"I cannot go with you," Ruanmi told Serrin. "I must stay in camp all the time. Nholo will take you to Shakala. He comes right back, though. You must find own way back, except he go back for you same time tomorrow. If not we tell the others you got eaten by the king," and he made an extremely realistic, throaty lion's growl, then chuckled quietly to himself.

"Thanks, chummer," Serrin said drily and belted himself into the back seat. With Tom hogging the front seat, he had to squeeze into the back with Kristen and Michael. The jeep's headlights lit up, revealing a miasma of huge-winged moths and buzzing insects. Serrin fumbled for the repellent spray in his bag, but he had no time to get it before the jeep started off on its bone-crunching journey. After that, getting anything out of anywhere was virtually impossible. The elf only hoped that they'd be moving too fast for anything to bite him.

Martin knew the signs of Luther's growing fury all too well; the tension was palpable. The work was so exacting, so precise, so inevitably strewn with tiny mistakes ruining the perfection Luther craved. The molecular probes simply didn't have the precision, not with the techniques available. A dogged scientist would simply have scatter-gunned every possibility and weeded out the

failures, but then such a person would never have been able to make the discoveries Luther had. He knew exactly what he wanted, and Nature's stubborn refusal to give it up enraged him far beyond the bounds of reason.

Martin hadn't been at the monastery during the Rage of '42, when Luther had slain every single living person in the place. Martin's job had been to cover that up, fabricating the fire that had destroyed much of the old building. He didn't think he could get away with such a trick again. Time was short now, Luther was very close, and he had to take the risk Luther himself had refused because of the proximity of the victim. Luther was oblivious now, not needing food, drink, or sleep, only dimly aware of anything happening outside his laboratories. Martin would not be missed. If Luther went berserk, one last crazed feeding might just return him to his senses.

Their driver was obviously nervous, afraid even, when the jeep jerked to a halt. He almost pushed them out. Promising to return the next night if they hadn't arrived back at camp, he pointed out the way to them.

"Half a mile, that way. If you hear the cheetahs cry, walk on. Don't shoot." Eyes wide with apprehension, he hastily turned the vehicle around and sped away.

"Keep that H amp;K hefted, Tom," Michael said, directing his flashlight ahead of them. In his other hand was a Predator.

They didn't see the cats, only heard them, but it wasn't the growling they'd expected. Rather, the short, high call of the cats was more like a protesting meow. It certainly didn't seem to compare with the roaring of the lions.

Treading the savanna carefully, they almost didn't realize that they'd found Shakala until they looked closer at the trees looming into view against the clear, starlit sky. The branches seemed oddly twisted, almost into a woven helter-skelter shape, a copse of them lined up like the arms of veldt soldiers. Glittering yellow eyes looked down at them from vantage points high overhead. Then, as much by instinct as anything else, given the silence of the footfalls, they realized they were encircled.

One of the elves stepped forward from the advancing phalanx. Though he was obviously tall, lean, and strong, it was impossible to see his exact form. Only the lightness of the belted loincloth and the cape around his shoulders demarcated him from the night which otherwise blurred with his immaculate blackness.

Michael let the gun fall slowly to his side and the others followed his cue. "Shakala said he would see us if we

came," he said quietly. There were too many spears not to be damned polite here, and those were just the obvious weapons.

"We were not told there would be a kaffir," the man said viciously. "There will be a price to pay for that." The group with him advanced another step, only yards away now, perhaps forty or fifty strong. Kristen cowered beside Serrin and tried to look as small as possible. The elf was shaking, aware that there were shamans with this group, sensing their power. They would be far more dangerous than their spears if this came to violence.

The Zulus stood silently around them, staring them down, deliberately letting the tension build. Then, from the trees before them, a figure sprang fully thirty feet to the ground, landing perfectly on all fours and then rising to his seven-foot height, folding his arms and surveying them with fierce intelligence. Power screamed from the Zulu elf; Serrin was confused, sensing the aura of a mage but seeing him dressed in the unmistakable trappings of a cat shaman.

"Shakala, I presume," Michael said with the hint of a nod. The elf ignored him at first, turning his eyes to Kristen.

"Be glad this is no sacred place, kaffir, or I would rip your throat out," he growled. Then he turned to Tom, at whom he gazed long and hard. Sensing that this was some kind of staring-down contest, the troll looked back into the Zulu's eyes, refusing to yield. The elf's face hardened for an instant, and then a playful smile spread over his angular face. The expression might have been that of a cat playing with its helpless prey.

"We've come to ask for your help. We know that someone tried to kidnap you. It's possible they may try again," Serrin began. Since Shakala had ignored Michael, he thought it best to speak up.

Shakala's eyes turned to him as soft light spread around from objects some of the Zulus were carrying. They weren't torches, or didn't seem to be; Serrin thought he felt the aura of magic on them, but he was locked into the shaman's gaze. Despite the situation, Serrin couldn't help registering the beauty of the man. With that aquiline

nose, the high bones of his face, the elegance and proportion of his hard body, he looked like a prince.

Shakala laughed. It was an extraordinary sound, tinged with the high call of a cheetah at the beginning and with the growl of a lion as it faded away.

"No one will try again," he said derisively. "And why should I help you, little mage? What do I care about you?"

"Nothing," Serrin said quietly. "But the same people also tried to get me. And others have been taken, and killed. It's possible they might come back for more of your people. We just don't know."

He wasn't lying. For all he knew, that might be true. Shakala stared as if trying to ferret the truth out of Serrin.

Still not replying, he abruptly turned away and pointed at Tom.

"I may speak with him," he said. "Perhaps. If I do not just kill him first. He is either very brave or very stupid

to come here with Mujaji's mark on him. What I am inclined to think" he flashed his brilliant, sadistic smile again "is that he is probably very stupid. Either way, he will not leave with the mark upon him."

Tom stood his ground, unflinching. He didn't know just what the shamans of Table Mountain had done to him. He had been shown the stone and the ocean, felt something of their immanence within him and marveled at it, but he hadn't realized that it could be sensed by other shamans. Bear had not changed inside him; she had not shown any displeasure at what had happened. The elf was gesturing to him, leading him into the circle of trees. Half the surrounding elves formed a circle around them, the others ringing Serrin, Michael, and Kristen. Weapons other than spears were visible now as metal gleamed in the gentle light.

"This is my place," Shakala cried out. "I am prince here. Beware princes, troll, for they are less easy to placate than kings and they take their sport far more seriously." It would have sounded pompous, even ridiculous, had the Zulu elf not looked so striking and beautiful in the barely illuminated darkness.