Once mounted, he looked back, but he could see no sign of pursuit. Inland rose the same lines of dunes which had accompanied them all the way so far, except where the rock spines of the subsoil broke through, and he felt sure the swamp began and still stretched endlessly on, only a few miles beyond that.
It was late evening now, the low clouds red in the west and the sun’s disc altogether gone. It was high time to look for a campsite, but they had only come a few miles and he had no idea how good the savages were at tracking. His decision to kill the shaman might have merely enraged them instead of helping to hinder pursuit by forcing them to mourn ritually the death of a leader. The girl, too, ought to have rest and food very soon. She might be as tough as she appeared, but what she had been through that day would have tired a strong man. The priest himself felt weary and he had endured far less.
Another hour’s ride, and in the full dark, more water loomed up. It was impossible to see how broad it was, and it would be insane to try swimming it in the dark. Reluctantly, Hiero turned the morse inland, following the bank of the stream or inlet, and keeping double watch in case anything large came out of it and wanted dinner.
Their progress was necessarily slow and grew slower yet as cacti, vines, and woody plants grew more common. Eventually, peering about on the side away from the water, Hiero caught sight of a dark hillock somewhat to their left. He steered Klootz that way and to his surprise found that the “hillock” was an enormous, rounded bush or low tree, about forty feet high, with a stout, central trunk. Its branches hung nearly to the ground and provided as close to a natural tent as one could hope to find.
Once “inside,” after they had unloaded and unsaddled the morse, Hiero dismissed him to feed and mount guard, simultaneously. He decided to risk a very small fire of twigs, and after he had gathered them and got it lit, realized that no good reason for it existed, save to look at the girl. This discovery annoyed him.
She had sat quietly, arms around her knees while he unloaded and puttered. As he got food from the packs and water from the big canteen, she accepted a share in silence, but made no effort to talk. Eventually, the short meal over, she brushed a few crumbs from her lap and once again stared levelly and impersonally at him over the light of the wee fire. It was obviously time for some attempt to communicate.
