The Judge’s Hold withstood the tremors. It had been built to survive nuclear war . . . and had. Within minutes, a bruised Ganik crawled into his presence, fell at his feet, and using one of the forms of address that his teacher insisted upon, said: “Oh, mighty one who looks down from on high, a dozen men were killed in a cave-in in Sector 8.”

“Is there other damage?”

The Ganik shrugged. Well, that would do for a no.

“How long wili it take to clear the exit?”

“Only a few hours, as you have taught us the engineering ways.”

“You’re a smart one, all right. Give the order to collect the bodies if they can be located. Waste not, want not. And most important of all, report to me on how many mirrors I have left.”

“By Sun, Wind and Steel,” said Von, wiping grit from his eyes. “How many can hear me? Call out, or mindspeak!” “Danger increases,” interrupted the prairiecat Swifteye, mate to Flatear. “We must flee the fires.”

“I can see that, cat-sister,” said Von, “but survivors there may be whom we can save.”

White-hot rocks were still falling, albeit smaller ones than before. The fires ignited by these were rushing together, forming one large curtain of red-and-yellow death. The only direction left was off the plateau, but that way was little better than the fire. The terrain was slowly collapsing about them, and no sure footing was possible.

“Follow me, all who can hear my voice or beaming!” called out the chief. Swifteye sent out farspeak, and everyone else converging on the spot added his or her beacon to the call: “LET ALL WHO SURVIVED COME WITH US.” Every rolling pebble or far-off thunder added to their terror.

Berti the cook had a broken leg and arm and was bleeding from his chest. Terrell’s boot splints had protected his ankles from being cracked; he was now withdrawing these bands of metal and using them as splints for his friend’s bones, while the cook retained his good humor, between racking coughs, by insisting that he was better off than the Moon Maiden beside him, whose wound had been terminal: a broken neck.

When the ragtag group was ready to travel, Von went in the lead, checking out the treacherous incline that dared his every footstep. Swifteye was at his side, sending out messages to Flatear—messages that were not answered. Von was the first to see Blackhoof, a noble warhorse, trapped beneath a mound of earth. Only the head and one hoof protruded, and it was evident from the angle of the hoof that the leg was broken. The horse mindspoke a simple message, all the more eloquent for its simple plea.

As Von started toward the horse, Ethera’s arm reached out for him. He had not known until that moment that she lived. “My chief,” she said, as he touched her lovely face, so wonderfully whole and unmarked, “no one loved Blackhoof more than I, but you risk your life to climb down there. Would it not be best to end his suffering with an arrow?’ ’ She gestured at one good bow and several steel-tipped arrows that had survived.

“My soul flies now that I see you live, dear one. But I will not dispatch yonder steed without a proper farewell. He bore me in battle, and that’s an end to it.”

Blackhoof s eyes were huge in pain, his nostrils flaring; but he beamed an emotion of such pure joy at the coming of a kinsman, and this man in particular, that the danger seemed to recede before such camaraderie. An aftershock surprised everyone, and Von fell, sliding the last ten feet of rock-strewn slope to come up hard against the sweating flank of the horse. Putting out a big hand, he patted the wet, dark neck of his steed. They looked into each other’s eyes, and exchanged something beyond words or mindspeak, before Von cut his friend’s artery.

The chief of the clan didn’t have to make the climb back up alone. Ethera had come to join him, and helped support his large frame, bruised from the sliding.

By some miracle, the survivors made it the rest of the way without further mishap, although Terrell needed extra help with Berti, who was fading in and out of consciousness. Periodically a wild animal would scamper or gallop by them, so close that some of the Kindred could almost touch it. The greater fear drowned all smaller instincts.

Only when they’d reached the base of the plateau, and dusk was closing in, did they finally take a count of their numbers. The horses and ponies were presumed dead or run off. From a party of twenty warriors, thirty-five clanswomen, six prairiecats, and five Moon Maidens, their numbers were reduced to eight men, ten women, two cats . . . and none of the Moon Maidens. Von kept up their spirits with: “We don’t know that any be dead we didn’t see with our own eyes. Others may be lost from us, as we are lost from other clans.”

“Wouldn’t we have received mindspeak?” asked a young girl.”

“Nothing is certain,” Von insisted.

Further discussion would most certainly have involved plans to reconnoiter and set up camp. Foraging would be no problem with all the fresh food so newly descended from the plateau. Their deliberations never got anywhere, because they were ambushed!

Exhausted as they were from the arduous journey, they still had the strength to put up resistance. The nature of the enemy was so completely unexpected, however, that it delayed their response. The enemy was a short, hairy Ganik, but what was worse, he carried a weapon the likes of which none of the Horseclansmen had ever seen.

The noise from the strange weapon was frightening; in fact, they feared that the earthshaking had started again. Even more frightening were the smoke and sparks thrown by the strange weapon. None of the clansmen were harmed, however; and the idea of a Ganik deliberately shooting to miss was almost as inconceivable as his using an incomprehensible weapon in the first place. Before Von could give orders to rush the enemy, a giant of a man, almost nine feet in height, appeared from around a boulder to their right, blocking their only avenue of escape, since none wished to challenge the unknown weapon to their left.

“Don’t give hard time,” shouted the giant. “Bigboy hurt when ground shook. Back hurts. Ribs hurt. Don’t fight or Bigboy hurt you bad.” The Horseclansmen stood still, several thanking Wind that they could understand the strange language of the Ganiks. Somehow it made the bad situation a little better.

“Hey, shaggy man,” taunted Terrell. “Aren’t you afraid that your demon, Plooshun, will feed your guts to your children for sinning against him? He will strike you down for using that strange weapon!”

Von was surprised. He knew that Terrell spoke many languages, but he hadn’t realized that his young lieutenant knew so much about the Ganiks and their strange beliefs. Terrell’s words were having good effect on their first captor— the little man was sweating heavily, and cursing in his coarse dialect. However, before they could take advantage of the Ganik’s fear, the giant shouted again.

“Leave him be! Bigboy talk now,” he cried. “Come. The Judge decide what happens to you now.” The Horseclansmen still might have succeeded in rushing the enemy, despite their weakened state. Swifteye mindspoke to Von, assuring him that nothing could prevent her from tearing out the throat of whichever Ganik he assigned. Then suddenly a small army of Ganiks appeared, creeping forth from among the shadows.

Von broadbeamed a silent warning to his people: “Had they meant but to kill us, they’d have done so ere now. Wait for a better chance. We’ll bathe the ground in blood before we enter their stewpots, I promise it.” His people, more angry and frustrated than exhausted, eager to meet a tangible enemy after enduring natural disaster, agreed with their chief. They would bide their time.

So it was that Horseclansmen were introduced to the peculiar legal practices of a renegade Witchman.

The earthquake had played a game upon Noplis. Miserable over his latest performance, even obsessed with it, all the forces of nature had risen up to remove the would-be entertainer from his no doubt grateful audience. At least, it felt that way to him. If the earthquake were a bard itself, it could have done no better than to leave the singer of woeful tales with but one companion: his most severe critic, Flatear. Surely the earthquake had too blatant a sense of irony to be a first-rate artist.