"He is dead," said a fellow from the deck of the captain's barge, where the lookout had fallen, the fins of a quarrel protruding from his breast. It had not been a difficult shot, it might have been a stationary target, a practice run on the training range.

"Those are not your eyes," I said to a fellow looking up at me. "Those are the eyes of Cos." The tam had returned southward. That was as I would have expected.

Men stood about, numb.

"Where are our tarnsmen?" asked a fellow.

"Cos controls the skies," I said. "You are alone in the delta.

"Kill him," said a man.

"Surely," I said, "you do not think the paucity of your tarn support in an area such as this, and even hitherto in the north, in the vicinity of Holmesk, is an accident?"

"Kill him!" said another.

"Kill him!" said yet another.

"What shall we do, Captain?" asked a man.

"We have our orders," said the officer. "We shall proceed west."

"Surely, Captain," said a man, "we must daily, to punish the rencers!"

"Then Cos would escape!" said a fellow.

"Our priority," said a man, "is not rencers. It is Cosians."

"True," affirmed a man.

"And we must be now close upon their heels," said a man.

"Yes!" said another.

"I would recommend the swiftest possible withdrawal from the delta," I said.

"Excellent advice, from a spy!" laughed a fellow.

"Yes," laughed another, "now that we are nearly upon our quarry!"

"It is you who are the quarry," I said.

"Cosian sleen," said another.

"We shall continue west," said the officer.

"To be sure," I said, bitterly, "you will encounter the least resistance from the rencers to such a march, for it takes you deeper into the delta, and puts you all the more at their mercy."

"Prepare to march," said the officer to a subordinate.

"The rencers are not done with you," I said.

"We do not fear rencers," said a man.

"They will hang on your flanks like sleen," I said. "They will press you in upon yourselves. They will crowd you. They will herd you. Then when you are in close quarters, when you are huddled together, when you are weak, exhausted and helpless, they will rain arrows upon you. If you break and scatter they will hunt you down, one by one, in the marsh. Perhaps if some of you strip yourselves and raise your arms you might be spared, to be put in chains, to be taken, beaten, to trading points, thence to be sold as slaves, thence to be chained to benches, rowing the round ships of Cos."

"Sleen!" hissed a man.

"To be sure," I said, "perhaps some will serve in the quarries of Tyros."

"Kill him!" cried a fellow.

"You must withdraw from the delta, in force, immediately," I said.

"There are many columns in the delta," said the officer.

"This column," I said, "is in your keeping."

"We have our orders," he said.

"I urge you to withdraw," I said.

"We have no orders to that effect," he said.

"Seek them!" I urged.

"The columns are independent," he said.

"Do you think it an accident that you are in this place without a centralized chain of command?" I asked.

He looked at me, angrily.

"Ar does not retreat," said a fellow.

"You are in command," I said to the officer. "Make your decision."

"We did not come to the delta to return without Cosian blood on our blades!" said a fellow.

"Make your decision!" I said.

"I have," he said. "We continue west."

There was a cheer from the men about.

"Saphronicus is not even in the delta!" I said.

"If that were true," said the officer, "it could be known only by a spy."

"And I had it from a spy!" I said.

"Then you, too, are a spy," said a fellow.

"Spy!" said another.

"Gag him," said the officer.

I was again gagged. This was done by my keeper.

"Let me kill him," said a man, his knife drawn, but the officer had turned away, consulting with his fellows.

"He tried to warn Aurelian of the tarnsman," said a man.

"He feared only for his own skin," said my keeper.

"And let him fear even more, now," said the other fellow. I felt the point of the knife in my belly, low on the left side. Its blade was up. It could be thrust in, and drawn across, in one motion, a disemboweling stroke.

I stood very still.

Angrily the fellow with the knife drew it back, and sheathed it. "Cosian sleen," he said. He then, with others, turned away.

My keeper then, pushing on the back of the yoke, thrust me over the rail of the barge, and I fell heavily, yoked, into the water and mud. I struggled to my feet, slipping in the mud. I tried to clear my eyes of water. "Precede me," he said. In a moment I was stumbling forward, before him, returning to the raft, the rope on my neck over the yoke, running behind me, to his grasp. I shook my head, wanting to get the water out of my eyes. I felt rage, and helplessness. I wanted to scream against the gag. The men of Ar, I thought, wildly, are mad! Do they not understand what has been done to them! I wanted to cry out to them, to shout at them, to tell them, to warn them! But the gag in my mouth was a Gorean gag. I could do little more in it then whimper, one whimper for "Yes," two for "No," in the common convention for communicating with a gagged prisoner, the verbal initiatives, the questions, and such, allotted not to the prisoner but to the interests or caprices of the captors. But then I thought they would not listen to me even if I could speak to them. They had not listened before. They would not now! I must escape from them, I thought. I must escape! Somehow I must avoid the fate into which they seemed bound to fall. I had no interest in sharing their stupidity, their obstinacy, their doom. I must escape! I must escape! We were then at the raft. It was where it had been left, where it had been thrust up, on a small bar, that it might not drift away when we went forward. He bent down. He picked up the harness attached to the raft. I tensed. I saw a fellow, wading by. "Face away from me," said my keeper. I faced away. Another fellow waded by. "Stand still, draft beast," said my keeper. Another fellow moved by. I stood still. "Do not move," he said. Another man was approaching. I did not move. The harness was fitted about me. The fellow waded by. Angrily I felt the harness buckled on me. I did not know how long the rencers would give them, perhaps until dark. Already the stones might be striking together beneath the water. It seemed then for a moment that we were alone, that none were immediately with us. I spun about, in the rence. His eyes were wild for one instant, and then the yoke struck him heavily, on the side of the head. Surely some must have heard the sound of that blow! Yet none seemed about. None rushed forward. I looked down at the keeper. He was now lying on the bar. He had fallen with no sound. I drew the raft off the bar, into the water. If I could get beyond the men of Ar I was sure I could break the yoke to pieces, splintering it on the togs of the raft, thus freeing my hands, then in a moment discarding the harness and slipping away. I moved away, drawing the raft after me.

For several Ehn I was able to keep to the thickest of the rence. In such places, one could see no more than a few feet ahead. Sometimes I heard soldiers about. Twice they passed within feet of me. The raft tangled sometimes in the vegetation. Once I had to draw it over a bar. Once, to my dismay, I had to move the raft through an open expanse of water. Then, to my elation, I was again in the high rence.

"Hold," said a fellow.

I stopped.

I felt the point of a sword in my belly.

Another fellow was at the side.

These were of course pickets, pickets of the defense perimeter. It had been in accord with my own recommendation I realized, in fury, that this perimeter had been so promptly set, that it was so carefully manned.