They headed northeast, with the mountains as a sharp green-and-white goal against the morning sky. Though Ross's sense of direction was not too acute, he was certain that they were making for the general vicinity of the hidden village, which he believed the ship people had destroyed. He tried to discover something of the nature of the contact which had been made between the aliens and the horsemen. "How find other chief?" he asked Ennar. The young man tossed one of his braids back across his shoulder and turned his head to face Ross squarely. "Your chief come our camp. Talk with Foscar--two--four sleeps ago." "How talk with Foscar? With hunter talk?" For the first time Ennar did not appear altogether certain. He scowled and then snapped, "He talk--Foscar, us. We hear right words--not woods creeper talk. He speak to us good." Ross was puzzled. How could the alien out of time speak the proper language of a primitive tribe some thousands of years removed from his own era? Were the ship people also familiar with time travel? Did they have their own stations of transfer? Yet their fury with the Reds had been hot. This was a complete mystery. "This chief--he look like me?" Again Ennar appeared at a loss. "He wear covering like you." "But was he like me?" persisted Ross. He didn't know what he was trying to learn, only that it seemed important at that moment to press home to at least one of the tribesmen that he _was_ different from the man who had put a price on his head and to whom he was to be sold. "Not like!" Tulka spoke over his shoulder. "You look like hunter people--hair, eyes--Strange chief no hair on head, eyes not like----" "You saw him too?" Ross demanded eagerly. "I saw. I ride to camp--they come so. Stand on rock, call to Foscar. Make magic with fire--it jump up!" He pointed his arm stiffly at a bush before them on the trail. "They point little, little spear--fire come out of the ground and burn. They say burn our camp if we do not give them man. We say--not have man. Then they say many good things for us if we find and bring man----" "But they are not my people," Ross cut in. "You see, I have hair, I am not like them. They are bad----" "You may be taken in war by them--chief's slave." Ennar had a reply to that which was logical according to the customs of his own tribe. "They want slave back--it is so." "My people strong too, much magic," Ross pushed. "Take me to bitter water and they pay much--more than stranger chief!" Both tribesmen were amused. "Where bitter water?" asked Tulka. Ross jerked his head to the west. "Some sleeps away----" "Some sleeps!" repeated Ennar jeeringly. "We ride some sleeps, maybe many sleeps where we know not the trails--maybe no people there, maybe no bitter water--all things you say with split tongue so that we not give you back to master. We go this way not even one sleep--find chief, get good things. Why we do hard thing when we can do easy?"