He still kept the trail of the riders in sight, but was even more careful about keeping under cover. The next man he met might not be helpless or dying. Or there might be thirty men instead of one any or all of them ready to shoot or slash first and ask questions afterward. There was very little Blade did not know about staying alive while walking into the middle of a war. That was one of the reasons why he was still alive.

Blade walked north in the desert silence for at least an hour. Once he thought he saw the silhouettes of riders on top of the next hill. A closed look showed him only a cluster of unusually tall bushes, their outlines twisted by shadows. Another time he found three carved jade figures of full-bodied women that had slipped from some rider's sack of loot. Otherwise he might have once again been moving across a desert that had always been empty and always would be.

Blade was beginning to wonder when the sky would start showing signs of dawn, when he heard a long, high-pitched, bubbling cry from beyond the next ridge. It was answered by several more of the same. He stopped, then covered the last half mile in a slow, stalking crouch.

What he found was the scene of a massacre rather than a battle. The narrow valley below him offered good footing for heavily loaded pack camels. It also offered a perfect site for the ambush the white-robed riders had carried out with superb skill. At least twenty men in dark trousers and cloaks lay sprawled dead on the ground. There were enough detached arms, legs, and heads lying about to make it hard to count exactly. Thirty-odd pack camels lay among the men, throats laid open with scimitar slashes, their packs hastily stripped off and torn apart. A dozen or so more camels wandered aimlessly up and down the valley, calling to each other and occasionally nuzzling a body.