Part 27 (1/2)

”He came back down to join us,” Kemal said. ”We spoke as you doubtless will, but he would not listen.”

”No, so best save your breath for climbing the hill again,” Ivram added. ”I confess I had hopes of taking one more look at a demon. The more we know-”

”He hoped to make one senseless with the last of the Powder, so we could carry it to Fort Zheman!” one of the men shouted. ”Ivram, have you gone mad?”

”I don't think so. But-would anyone but a madman have imagined those demons, before-?”

”For the Master!”

Four robed shapes plunged down the hill toward

Bora and the rearguard. Their human speech and their robes told him that they were not demons. The swords gleaming in their hands showed them to be dangerous foes.

Bora's hands danced. A stone leaped into the pouch of his sling. The sling whined into invisibility, then hurled the stone at the men.

Darkness and haste baffled Bora's eye and arm. He heard the stone clatter futilely on the hillside.

Then the four swordsmen were among the rearguard, slas.h.i.+ng furiously at men who had only one sword for all seven of them. The man who had complained of Ivram's plans was the first to fall, face and neck gaping and b.l.o.o.d.y. As he fell, he rolled under the feet of a second swordsman.

His arms twined around the man's legs and his teeth sank into a booted calf. The swordsman howled, a howl cut off abruptly as a club in Kemal's hands smashed his skull.

A second swordsman died before the others realized they faced no easy prey. Tough hillmen with nothing to lose were not a contemptible foe at two to one odds.

The third swordsman's flight took him twenty paces before three villagers caught him. All four went down in a writhing, cursing tangle that ended in a choking scream. Two of the villagers rose, supporting the third. The swordsman did not rise.

The fourth swordsman must have thought himself safe, in the last moment before a stone from Bora's sling crushed his skull.

Bora was counting the stones in his pouch when a faint voice spoke his name.

”Bora. Take the rest of the Powder.”

”Ivram!”

The priest lay on his back, blood trickling from his mouth. Bora held his gaze on the man's pale face, away from the gaping wounds in belly and chest.

”Take it. Please. And-rebuild my shrine, when you come back. You will, I know it.”

Bora gripped the priest's hand, wis.h.i.+ng that he could at least do something for the pain. Perhaps it had not yet struck, but with such a wound, when it did-

As if Bora's thoughts had been written in the air, Ivram smiled. ”Do not worry, Bora. We servants of Mitra have our ways.”

He began to chant verses in a strange guttural tongue. Halfway through the fourth verse he bit his lip, coughed, and closed his eyes. He contrived a few words of a fifth verse, then his breathing ceased.

Bora knelt beside the priest until Kemal put a hand on his shoulder.

”Come along, Bora. We can't stay here until the demons get hungry.”

”I won't leave him here for them!”

”Who said we would do anything of the kind?”

Bora saw now that the other unwounded men had taken off their cloaks.