"Torgo!" the woman snapped. "Hurry!"
The big man said nothing, just snatched Arif up and set out after thebeautiful woman. Behind them, Zouki squealed, caught. The other adults beganrounding up the remaining children. The short, wide man yelled at them tohurry.
Aaron had stomach cramps. He had trouble hearing the Herodian sorceress, whohad gathered everyone around. As soon as she stopped talking about it they were going to do it. The Dartar boy Yoseh stood to his right, shaking. Reyhapressed against him from the left, strangely calm.
Mo'atabar translated from the Herodian, loosely. "She says that right insidethe gateway we should run into a narrow, straight passageway about forty feetlong. That's all she can tell about it from here. She says it should be thehardest part. We get through, the place should be ours. She says get throughfast, don't stop for anything. She has to get in to the anchor for the patternso she can kill its traps. Questions? No? Then let's get lined up."
They would pass through the pattern single file, follow-the-leader, so eachman could repeat exactly the steps taken by the man ahead. Traps could beevaded but not disarmed except from within.
The surviving prisoners drew straws. Three would win immediate release. Fourwould lead the column. The winners cheered and the losers wept. Mo'atabarissued captured Herodian short-swords to the latter.
Aaron eyed the equipment carried by the shock troops. In addition to heavyshields, helmets, armor, javelins, and pikes, many had coils of rope wrappedaround them, rope ladders, bundles of javelins and arrows and bows, or stuffedpacks on their backs.
The line began moving.
His place was toward the end, behind Yoseh. Only Reyha, Mo'atabar, and thesorceress followed him.
He heard the screaming before he caught sight of the breach. He nearly voidedhimself. But the line kept moving and he thought of Arif in there and he keptmoving, too.
Yoseh wanted to yell at the carpenter to stop stepping on his heels. He wasmoving as fast as he could. He had to concentrate on what Mahdah was doing sohe would not misstep.
Sweat poured out of him, mixed with the sweat of the sky. He'd never been sothoroughly scared. Never before had he been given so much time to work himselfinto a panic ...
He heard the screaming as the entrance wavered into existence, alive withflashes of pink and lemon light. As that dreadful maw welcomed him themomentum of the line faltered, but only for a moment. He skipped over two ofthe veydeen prisoners, then three of the warriors Fa'tad had sent to lead theattack.
Halfway along the passage there was a small guardroom the sorceress had notmentioned. Two men and a woman lay dead there. Blood covered everything, looking like shiny black paint in the feeble light of a single lamp. One ofthe men had been disemboweled. Yoseh gagged at the stench.
"Keep moving!" Mo'atabar yelled. "This tunnel is a deathtrap. "
It was. Yoseh stumbled over another five bodies before he reached its end.
Three were his own people, one was a prisoner, and one was a woman with ajavelin protruding from her back.
The passage ended in a large space divided into stall-like compartments bypartitions of rough boards. The pink and yellow lights still played there. Afire burned in a corner. There was a lot of screaming. Dartars chased peoplethrough the maze and got caught as often as they caught someone.
"Stop!" Mo'atabar yelled. "Nogah! Get the bodies out of the passage. Find outif any of them are still alive. See if you can find lamps or lanterns ortorches."
"Enemy bodies, too?"
"All of them."
Nogah assigned Yoseh, Mahdah, Faruk, and two others.
It was not pleasant work, nor was it easy, but it did not take long, either.
Yoseh was pleased when he discovered that two of the Dartars were not dead.
Mo'atabar told the surviving prisoner he was free to leave.
The ferrenghi sorceress set up in the guardroom, began disarming the patterngate.
Mo'atabar tried to convince the carpenter and veydeen woman they should staywith the sorceress. They refused. They wanted to run with the hunters.
Mo'atabar shrugged. "Your lives," he told them. "Your risk."
"Our children," the woman countered. She did not say much.
The look in her eye made Yoseh's flesh crawl. It was the look he imaginedshone in the eyes of cannibals.
The battle of the storeroom ended, a Dartar victory but not cheap. Anotherfive of the shock force had been slain. The losses concerned Mo'atabar thoughhe tried to hide it. "Nogah, you and your bunch collect up the stuff these menwere carrying." Yoseh ended up with a coil of rope, a bow, and arrows. Whatwas he going to do with those?
The fire went out of its own accord. Beyond lay the only apparent exit.
Offered a bow, the carpenter refused. "I'd probably hit myself in the foot.
Give me a javelin if I have to take anything." He accepted a shield, too. Hesaid he had learned to use both in younger days.
The veydeen woman asked for a javelin, too. Handed one, she held it away likeit was a poisonous snake.
Mo'atabar herded everyone together near where the fire had died. He said, "Iasked the witch what next and she says the next area is kitchens and stuff.
Once past those we should be past the worst."
Nogah muttered, "That's what you said about the passage coming in."
Mo'atabar scowled. "Look out for booby traps and ambushes." He added othercautions.
Yoseh did not listen closely. This was not the Dartar way of war, mounted, sweeping across the desert. This was like fighting through the caverns of theunderworld. He stared at the dead defenders. Men and women both, all far tooold to fight. Old as Tamisa's grandmother. He did not like what that implied.
Those ancients had sacrificed themselves. Though their efforts had not beenfanatical or terribly courageous. It seemed a desperate attempt to buy time.
Which had to mean there was something to buy time for.
Nakar the Abomination.
Yoseh's fear deepened.
He glanced at the carpenter and felt sorry for the man.
Mo'atabar read the same story from the same signs. He admonished everyone tohurry. "Ready?" Like a good Dartar chieftain he led the charge.
The nothing of the opening hurled him back into the men behind him.
"It's blocked!" someone yelled.
"But there isn't anything there!"