The floor of the cave was cold and damp. After short struggling with ropes binding her, Shadow took a vertical position, leaning onto an uneven rocky wall. She was alive and, except for the dull pain in the neck, felt no effect of being struck by a poisonous tail. Neither did she feel any other injury, only a few scratches and bumps here and there.

Where was she? How did she get here?

The cave was undoubtedly big, and there were many people inside. First, Shadow noticed a long, bright opening not far to the left—an entrance. Covered with a canopy of vines, it still allowed plenty of light in the cave. The sun must be shining bright outside. For how long did Shadow sleep? For one day or one year? She had a weird feeling as if she woke up in her next life.

Several men were sitting around the entrance. They were discussing something and playing a dice game. Other voices, loud and angry, the ones Shadow heard when she woke up, were coming from the opposite direction. To the right, the cave expanded, and its far end was hidden behind the fallen rocks and uneven formations rising from the floor. More people were hiding there, arguing about something in a sand speech. Shadow could not understand a thing from what they were saying, partly because she did not know the sand speech well, partly because she felt dazed, and there was a strange ringing in her ears.

Shadow counted seven more prisoners—they all were sitting to the left of her. Some were local shepherds, while other men looked foreign, like merchants from hilistian kingdoms. Now, we all became a prize of slave hunters—a living stock that has to be delivered to the market and sold for profit, though she.

In the land of Alder, such a crime was punished by death, not to mention that the sand snakes had the guts to hunt for slaves during the Ascension, right under her father’s nose. This thought infuriated Shadow.

Bandits, guarding the prisoners, paid no attention to the fact that she woke up, and this was something she decided to fix right away. Shadow recalled a few sand speech swear words and yielded:

“Hey you, sons of the snake, do you know who you set on? I am Gray Shadow Lurking Among Sleeping Trees And Amongst Rustling Grass, daughter of the head of the Crimson Alder clan! Set me free immediately, or I swear to kill all of you in a most terrible way!”

The bandits exchanged looks. Cursing, one of them rose and approached Shadow. The sharp edge of his long knife touched her chin, leaving a small cut on it.

”Keep quiet, and we will spare your life, teheni-girl,” the man said.

”Be sure, the warriors of my clan are on the way here,” Shadow snarled while trying to move away from the knife. ”They will kill you and feed your guts to stone pangos.”

It was hard to speak so daringly at this moment, but Shadow did her best. The bandit bared his teeth, hit her chin with his fist, and returned to his fellows. Angered by the pain, Shadow growled, rushing in her bonds, anticipating how she would plunge a blade deep into the bastard’s throat.

One of the hilistians who looked foreign, a young man sitting next to Shadow, moved closer.

“My name is Belrigan,” whispered he. His teheni had a funny accent, but Shadow understood him well.

If Belrigan were a teheni, he would be around thirty winters old, the same as she was. However, humans aged differently. He must be twice younger,Shadow weighted roughly—she was not an expert in humans to make a more accurate estimation.

Belrigan and the other man sitting next to him had their hands free. However, their legs were not only tied but also roped together, so one could not move far from another.

”I think these people indeed want to keep you alive.” Belrigan said.

His companion, who looked much older, joined them by budging himself closer in a way that would look funny in other circumstances.

”They surely would prefer you to be safe, my good girl.” he said. ”So don’t make them much trouble. They even allowed me to heal your poisoning. Name’s Gerome, by the way.”

”What do you mean they allowed you to heal me?” Shadow repeated, not sure if she understood correctly.

”Precisely it. Your condition was terrible when they brought you to the cave yesterday evening. My poor child, as soon as I saw you, I realized that you are under the effect of stone poison and asked them to give me the pango juice.”

”Pango juice?”

”It’s the antidote that dissolves the stone position.”

”There is no such thing,” Shadow did not believe.

”Oh… actually there is! I made it myself,” Gerome’s voice showed that he was very proud of this achievement. ”The pango juice was among other things that these unkind people stole from us. The source of the antidote is the beast itself. You see, when the pango hunts, it paralyzes its prey with poison, but that makes the flesh quite hard, like a… stone. So, after it kills the victim and wants to eat, pango softens the dead body with its saliva. I learned that all you need is to take that saliva from the beast and process it. Then, it could serve as an antidote. You just need to rub it thoroughly into the skin…”

”You rubbed me with the spit of the lizard?”

Maybe, the dream about the hands touching her was not a dream at all.

”We applied it externally, yes,” nodded Gerome.

No matter how repulsive it was, Shadow couldn’t allow herself to show her genuine emotions. Just after a few deep breaths, she got herself in one peace.

”Thank you for saving me. I swear to repay the favor. By the honor of my clan and all my ancestors, you are now under the protection of the Alder.”

”Oh, no worries, my child. Anyone would do the same in my place.”

What else could they do with me while I was unconscious?

Shadow glanced at two hilistians. The older man looked piously and fair, but… from what Shadow heard about humans, that meant little.

No-no that is impossible. Nothing happened… I would have noticed if there was something…

Shadow forbid herself to ruminate over such things before she could drown in an abyss of useless thoughts. It was not a time and not a place for being weak.

The loud voices heard from the other end of the cave subsided. Most of the bandits, except those who guarded prisoners, seemed to leave the cave. Time slowly dragged on, and Shadow’s skin started to itch. It could be because of the wet clothes or, maybe, because of the antidote applied to her. The fear embraced her body like a cold, creepy snake, taking her warmth and her courage.

What could she do? What must she do?

Why would these sand-snakes want me alive? And what are they waiting for here? That is not how slave hunters behave. They would not waste time after a raid. They would take their catch over the border and sell it as soon as possible.

Belrigan and Gerome were discussing something in low voices. The guards did not bother to stop them, and Shadow decided to ask too:

”For how long are you here?” she whispered to Belrigan.

”Almost a day, same as you. They caught us soon after the sun hid behind the phoenix peak. And when they brought you, it was already dark. And those three shepherds, who sit over there, seem to be here since the last morning.”

Missing people could not go unnoticed. What if someone already notified my father? Of course, he will not stop Ascension because of some shepherds, but he could send warriors to scout the border. There are many places around Chipped Mountain where one can hide, but they will surely check the Silent Waterfall, especially when I won’t show up in the evening.

”Do you know how far we are from the waterfall?”

”We are above it, near the lakes. Here starts a path that climbs up to the phoenix mountain,” Belrigan thought a little and then added, as he understood what she was thinking: ”Escaping won’t be easy. The cave is big, and it has at least two exits, but there are also more than twenty armed men here.”

Maybe they are not raiders? What if… they came for a different prize? What if they came to kill my father and behead the clan?Shadow’s heart started pumping in her chest as soon as she thought about it, but she managed to calm down. No, it’s not possible. They would not take prisoners in that case.

Their guards changed, and one of them brought water to the captives. The light behind the canopy of vines was slowly fading, when the bandits returned to the cave, and Shadow again heard their voices from behind the rocks. This time, she listened carefully and tried to understand what they were speaking about.

”Phoenix… tonight… flee…,” she repeated what she could recognize, but that did not make much sense to her.

”They discuss if it is safe to start climbing to the phoenix nest right now, before dusk,” prompted Belrigan.

“Do you understand the sand speech?” Shadow asked.

“Yes, I do,” Belrigan nodded.

“But why do they want to climb to the nest?”

“To catch the bird, of course,” put in Gerome.

”The bandits hunting a phoenix? Shadow could not believe it. “You must be mistaken.”

”Bandits, you say?” Gerome perked up. ”No, my girl, they are not bandits at all. They are tsar’s men. They came here to capture the phoenix and add this magical bird to the bestiary of the evil tyrant!”

Saying that Shadow was surprised was quite an understatement.