Over the next two days, their desire to get moving overruled the risk of detection. 'Nobody ever got anything done waiting for the perfect time,' Challis reminded them.

Besides, she was stiff and tired of sitting in the gorge and giving Flantain painkillers. The rain didn't stop, and Challis could hear the occasional distant rush of mudslides further along the ravine. She could only pray that the land wouldn't flood them in where they were. The log held up without leaking much, though the wood became sodden in patches on the inside. Then, that first night they had all jolted awake to find themselves covered with beetles. Shoots had a grand time nipping them up, but Thax had torn off his shirt and stomped out into the rain, he declared, to take a bath.

To get back to the Director and Groffoco, Flantain's condition put their options on lockdown. She couldn't walk yet, and sitting in an upright thrike saddle was impossible. Going back for Drunnel's horse didn't mean she could ride it. Thax gallantly offered to carry her in his arms, but one comment of the hazardous footing after the rain put an end to that idea.

"And we can't afford to rest every twenty feet," Flantain said, tilting her head slightly toward him. Thax scoffed.

"No faith in me anymore, I see. Besides, I could probably make thirty."

"I have faith in you," she said quickly. "Just… not in your arms."

"It would kill your back," Challis added. Once, when she had twisted her ankle, Rasalas had carried her across half of Polescos in the sweltering canyon heat. He hadn't reined in his comments about her weight, or the strain on his back. True, Flantain was no Challis, but Thax was no Rasalas either.

Thax twisted one way, then the other. "Hardly," he grinned. "We thrike masters have phenomenal backbone health."

Finally, Shoots took the weight. Using Flantain's cloak and about two miles of dead vines, Challis and Thax shaped a sort of sling and secured the young woman on her stomach over the flat saddle. When the thrike stood up, Flantain was nearly upright with her feet brushing the forest floor. Shoots was big, however, and took the weight on the harness straps over his chest without a grunt. Challis made Flantain as comfortable as she could. She left it to Thax to tie the knots.

Flantain was pale and biting down on her knuckles after three minutes, so Challis kept her unwavering focus on sweeping for Drunnel and Groffoco, at least at first. When they got the thrike up and out of the gorge at last, the real troubles began.

The air was sparkling clean in Dogoby's Reach after the rain, which meant visibility was excellent for everyone but Challis. As soon as she sensed a nearby presence, be it patrol or Groffoco, they had to get to cover quickly or risk being seen. The flattop trees were wider and longer but more sparse in the ravines than the upper rainforest. The party depended entirely on the secondary level of vegetation, then, and its more varied stretches of splayed stalks and leaves that were not as clean a cover as flattops. Only distance and the relative density of greenery between them and other eyes mattered. Thax turned out to be the best judge of that as they made their slow way along.

Challis savored the bits of sunlight that found them, inadvertently slowing her pace. Her clothes were that same sticky-wet that wasn't drenched and wasn't dry and rubbed raw spots onto her skin. Finally, she loosened her belt, which helped to ease the rubbing but not the empty hunger in her belly. Between the three of them, they'd peeled and eaten exactly two avocados, thirty-eight bean nuts from Flantain's pack, and chewed up about ten pounds of balappus bark in two days. If Flantain wasn't in so much pain, she would have fainted on the thrike from sheer lack of sustenance. Thax and Challis didn't talk out loud about their own discomfort, though it was cutting words short and tempers shorter before half-light on the second day.

A flickering piece of her mind tapped into the middle of Challis' attention. Half a moment later, Thax grabbed her by her braid. She stumbled backwards into him, and they made a frantic backtrack before a rich-smelling tree trunk pressed against her face.

The thrike, led by Thax, squelched nearby before snuffling in agitation.

"Eyes?" Challis panted.

"Up topside on the edge," Thax said, knowing what she meant. "It's raiders, if those are horses and not some swanky Brumelo transportation."

Challis wiped sweat onto her sleeve. "What in the world," she breathed. Then, "That hurt."

He muttered, "I was aiming at your collar. Missed."

"Where are they now? Shoot, are they –"

"Scaling the ridge. Dammit!" he hissed. "We need to scoot. Stay with me or we're leaving you behind." He turned, yanking the thrike along with him, and they plunged into a thick mess of slapping leaves. The ground didn't catch at her feet, Challis was glad, though it meant they were leaving a clear trail. The traction chains of their boots were molded into claws to cut into the mud in the guise of thrike tracks. If Perraxis raiders were after them, that alone would attract attention like nothing else.

Challis was used to running and hiding. Over the last six years, the running itself had been therapeutic on its own, forcing whatever chaos of emotions she had into the muscles of her legs and the pumping of her heart. Running always reordered her energies, and unfailingly carried her away from problems for however short a time.

This time was different. She pushed forward with her arms up against the branches. Then, without warning, confusion dropped down onto her. It drew her breath up short. After a stunned minute, she realized why. The condensing of energy particles that formed the jungle terrain in her awareness had begun, slowly but surely, to fade. It snapped her into a panic more extreme than if wild dogs were on her heels. Challis' feet stumbled, and she pitched forward onto her hands and knees with a cry.

"Oh no," she gasped. "Not now. Ras, wait!"

She scrabbled one hand at her neck, then the other. Thick blindness settled heavily over her mind as the world shrunk smaller and smaller. The currents of energy effluxes around her disappeared into vague blobs, then pinpoints, then nothing existed but a heartbeat thumping painfully up in her throat.

The tripwire was gone.

* * *

Mud squished up around her knees as Challis stayed where she was, too stunned to feel much of anything. She couldn't remember the tripwire coming off or when she had last felt it around her neck. She unthinkingly tried to reach out for it with her mind. But, whether the brimming source of energy could be sensed like any other life form or not, Challis was stunted by blankness. She couldn't feel for anything any better than she could see with her eyes.

In a moment, surely, Thax would notice she wasn't following them and come back for her. He was a team captain, if unofficially, accustomed to keeping track of multiple people. She just needed to keep her head on and be patient.

She could hear nothing aside from the hum of the rainforest, in front and behind. The energy fields she had gotten so used to had dissipated into thin air. A sharp pang that had nothing to do with fear broke through her and… the raiders must be getting closer.

"What are you even doing, Gannagen?" she asked in a sharp whisper. She jumped up, as unsteady as anything, and slapped out to the side until she found a tree trunk. The twisted rope of a vine, as thick as her arm, was embedded into the bark of the tree here at the base. She dug her fingers in, planted a foot, and began to climb. Her breath came hard at every heave of her legs as she tried to channel the agility of Rasalas. Only when she slipped for the second time did she slow down.

She couldn't tell how far up she was, but when the slight wisp of a ravine breeze cooled her hair, Challis stopped and clung to the fork in the trunk. She would have to listen for any noise of the followers, and stealthily circle the trunk to avoid them.

Two shapes shifted against the green again just as Thax looked back. The ravine's wall swooped up behind them, a mat of tangled jungle that bent out of sight toward the north where the military city of Hannowold waited like a watchtower.

"Oh, no. No, no, no." He halted, his neck tweaking as he jerked his head around. "Cracks and cheepers, she had one thing to do. What do I need to do, keep her on a ­–"

Shoots snorted and seesawed its great head. It was stamping, its wingtips crashing into leaves. Thax wrapped the strap a second time through his fist with a curse and spun back around, looking for anywhere they could go, or hide. A thought struck him and he stared at the thrike. Flantain was already in as safe a position as she could be, and Shoots could easily carry her and him both if they had to take flight to get out of here. If it weren't for that scampering muckraker of a Gannagen.

He could send just Flantain into the air, but where to? Back to Oedolon? Shoots had a good brain, but ­– no, its wing was still wounded. Thax had forgotten all about that. They needed to hide, as quickly as possible. Maybe he could come back for Challis.

The thrike clattered down a short bank behind him. Thax kept pulling on to lower terrain, ducking and twisting around foliage until he saw what he had hoped for: a dense shadow in the jungle not far ahead. It was packed full of bare brown branches, a healthy gillig thicket with all of its leaves layering the topside like a blanket to blacken the area underneath. If luck was on their side, the gilligs stretched long and wide. Shoots could clamber over the top and drop into the middle of it to become invisible.

"Nothing like locking yourself into a cage for your own safety," Thax grinned at Flantain, who had gone unconscious five minutes ago. He hoped desperately that her position hadn't shifted into hazardous and cut off necessary circulation. "Get a move on, Shoots. And quit looking at me like that."

He stepped forward, and a boot slipped. It yanked him down a slick bank of mud hidden behind a thin screen of leaves, each as big as his two spread hands. Thax's arm, too well secured to the thrike, jerked him to a halt just hard enough to pull Shoots off balance too. The big animal tumbled boulder-like in enough noise to scare an earthquake. Thax splashed into a muddy creek, just missing a row of rocks sticking up from the surface.

It was the thrike that smushed him into them with a bone-crushing impact.

Thax couldn't howl his pain with the torrent of water sloshing over his face, so the bones did it for him. He could swear a giant was wringing him out like a washcloth, making his ribcage crackle in pops of agony as he fought for even the smallest breath. Something splashed in blinding sprays next to him. One of his legs was crushed into the mud. Thax hunched against the mossy rock, half out of the water, and gingerly hugged his arms to his chest. He squeezed his eyes shut as time stood frozen in shock for several long, breathless moments.

Flantain. His eyes flew open. He looked around in a daze, trying to make sense of the mass of thrike next to him. Shoots was nosing him, or rather, beaking him, at his hair the way Punge used to do.

"I don't… have… any dead ferrets," he gasped, muscles locking when he started to speak. "Sorry. My ribs are kicking like an angry mule with two rear ends, so back off." He finally caught sight of Flantain, draped gracelessly over the thrike's back but still secure, and useless to the world. That made two of them.

That made him think of Challis, and Thax's groan rose into a gnarl of frustration. They were dead now, all four of them, and it was his fault. Director Haske would not be pleased.

As if to drive in the last nail, the clatter of horse hooves sounded on the bank behind him. Thax made a minor attempt to lock and load his firearm, but his arm couldn't flex without razor pain shooting him in the chest. He lolled his head back against the rock instead, his gaze blurry but half-open enough to see two sleek Perraxis horses draw up alongside the creek in dainty strides. They really were beautiful horses.

"Well, now," a fat voice drawled. "More runaways. Need some help, now."

"Don't bother." Thax's forced smile contorted as he tried to wiggle his leg out from underneath the thrike. Shoots was planted in the water like a statue, wings folded as it tilted its peering eyes at one of the men, then the other. Thax still had the lead line wrapped in his fist. "Just taking a breather. Didn't know anyone was nearby." He grimaced, his voice coming out ragged. "Say, you don't have any of those New Moon Beamers on you, do you?"

The men shared a glance, frowning. The one on the left was scarred and tough-looking, with a jaw that squared off his face under bushy eyebrows. Thax could picture him shouldering logs and twisting rocks into halves like apples in his fists. The other was smaller, though still notably solid in his confidence as well as his build. His hair looked as if it had been lashed by razor-wire, with shorter strips slicing through the longer patches in a roughneck, rakish look. Thax paused in a moment of wonder to stare at it before forcing his eyes down to the high-tech crossbows hanging on the saddles. He thought he could also see hilts of short swords peeking out from behind the men's shoulders. The combination of weapons, armored vests, and transparent Brumelo-esque shields stuck a formidable impression onto their otherwise lawless manner.

"I know you," the smaller one said suddenly. He pointed a finger at Thax. "You, you're that cheeky whoop that went after Munton. Remember, Keefs?"

The other gave a gravelly laugh that never reached his eyes. "Got 'im all squeaky on his seat. What a sleeze."

They both looked hard at Thax, who had pulled at his leg again and gone white with pain. He gritted shallow breaths in and out.

"It was the boss's idea, not mine," he said weakly. "But you never answered my question. Beamer flashlights. How much do you want for one?"

"What's with the girl?" The first one, Keefs, looked at Flantain. One of her arms was trailing in the water but she looked otherwise peaceful. Thax was glad she hadn't come back to herself yet. Another interfering voice could change the situation in a moment.

"Sick as a dog," he said. "Best leave her be." The men stared and shifted. Thax seethed up at the streaks of sky past the treetops. "Now, did you two want to talk about something?"

"Your names, for starts," the second man said. "And how we can get you some help. You're in restricted territory, you know that?"

"Ah. Thanks for the tip."

"Names and business in Hannowold?"

Thax stiffened, and regretted it. "Ow. What are two Perraxis raiders doing under a city-based contract?" he asked, acting confused. "The whole lot of you. I thought you were unaffiliated. What's with all the Hannowold business?"

"Not anymore," Keefs declared smugly. "Shaw's upped our standing with the local tech. Some nice upgrades, wot-say?" He said the last as one word. The men's long shields gleamed down at Thax who was, for the first time, silent.

"Get them up, Nash," Keefs grunted as the two dismounted. "Give you a hand."

Thax tried to hold Shoots down, but the wary approach of the men unsettled the thrike and it started to heave to its feet. Monster wings rose and bent forward, and hot pressure exploded in Thax's ribs and his leg as the thrike moved. He didn't notice the men carefully circling as he desperately tore the reins free before Shoots could break his ribs again.

"Don't even touch them."

A young woman's voice didn't cut through the air so much as it gradually brought the situation to a pause. All eyes reeled back toward the men's horses, whose picket lines had been untied and held loosely in one hand. Challis patted one horse on the neck, and her fingers found a crossbow.

Thax's stomach dropped.

She stood between the champing bits, head tilted slightly, her eyes riveting toward every bit of sound. Thax noticed twigs in her hair and sap smudged all over her tunic, and no wire looped over her neck. At that, he realized just how big of a mistake he had made.