my head and I lay sprawling in the brushwood, eating dust, with an elephant sitting on my chest and threatening hands gouging my throat. My last coherent thought before the breath went out of me, was—

"I'm waking up!"

CHAPTER SIX Narayan

But I wasn't. When I came to—it could only have been a few seconds that I was unconscious—it was to hear Evarin snarling curses and Idris barking incoherently with rage. I heard Karamy screaming my name, and started to answer, but the steely fingers were still at my throat and with that weight on top of me, I hadn't a chance. The fall, or something, had knocked Adric clean out of me. I was fuzzy-brained, but sane. I was an innocent bystander again.

I could see Evarin and Idris in the road, casting wary glances at the brushwood all around them. I could just make out the face of the man who was holding me pinned to the earth with his body. He had the general build of a hippopotamus and a face to match. I squirmed, but the threatening face came closer and I subsided. The man could have broken me in two like a match.

Around me in the thicket were dozens of crouching forms, fantastic snipers with weapons at their shoulders. Weapons that could have been crossbows or disintegrators, or both. "Enter Buck Rogers," I thought wearily. I was beginning to feel faint again, and old welter-weight on my stomach didn't help any. Abruptly he moved, delicate fingers knotting a gag in my gasping mouth; then the intolerable weight on my chest was suddenly gone and I sucked in air with relief. The fat man eased himself cautiously up, and I felt a steel point caress my lowest rib. The threat didn't need words. I could see the Narabedlans gathered, a tight little knot in the road. The snipers around me were still holding their weapons, but the fat man commanded in a low voice "Don't fire! They're sure to have guards riding behind them—" the voice died to a rasping mutter, and I lay motionless, trying to dredge up some of Adric's memories that might help; but the only thing I got was a fleeting memory of my own football days and a flying tackle by a Penn State halfback that had knocked me ten feet. Adric was gone; clean gone.

The Narabedlans were talking in low tones, Gamine the rallying-point round which they clustered. Evarin had his sword out, but even he did not step toward the mantling thicket. Cynara was holding Evarin's arm, protesting wildly. "No, no, no, no! They'll kill Adric—"

Suddenly, between two 

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