reveal much-not even the size or shape of the foot. But I do know this: ogres don't wear shoes.'
'The tracks could belong to the princess,' Basil suggested.
'Or they could belong to the spy who betrayed her,' Tavis countered. 'Either way. I'm not leaving here until we know for certain whose bones those are.'
'We're as certain as we have time to be,' Basil said. 'Our pursuers have spotted us, and now they're redoubling their efforts to catch up.'
The verbeeg pointed down the mountainside. Though the scarp was not quite vertical, it was steep and barren enough so that Tavis could see the valley below, where the silvery ribbon of a shallow stream meandered across a lush carpet of pointed conifer trees. More than a dozen earls were urging their horses across the brook, their lances held high and their breastplates flashing tike mirrors in the morning sunlight.
On the stream's shore stood Morten, gazing up at the rocky shelf where the scout and his companions stood. If the bodyguard's wounds still troubled him, he showed no sign of it As each earl neared the shore, the burly firbolg looked away from Tavis to pull both horse and rider up the steep bank.
'Maybe they're not coming after us,' Avner said. Despite his words, the boy's voice was doubtful. 'Maybe the king changed his mind and sent them to help.'
Tavis shook his head. 'No, they're coming to take us back,' he said. 'If Camden were after the ogres, he would have sent more than a few earls.'
'This isn't fair!' Avner griped. 'If the king's so willing to chase us down, he ought to send a company of castle guard after his own daughter!'
'You're absolutely right,' Tavis replied, rubbing his chin. 'Since Brianna disappeared, Camden's been doing a lot of tilings that don't make sense.'
'He's too distraught to think clearly,' said Basil. 'Anxiety clouds human judgment to unwarranted extremes, and your addled king is no exception. I fear he's chosen us as his scapegoats.'
'Then let's double back,' suggested Avner. 'I saw a good place to set up an ambush.'
'So we can become murderers as well as thieves?' Tavis growled.
'Setter their lives than ours,' Avner countered. 'It's the only way to save ourselves.'
'We're trying to save Brianna, not ourselves,' Tavis said, his voice still cross.
'It's too late to save her.' Avner pointed at the bone heap. 'Even you can't put her back together.'
'We can try.' Tavis replied. 'That's the only way we'll find out who this realty is.'
'But Morten and the earls-'
'Will have to climb the mountainside just like we did-and they're wearing armor,' he said. 'It will take them at least an hour. If you two help, we can sort through this mess by then.'
'And if we discover this is Brianna?' Basil asked.
'What will you do?'
'I'll lead you and Avner to safety before I give myself over to Camden,' Tavis replied. 'After involving you in my trouble with the king. I owe you that much.'
Avner scowled at this, but Basil quickly stepped over to the heap and began to pick up bones. 'Then by all means, let's begin work.' said the verbeeg. 'An hour isn't much time.'
The trio soon had the pile scattered across the ledge, gathering the bones into three separate groups: human, ogre, and those they weren't sure of. Tavis reduced the size of this last category by adding some of the unscorched bones to the human pile, since many of those that were obviously human also showed little sign of heat damage. Still, their skeleton lacked critical portions of the legs and back. Even the skull was missing, making it impossible for the scout to say whether the dead person had been as tall as Brianna.
'Well?' asked Basil, impatient.
Tavis shook his head. 'I can't tell,' he said. He picked up the human pelvis. 'The hips look narrow for a woman's, but I can't be sure,' he said. 'I've never tried to identify someone from a pile of bones before.'
'Don't waste too much lime puzzling it over.' Avner said. 'I can't see Morten and his friends anymore.'
'They're probably circling around to come up behind us,' Tavis said absentmindedly. 'Armor's heavy, so they'll stay mounted and try to traverse their horses up the slope. And the forest back there will offer cover from my arrows.'
'You'd actually shoot them?' Basil asked.
'He fired on Camden, didn't he?' Avner's voice was proud.
'I fired past his ear.' Tavis pointed out. 'But even if the earls realize my miss was deliberate, they won't be sure I'd show them the same courtesy. They'll approach with caution. We have plenty of time.'
Returning his attention to the human's bones, the scout pulled the shattered sternum from the pile and began fitting broken ribs to it. 'These ribs were broken off like someone pulled them off one by one,' he observed. 'And they all have tooth marks.'
Avner's jaw fell agape. 'The ogres ate her?'
'The shaman ate someone.' Though Tavis's voice sounded calm, his mind was spinning with dreadful
