‘So are we if we don’t get moving!’

The firestorm now filled half the sky – the heat—

He grasped her arm and they plunged around the pillar—

—into a glittering cavern. Where blood had sprayed, gouted out to paint walls and ceiling, and where the shattered pieces of a desiccated warrior lay almost at their feet.

A T’lan Imass.

Lostara stared down at it. Rotted wolf fur the colour of the desert, a broken bone-hafted double-bladed axe of reddish-brown flint almost entirely obscured beneath a pool of blood. Whatever it had attacked had struck back. The warrior’s chest was crushed flat. Both arms had been torn off at the shoulders. And the T’lan Imass had been decapitated. A moment’s search found the head, lying off to one side.

‘Pearl – let’s get out of here.’

He nodded. Then hesitated.

‘Now what?’

‘Your favourite question,’ he muttered. Then he scrambled over to collect the severed head. Faced her once more. ‘All right. Let’s go.’

The strange cave blurred, then vanished.

And they were standing on a sun-bleached rock shelf, overlooking a stony basin that had once known a stream.

Pearl grinned over at her. ‘Home.’ He held up the ghastly head before him and spoke to it. ‘I know you can hear me, T’lan Imass. I’ll find for you the crotch of a tree for your final resting place, provided I get some answers.’

The warrior’s reply was strangely echoing, the voice thick and halting. ‘What is it you wish to know?’

Pearl smiled. ‘That’s better. First off, your name.’

‘Olar Shayn, of the Logros T’lan Imass. Of Ibra Gholan’s clan. Born in the Year of the Two-Headed Snake—’

‘Olar Shayn. What in Hood’s name were you doing in that warren? Who were you trying to kill?’

‘We did not try; we succeeded. The wounds delivered were mortal. It will die, and my kin pursue to witness.’

‘It? What, precisely?’

‘A false god. I know no more than that. I was commanded to kill it. Now, find for me a worthy place of rest, mortal.’

‘I will. As soon as I find a tree.’

Lostara wiped sweat from her brow, then went over to sit on a boulder. ‘It doesn’t need a tree, Pearl,’ she said, sighing. ‘This ledge should do.’

The Claw swung the severed head so that it faced the basin and the vista beyond. ‘Is this pleasing enough, Olar Shayn?’

‘It is. Tell me your name, and you shall know my eternal gratitude.’

‘Eternal? I suppose that’s not an exaggeration either, is it? Well, I am Pearl, and my redoubtable companion is Lostara Yil. Now, let’s find a secure place for you, shall we?’

‘Your kindness is unexpected, Pearl.’

‘Always is and always will be,’ he replied, scanning the ledge.