Del peered balefully at me, shielding her eyes from the sun with a raised hand. "Barely. I had more of the spirits. What do you call it?-the bark of the dog?"

I grinned. "The hair of the dog. Told you it works."

"Marginally." She hooked a finger under the fingerbone necklet dangling against her harness and displayed it. "What's this?"

"My guess is it's some kind of guest-gift. You're the Oracle's sister, and I'm the jhihadi.

Maybe they're some kind of safe pa.s.sage tokens through Vashni territory. Not a bad thing to have."

It was an understatement to mention Del was not happy. "We didn't even wake up when they put them on us. They might as easily have cut our throats."

"They could have done that while we were awake. Anyway, I think we'd better wear them for a while, just in case."

She didn't like the idea, but nodded. Then she pointed at the Vashni sack. "Can we at least get rid of that? I think we should bury it."

I grinned. "Not too fond of sandtiger, are we?"

"It doesn't taste particularly good going in either direction."

Fortunately I'd only experienced the one direction. I grabbed a bota and sucked down more water, then made the effort to climb to my feet. It was easier this time. "Better take it with us, till we're out of Vashni territory. You never know what might insult them."

"Then you carry it."

I glanced up at the sun. "Midday," I muttered. "We ought to get moving. Maybe we can make the chimney before nightfall."

"Or not," Del said, "considering how we feel. You said yourself there is no rush."

"That was earlier, when I took pity on you."

"And I'm not deserving of any now?"

"You're standing, aren't you? If you can stand, you can ride."

Del said glumly, "I suppose that means I must stay on my horse."

"Well, I could always throw you belly-down over the saddle and tie you on. Of course, all the blood would rush to your head, and I'm not sure that would make you feel any better. I certainly recall how I felt when you did it to me."

She flicked me an arch glance. "That was the Vashni who did it to you. And it was either that or let them kill you. To kill Chosa Dei."

"Well, they were much friendlier this time around," I agreed. Then I scratched my head and sighed, staring at the horses. "I suppose they won't saddle themselves. Guess we'd better get to work."

And work it was, with a pounding head. Took longer than usual, too, though eventually we did have both horses saddled, repacked, and ready to go. The Vashni had left us two blankets as well, which I found downright neighborly of them.

I led the stud into the center of the clearing, sorry to leave the shade. With great deliberation I stuck a foot into the left stirrup, carefully pulled myself up, and swung my right leg over. Amazingly, everything stayed attached.

"Well, bascha, I guess-" But I didn't finish, because Del arrived with the gelding in tow, thrust his reins at me urgently, and disappeared with haste behind a clump of trees.

This time I didn't tease her. I dug out some of the red silk left over from my Skandic clothing, unhooked a water bota, and handed both down to her without comment when she reappeared. Del rinsed her mouth, spat, then washed her face. She looked terrible.

I made the sacrifice. "Maybe we should stay here another night."

"No." Del took the gelding's reins back from me, flipped them over his neck, and mounted.

She was clearly shaky, but determined. "I know how badly you want to get your hands on your jivatma. If it were mine . . ." She shook her head. "We'll go on."

The poor, pitiful bascha had reverted to cold-faced Northern sword-singer. I knew better than to attempt to jolly her out of it.

Besides, she needed to concentrate on keeping her belly where it belonged.

I realized within a couple of hours that we were not going to make the chimney before nightfall. Though I was feeling much better as the day wore on, and Del seem resigned to a generalized discomfort-at least she wasn't sick anymore-a faster pace might upset the balance. Not only that, but footing was tougher as we wound our way closer to the dramatic rock formations in the distance, beyond the foothills. Skull-sized boulders sprouted like shrubbery, abetted by drifts of bedrock peeping above the soil. "The horses had to pay more attention to where they set their hooves, and we had to pay more attention to the occasional misstep, prepared to bring equine heads up to reestablish balance before they went down onto their knees.

Then a sandy area caught my eye. Like water spilled from a pitcher, it wound its way through rocks, then spread into a wider patch.

"Over here," I called to Del, riding behind me. "Footing's better."

And indeed it was. The sandy area went down a rocky hillock and opened into something very like a shallow streambed, except there was no water. There had been once, before desert took it over. But now it was dry, with an underlayment of hard and uneven stone intermixed with sandy pockets and water-smoothed, hollowed-out boulders. Amazingly, there was a scattering of vegetation here, edging the streambed. Tough, reedy-looking shrubbery of a pallid green hue.

"Look ahead-there." Del pointed. "Are those wagon ruts?"

"Out here?" But even as I asked it, I saw what she meant. A few paces up there indeed appeared to be wheel ruts running across the streambed, visible only when they hit sand pockets. I moved the stud into a faster pace, then pulled up when I reached the ruts. "Hunh," I commented. "Someone's been out here in a wagon."

Del reined in beside me. "It makes no sense. There is nothing out here for settlers or caravans."

I shook my head. "Not enough tracks for a caravan. One wagon, I'd guess. Two mules.

Maybe someone got lost." I marked how the ruts entered the streambed on one side and exited the other. "Let's follow the tracks," I suggested, reining left. "Maybe whoever we find will invite us to supper."

If they haven't already been someone else's supper."

'I'm not sure we're still in Vashni territory," I said. "Which reminds me ..." I untied the increasingly odiferous bag of sand-tiger meat from the saddle and let it drop into the edge of the streambed as the stud climbed out. The gelding followed, white head swinging on the end of his long neck. Gold fringe dangled lopsidedly. "You know, you could always hang your Vashni neck-let across your horse's face. He's already wearing axle grease and wine-girl fringe . . . human fingerbones might give him a little added cla.s.s."

Del, not surprisingly, did not deign to reply.

We followed the tracks as they wound their way through the rocks and sand. After a while they turned in toward the mountains on our left, gaining in elevation. We wound our way up, and then almost abruptly the crude ruts gave out onto a flat area to our right, opposite the ma.s.sive boulders skirting the bottom of the mountain on the left. The flat formed a plateau, the chopped off crown of a shallow bluff overlooking where we'd come from, including the streambed. A few straggly trees, low shrubbery, and modest gra.s.sy patches skirted the edge near the continuation of the ruts. I pulled up there to give the stud a blow and take a look around. Del's gelding picked its way slowly up to join us. Del was, I noticed, drinking water again.

"You all right, bascha?"

She nodded as she restoppered the bota. "Much better than this morning. Just thirsty."

"Liquor does that." I glanced around. "You know, this wouldn't be a bad place to stop for the night-" I broke off, whistling in surprise. "Hoolies-would you look at that?" I pointed.

"Up there against the boulders, there. Looks like a shelter to me. And the remains of a cookfire in front of it."

"Where-? Oh, that?" Del rode past me, heading toward the huge tumbled boulders lining the merging of mountain with flat area. "It is a shelter, Tiger-it's a little lean-to. The wagon ruts go right past it, but they're deeper by the shelter, as if they stopped here."

I followed. Del was right. Someone had used one of the larger boulder formations for the back wall and had built a rough lean-to out of branches and canvas. The fire ring hadn't been used for a while, but clearly this was a regular camping place. No one would sacrifice canvas in the desert unless he intended to return.

"Halloo the camp!" I called. "We're coming in!"

Del reined in next to the fire ring. "No one's here."

"You never know." I dismounted and drew my sword. Del had done the same. But there was no place to hide in the lean-to; it boasted only two sides, the boulder for a back wall, and a branch-and-canvas roof. It was large enough for possibly three people, if they were very close friends. "Good enough for tonight," I said. "Let's get the horses settled, and then we can think about food."

Del recoiled. Her expression clearly announced she wanted nothing to do with food.

Possibly forever. I disagreed. "You need to eat something. You've only had water all day."

"Yes, and in fact. . ." She turned abruptly and headed toward the hillside strewn with tumbled boulders, sheathing her sword.

"Are you sick again?" I asked.

"No. But I have had a lot of water."

"Ah." Grinning, I strode back to the horses. I decided to be a nice, kind, thoughtful man and untack her gelding. "Hold on, old son," I told the stud. "You're next."

I untied saddlepouches and piled them beside the lean-to, tossed Del's bedding inside. The gelding gazed at me out of mournful blue eyes, peering through dangling bits of fringe.

"You look ridiculous," I told him, undoing his girth. "No offense, but you do." I lifted saddle and blankets off his damp back, set both by the lean-to. "Amazing what we let women get away with, isn't it?" His response was to thrust his head against my chest and rub. Hard.

"Ah, hoolies, horse-" In disgust, I stared down at the front of my burnous. "Now I've got black gunk all over me!" Of course, the gelding also had greasepaint smeared all over his face, like an overly painted wine-girl first thing in the morning. Quite a pair, we made.

I heard the rattle of fallen pebbles high in the rocks and glanced up to see Del picking her way down from one of the piles of boulders. You'd think that since we'd been sharing a bed for several years modesty would no longer matter, but Del was fastidious. She always went off to find privacy, and I'd been ordered to do the same. I just never went as far. Men have a certain advantage when it comes to relieving the bladder.

Her arms were spread for balance as she worked her way down. She was concentrating on her path, rope of hair swinging in front of one shoulder. It's difficult to look particularly graceful when clambering down over piled rocks and boulders. Even for my Northern bascha.

I drew in a deep breath, preparing to bellow complaints about her horse. But I lost the impulse the instant I saw movement behind her.

Vashni? No- Movement flowed down the mountainside, disappeared behind rocks.

I dropped the reins. "Del!"

Then it sprang up onto a boulder, and I saw it clearly.

"Del-" I was running for the rocks, yanking sword out of sheath. Her face was turned toward me.

I'd never make it, never make it- "-behind you-"

Atop the rock she spun, grasping for her sword hilt, and went down hard beneath the leaping sandtiger.

EIGHT.

WHEN in the midst of deadly danger, time slows. Fragments. It is me, the moment, the circ.u.mstances.

As it was now.

I saw Del, down. The glint of sun off her bared blade, lying against stone. The spill of white-blond braid. The sandtiger's compact, bunched body, blending into the rocky background as it squatted over her.

I bellowed at the cat as I ran. Anything to distract him, to draw his attention from his prey.

Del was unmoving: probably unconscious, possibly dead.

"Try me!" I shouted. "Try me, you thrice-cursed son of a Salset goat-"

The sandtiger growled, then yowled as it saw me. I threatened his prey. For a moment he continued to hunch over Del, then came up into a crouch, flexing shoulders. Jaw dropped open.

Green eyes glared.

Everything was slowed to half-time. I watched the bunching of haunches, the leap; judged momentum and direction; knew without doubt what was necessary. My nearly vertical blade, at the end of thrusting arms, met him in midair. Sank in through belly fur, hide, muscle, vessels and viscera, spitting him to the hilt- I felt the sudden weight, heard the scream, smelled the rank breath, the musk of a mature male. Without pausing I ducked head and dropped shoulder, swung, let his momentum carry him through his leap. Over my head, and down.

I was conscious of the horses screaming, but I paid them no attention. I was focused only on the sandtiger, now sprawled on the ground, jaws agape, tongue lolling. For all I knew he was dead already, but I jerked the blade free, then swung it up, over, down, like a club, and severed his head from his body.

Then I dropped the sword. I turned, took two running strides, climbed up into the boulders.

"Bascha . . ."

She lay mostly face-down, one arm sprawled across a cl.u.s.ter of rocks. Her torso was in a shallow guliey between two boulders. Legs were twisted awry.

"Del-?"

There was blood, and torn burnous. I caught the tangled rope of hair and moved it aside, baring the back of her neck to check for wounds. She had not had time to face the cat fully. His leap had been flat, then tending down. Front paws had curled over her shoulders, grasping, while back paws raked out, reaching for purchase.

He had leaped at her back, intending to take his prey down from behind. But Del had moved, had begun to turn toward him as I yelled, had begun to unsheathe her sword, and he'd missed his target. Instead of encircling her neck with his jaws, snapping it, piercing the jugular, the big canine teeth had dug a puncture and furrow into her right forearm and the top of her left shoulder at the curve of her neck. The main impetus of the bite had fouled on harness and sheath.

I planted my feet as firmly as possible in the treacherous footing, then bent, caught a limp arm, and pulled her up. I squatted, ducked, levered her over one shoulder, head hanging, braid dangling against my thigh, while her legs formed a counterweight before me. I rose carefully, balancing the slack-limbed drape of her body. Teeth clenched, I made my way slowly down the boulders, found level footing on the flat, sandy crown of the bluff, and carried her to the lean-to. I had tossed her rolled bedding there while unpacking the gelding; with care I slid her over and down, arranged her limbs, set her head against the bedroll. Then, lock-ing my hands into the front of her burnous, I tore fabric apart along the seam, exposing her body in its sleeveless tunic.

Exposing arms and legs, and the sandtiger's handiwork.

"All right, bascha-give me a moment here . . ."

Almost without thinking I unbuckled the harness, worked the leather straps and buckles over her arms and out from under her body. Tossed it aside in a tangle of leather and bra.s.s.

Yanked my knife free of its sheath, cut swathes of her burnous, and began wadding it between torn flesh and what remained of the tunic's high neck. Claws had cut through it, into the flesh beneath, baring the twin ridges of collar bones. One claw had nicked the underside of her jawbone at the angle beneath her left ear, trickling blood across her throat.

More fabric was sacrificed for her right forearm as I bound it tightly. Then I worked my left arm under her back, lifted her, tipped her forward against me. Her head lolled into my shoulder.

"Hold on, bascha-I'm taking a look at your back."

The sandtiger had attempted to set hind claws into her lower back and the tops of her b.u.t.tocks, but all he'd managed to do as she turned was pierce the leather of her tunic. Very little blood showed through. So, the worst of the damage appeared to be the bite wounds at the top of her shoulder and in her right forearm, plus the deep claw lacerations reaching from the first upswelling of both b.r.e.a.s.t.s nearly to her throat.

Of course, that was the visible damage. Inside, beneath the flesh and muscle, sandtiger poison coursed through her blood.

With Del slumped against me, I untied the thongs on her bedding, unrolled it with a snap and flip of my hand, eased her onto it. Now it was time. Time I knew.