Riyannah also learned the English Blade taught her with surprising speed. She remembered practically everything, seldom had to be corrected, and even managed to pronounce most of the words correctly. By the end of the second day on the march, Blade had taught her nearly all the basic words they'd need for survival in the wilderness. The lack of communication between them was no longer so dangerous.

Blade didn't care to go farther than this with the language lessons, after one unsuccessful experiment. He drew pictures of various types of flying machines on the ground, then named them. Finally he drew a picture of the Menel machine and said:

«Spaceship.»

He handed the stick to Riyannah and looked curiously at her. She looked back at him, meeting his eyes but not saying a word. Then she quickly scratched out the spaceship and turned her back on him, her shoulders quivering. She was silent for nearly half an hour.

She wasn't willing to trust him with any information about her own people or her own business. Blade wasn't surprised. She also probably realized that he didn't entirely trust her, so it was hardly fair to expect her to hand him all the information he needed on a silver platter!

Blade decided to let serious questions wait until they were a few days farther into the wilderness. Seeing that he wasn't going to behave like the soldiers might win her trust or at least get her off guard.

There was no point in even thinking about what intelligence services delicately called «physical methods»-torture. He was sure nothing he could do to her would make her say a word she didn't want to. He'd simply end up with a corpse, a bad conscience he'd carry to his grave, and no information to carry back to Home Dimension.

Getting back up through the canyon was a slower and wetter job than coming down through it. Several places where Blade had climbed down were completely impassable going the other way. By the time they came out at the wilderness end, it was nearly dark, a chill wind was blowing, and both of them were soaked to the skin up to their waists.