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Keneb mused on this, then he sighed and rose. 'Well, enough of that. I've a shroud to stare up at and snores to count.'

Kalam watched the captain move away and settle down beside Selv. The assassin drew a deep, slow breath. I expect your death was a quick one, Colonel Tras. Be fickle, dear Hood, and spit the bastard back out. I'll kill him again, and Queen turn away, I'll not be quick.Advertisement

On his belly, Fiddler wormed his way down the rock-tumbled slope, heedlessly scraping his knuckles as he held out his cocked crossbow before him. That bastard Servant's dissolving in a dozen stomachs by now. Either that or his head's riding a pike minus the ears now dangling from someone's hip.

All of Icarium's and Mappo's skills had been stretched to the limit with the simple effort of keeping everyone alive. The Whirlwind, for all its violence, was no longer an empty storm scouring a dead land. Servant's trail had led the group into a more focused mayhem.

Another lance flew out from the swirling ochre curtain to his left and landed with a clatter ten paces from where the sapper lay. Your goddess's wrath leaves you as blind as us, fool!

They were in hills crawling with Sha'ik's desert warriors. There was both coincidence and something else in this fell convergence. Convergence indeed. The followers seek the woman they're sworn to follow. Too bad that the other path happens to be here as well.

Distant screams rose above the wind's more guttural howl. ho, the hills are alive with beasts. Foul-tempered ones at that. Three times in the past hour Icarium had led them around a Soletaken or a D'ivers. There was some kind of mutually agreed avoidance going on – the shapeshifters wanted nothing to do with the Jhag. But Sha'ik's fanatics. . . ah, now they're fair game. Lucky for us.

Still, the likelihood that Servant still lived seemed, to Fiddler's mind, very small indeed. He worried for Apsalar as well, and found himself- ironically – praying that a god's skills would prove equal to the task.

Two desert warriors wearing leather armour appeared ahead and below, scampering with panicked haste down towards the base of the gorge.

Fiddler hissed a curse. He was the group's flank on this side – if they got past him ...

The sapper raised his crossbow.

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Black cloaks swept over the two figures. They shrieked. The cloaks swarmed, crawled. Spiders, big enough to make out each one even at this distance. Fiddler's skin prickled. You should have brought brooms, friends.

He pushed himself up from the crevasse he had wedged himself into, angled right as he scrambled along the slope. And if I don't get back into Icarium's influence soon, I'll be wishing I had as well.

The screams of the desert warriors ceased, either with the distance the sapper put between him and them, or blissful release – he hoped the latter. Directly ahead rose the side of the ridge that had – thus far – marked Apsalar and her father's trail.

The wind tugged at him as he clambered his way to the top. Almost immediately he stumbled onto the spine and caught sight of the others, no more than ten paces ahead. The three were crouched over a motionless figure.

Fiddler went cold. Oh, Hood, make it a stranger ...

It was. A young man, naked, his skin too pale to make him one of Sha'ik's desert tribesmen. His throat had been cut, the wound gaping down to the vertebra's flattened inner side. There was no blood.

As Fiddler slowly crouched down, Mappo looked over at the sapper. 'A Soletaken, we think,' he said.

'That's Apsalar's work,' Fiddler said. 'See how the head was pushed forward and down, chin tucked to anchor the blade – I've seen it before ...'

'Then she's alive,' Crokus said.

'As I said,' Icarium rumbled. 'As is her father.'

So far so good. Fiddler straightened. 'There's no blood,' he said. 'Any idea how long ago he was killed?'

'No more than an hour,' Mappo said. 'As for the lack of blood ...' He shrugged. 'The Whirlwind is a thirsty goddess.'

The sapper nodded. 'I think I'll stick closer from now on, if you don't mind – I don't think we'll have any more trouble from Sha'ik's warriors – call it a gut feeling.'

Mappo nodded. 'For the moment, we ourselves walk the Path of Hands.'

And why is that, I wonder?

They resumed their journey. Fiddler mused on the half-dozen times he'd seen desert warriors in the past twelve hours. Desperate men and women in truth. Raraku was the centre of the Apocalypse, yet the rebellion was headless and had been for some time. What was going on beyond the Holy Desert's ring of crags? pqdm.com