were telling me about. Walk ahead with this light and pick out a nice
smooth track going in the right direction. I never did have a chance
to build headlights for this machine so you will have to do instead."

Snarbi climbed down unsteadily and walked out in front. Jason opened
the valve a bit and they clattered forward on his trail as Mikah
turned the tiller to follow. Ijale crawled over and settled herself
against Jason's side, shivering with cold and fright. He patted her
shoulder.

"Relax," he said, "from now on this is just a pleasure trip."

X

They were six days out of Putl'ko and their supplies were almost
exhausted. The country, once they were away from the mountains, became
more fertile, an undulating pampas of grass with enough streams and
herds of beasts to assure that they did not starve. It was fuel that
mattered, and that afternoon Jason had opened their last jar. They
stopped a few hours before dark since their fresh meat was gone, and
Snarbi took the crossbow and went out to shoot something for the pot.
Since he was the only one who could handle the clumsy weapon with any
kind of skill in spite of his ocular deficiencies, and who knew about
the local game, this task had been assigned to him. With longer
contact his fear of the _caroj_ had lessened, and his self-esteem rose
at his recognized ability as a hunter. He strolled arrogantly out into
the knee-high grass, crossbow over his shoulder, whistling tunelessly
through his teeth. Jason stared after him and once again felt a
growing unease.

"I don't trust that wall-eyed mercenary, I don't trust him for one
second," he muttered.

"Were you talking to me?" Mikah asked.

"I wasn't but I might as well now. Have you noticed anything
interesting about the country we have been passing through, anything
different?"

"Nothing. It is a wilderness, untouched by the hand of man."

"Then you must be blind, because I have been seeing things the last
two days, and I know just as little about woodcraft as you do. Ijale,"
he called, and she looked up from the boiler over which she was
heating a thin stew of their last _krenoj_. "Leave that stuff, it
tastes just as bad whatever is done to it, and if Snarbi has any luck
we'll be having roast in any case. Tell me, have you seen anything
strange or different about the land we passed through today."

"Nothing strange, just signs of people. Twice we passed places where
the grass was flat and branches broken as