Right.

Look, said Gerin, desperate to shrug off the shiver of his own sudden fear. I m not saying most of us won t survive. That s not the point.

The veteran s ravaged features turned, fixed on him. With the onset of night, the long gleaming scimitar edge of the band could now be seen clearly, slicing out of the clouds overhead, spilling a soft, uneven light on whatever the Dark Court deemed it appropriate to touch. Some of that light seemed to catch and gleam in the man s eye as he looked at Gerin.

What is the point, then? he asked softly.

It felt oddly like staging, like one of the tricked-up little pieces of street drama he helped set off down at Strov to pull in an audience or milk passersby for sympathy. As if there was a correct, fixed answer to this. Gerin, having no idea what that might be, looked around at his fellow captives and their stares.

He cleared his throat.

We re none of us used to desert heat, he said. And half of us are already coming down with the fucking snots and sneezes. We re going to be sick and stumbling tired. We get a few days into the scrublands on the rations they re feeding us, doesn t matter who survives, who doesn t, none of us is going to be in any fit state to make any kind of escape. This is our last chance for that.

Escape? Tigeth snorted phlegmily. You stupid fucking

And the Rajal survivor cuffed him savagely across the head. Tigeth yelped and fell over sideways with the force of the blow. He opened his mouth to say something more but the veteran stared him down and Tigeth thought better of it. Then the scarred man s gaze swung back to Gerin again. He opened one chained hand in invitation.

If you have an idea, lad, I think now might be the time to spit it out.

CHAPTER 2

The blade came up, caught blinding sunlight along its leading edge for a moment, and then snicked inward.