“Kill them,” another grunted. “No good ever came of playing with one of them. She’s a viper.”

“Perhaps, but even a viper can break the monotony of traveling with you, Bruntas. I would guess this one fighter could kill you with both hands tied behind her back. Care for a wager?”

“Kill the child, and you have your wager,” Bruntas snapped.

Papa’s grin vanished. He spit to one side. “I don’t kill children.”

“She’s diseased!”

“She’s a child!” Papa thundered.

“And you’re a fool.”

Papa swiveled his spear away from Karas’s neck and whipped it next to his comrade’s neck. “Better than a dead fool.”

Darsal had never imagined, much less witnessed, a Scab defending a Forest Dweller. Either way, Papa had shown her his soft underbelly and removed his threat from Karas in one foolish move.

Darsal could attack now, but not without endangering Karas. So she kicked her horse in the flanks, driving it against Karas’s mount. Before Papa could react, both horses bolted into the center of the sandy clearing.

A second Shataiki landed on the rocks above them, squawking. They were still surrounded and outnumbered, but Karas was out of reach. At least for the moment.

Papa grinned, attention back on them. “Smart,” he said, fanning out with the others to form a circle of six around them. “A viper indeed.”

Darsal raised both hands. “I don’t want trouble.”

“Then cut your own wrists, wench,” the one called Bruntas growled.

There was no winning here, Darsal knew. Not without the book. The Scabs would eventually kill them both. Regardless of Papa’s empathy for children, Horde law would end their lives.

“Bruntas, that is your name? I could kill you from here with a flip of my wrist. Papa knows that, but you’re too stupid to realize it. Am I wrong?”

The Scab blinked. Darsal moved then, while their minds were on her words. Both hands flashing to her hip-sheaths, withdrawing a knife from each. She let them fly forward in the manner Silvie had taught her.

The blades took Bruntas and the Scab next to him in the necks. Darsal already had her sword out, spinning her horse to face the Scabs behind her. She slapped Karas’s mount as she turned.

“Run for the gap!”

Karas drove her horse at the two flailing Scabs.

Darsal bolted at two others, screaming her guts out. Instead of going after both with her sword, she ducked under one of their blades and plowed her horse into theirs. Both backpedaled, snorting.

The second Scab had a spear, but the weapon was hardly more than a beating stick at this close range. Darsal struck the nearest warrior with her sword, spun it once, and drove it into the second.

“Darsal!” Karas’s cry cut through the desert air.