The five wore full tunics with embroidered patches, kilts with large pouches hanging from black metal link belts, and sandals. Two of them seemed to be women, judging by their long hair, and they also wore broad-rimmed hats. The three men were clean-shaven and short-haired. The clothes of all five were spotless except for dust they had picked up in their frantic scramble over the rubble in the flight from their pursuers. There was no sign of weapons on any of them. The hands they raised to their enemies, clasping and unclasping in agonies of fright, were empty and clean.

Before Blade could see more, the armed men in the semicircle made their move. The ones carrying torches jabbed them into crevices in the piles of rubble to keep them upright and burning. Then they drew efficient if clumsy-looking swords from cloth scabbards on their belts and advanced toward the cowering captives. The then with the spears hefted their weapons in both hands, holding them high with points slightly down, ready to either stab or throw. Blade began to wonder just how barbaric the bearded men were. They seemed to have developed fairly sophisticated tactics and weapon techniques.

One of the swordsmen was almost within striking distance of the five. The captives were looking at him like birds charmed by a snake. Blade wondered if they were drugged, feeble-minded, or just too frightened to defend themselves. Five people, even in such a situation, should have had some way of at least taking a few of their enemies with them. But these five were apparently going to sit there and let themselves be butchered like the proverbial stalled ox. Blade wondered if there was any point in trying to help people so obviously incapable of helping themselves.