An hour later he was climbing a ridgeline that marked the crest of a gigantic sand dune. He stood as close to the edge as he dared and watched the leeward face of the dune swoop down and away. The face plunged five hundred feet down, and long fingers of mounded sand stretched out half a mile or more into the desert. What lay beyond was swallowed in the darkness. No light shone, nothing moved. It was like looking into a bottomless pit lined with black velvet.

Blade's eyes scanned the visible face of the dune from left to right. Two-thirds of the way across he stopped and stood up, looking more carefully. Down in one of the little valleys between the sand mounds was a cluster of-things. Things that were unmistakably paler and sharper in outline than anything Blade had seen so far in this desert. Color and outline might be a trick played by shadows or overstrained eyes. They might also indicate something not of this desert.

Blade moved cautiously down the face of the dune, not wanting to risk starting a sandslide. He did not breathe easily until he felt under his feet the hardpacked level sand on top of one of the mounds. Then he turned and began scrambling along the fringes of the dune toward the valley where he had seen the shapes. Soon he stood at the head of the little valley, looking down onto the floor. The shadows here were deep, but they did not hide what lay below.

Bleached and frayed robes and the bones of men and animals lay scattered about on the sand. Some were half-buried, others lay as if they had just been dropped there by a casual wanderer. From one threadbare hood the empty eye sockets of a whitened skull stared up at Blade.

Blade stared back down at the skull. As silent as it was, it told him one welcome fact. This Dimension had human inhabitants.