Still muttering under his breath Posak got shakily to his feet and turned his back on his companion to pick up the heavy pack. When he turned back again, his amazed eyes beheld his friend face down and motionless in the trail and the mightily muscled figure of an almost naked cave man standing over him and holding the torch. Posak opened his mouth to yell a warning to the others of the column. The cry was never voiced. An iron fist swept from nowhere to crash full against the point of his chin. There was a sharp brittle sound like a branch breaking and Posak sank lifelessly to the ground, his neck snapped cleanly in two. Quickly Tharn propped the torch of gumwood against a tree bole and dragged the two corpses into the brush. With rapid care he stripped tunic and sandals from one body and donned them. The tunic he found to be tight across his chest but still adequate; the sandals fitted him perfectly. So quickly had the cave lord acted that by the time he caught up the torch and rounded the bend in the trail, the end of Ekbar's column was no more than a dozen yards away. No one seemed to be looking back of his shoulder in search of the missing pair, a fact probably explained by the sight of open ground directly ahead. Blazing torch held high, thus leaving his face shadowed, Tharn moved easily along at the rear of the column of Ammadians, across the ribbon of open ground about Ammad's walls, and on through the city gates. * * * * * Vokal awakened under the touch of gentle but insistent fingers against his shoulder. He opened his eyes to find one of his personal slaves, a lighted candle in one hand, bending over him. "What do you want, Adgal?" he demanded, scowling. "Ekbar has returned, Most-High," the slave replied, cringing. "I told him you were sleeping but he demanded that I arouse you at once." The nobleman bounded from the bed and caught up his tunic. "Where is he?" "In the outer chamber, Most-High." "Good. Tell him I'll be out immediately." When Vokal entered the wide living room he found the captain of his guards standing at rigid attention just inside the door. The nobleman, his tunic fresh and unwrinkled, his thick grey hair as smoothly brushed as though this were midday instead of the dead of night, strolled to a nearby table, poured out a single glass of wine and sank into a chair. His thin shapely fingers lifted the goblet slowly to his lips, he sipped the liquid as slowly, savoring its bouquet. Finally he put down the goblet and swung his dreamy-eyed gaze to the uncomfortable and self-conscious captain of the guards. "Well, Ekbar?" he said softly. "He is dead, Most-High." "Indeed? You took care of the matter yourself?" "No, Most-High. He was killed many suns before my men and I came upon his men. Sadu, the lion, slew him." Vokal stiffened slightly. "How do you know this?"