A defector from the Forest Guard, Billos thought. No wonder the Horde has made so many advances lately. A traitorous Forest Guard fighter is feeding them information!

“We take it to Qurong at first light,” someone said.

And then it sounded as though they left the tent, leaving Billos alone, hog-tied to a pole with a bag over his head.

He lay shivering in the night air, further chilled by the cooling of his sweat. A hundred thoughts worked their way through Billos’s mind, and not a single one brought him any comfort.

For a while he tried to conjure up what the others might try for a rescue, but he soon dismissed any hope in his comrades. They would be fools to head into the desert to find him, and the only true fool among them was the runt, Johnis, who was also a coward.

He tried to imagine that this business about Johnis meeting the Roush was true, but he couldn’t manage it. Even children knew that Roush were myths created by the council elder, Ciphus, to promote the Great Romance, this religion that had the Forest Dwellers eating out of the palm of his hand.

Billos lay exhausted and trembling late into the night and finally, after many hours, slipped into sleep.

He’d been in the land of nightmares for just a short time when a soft ripping sound woke him. He caught his breath and jerked his head to the right.

A soft giggle sounded far off, then the howl of desert wolves. Nothing else. He was just starting to relax when the sound came again, very slowly, as if a knife was stuck in the canvas and was snapping threads one by one.

Riiiiiiiiiiippppp . . .

Billos froze like a skewered pig. Darsal! She’d come for him!

Riiiiiiiipppppp . . .

The sound hissed in the night. But, no, that hissing wasn’t coming from inside the tent, he realized. The hiss came from beyond the tent wall, made by whoever was cutting the canvas.

Or whatever was cutting it.

“Hello?” Billos managed in a whisper.

The sound stopped. But the cutting resumed within seconds. There could be no doubt about it—someone was cutting through the canvas.

Billos heard them cut the tent. Heard them slide inside. Heard their deep, deep breathing as not one but several someones walked about him, feet slowly padding on the ground.

He held his breath until stars began to pop in his eyes, and then he sucked in air as quietly as he could. The moment he did, the putrid stench of Horde drove up his nostrils and lodged itself in his sinuses. He gasped and tried to breathe the smell out, but he also needed wind, so he was forced to suck it deep into his lungs.