gone. This is the last time, Gahzi. He promised to kill me if I left again." Doulos put down the knife he held. "But there is a reason beside looking for my brother Rafek this time. Look what I found." Doulos pointed to the corner, where a man lay sprawled in the darkness.
"Who?" said Gahzi, his pale eyes narrowing.
"One of the diggers. He is fevered. 1 followed him from the city and took his knife. Gahzi, he is from the Circle. He is the one. Like the juma stories say."
Gahzi shook his head in disbelief, then bent to check behind the man's ear, where the small tattoo of a blue circle showed plainly when Gahzi lifted a lock of Javin's sandy hair.
Gahzi stood dumbfounded for a long time, then finally said quietly, with great compassion, "You are imagining what we all so desperately want, my friend. The juma are all gone, Doulos. The dream is gone with them. How are you feeling these days? Does your head still give you those terrible pains? Do you still see the visions?"
Doulos sighed and held up his hands. "You see for yourself the mark and do not believe? I know what the others have always said of me, Gahzi. But here he is before you; this is no vision."
Gahzi opened his mouth to reply, but stopped when he heard Riolla calling from outside and below, demanding that he answer her.
"She calls. I think we are chasing someone, but I know not who. In our party, there is an assassin, very shoddy, and we four carriers. You know this place now belongs to the ores? A large party has passed here very recently: beware. Stay hidden. I have never seen you. Doulos, go home; leave this poor man to his own fate. It may be that Maceo will not kill you. Surely he knows of your troubles, of your pain."
Doulos shook his head, smiled, and held up his hand in the farewell. "What has the prince ever cared for another's pain? Especially a slave's. Swear to me that you will not give us away to the Schreefa."