neck pouch lay beside him. The other bodies too had been similarly searched. The sight of Blis’s purple-mottled body was nearly too much for her. She turned away, and looked down at her bracelets. It was that one, she was sure. The one she didn’t like very much. It was the old-looking one with its snaky double helix pattern and that chilly black stone, the stone with the oil-on-water surface which seemed to shift as she looked at it.
With sudden insight she realized that this was what the Morkth had been looking for. It was this bracelet that had had such unpredictable magiclike effects. But to use it was to summon the Morkth, too.
She picked up the pie, miraculously still intact, and walked away. There was much to think about, but she wanted to do it elsewhere. An hour later she was seated with her back to the wall of a burned-out shepherd’s hut. The place had been fired, but not looted. Looting was not the Morkth way. The roof had burned, as had some of the rude furniture. But the moldy blanket from under the stone shelf had not. She would have something to sleep under tonight. There was food. Now to eat, and then sleep. The thought of food shut out all other ideas, even the horrors of the past twenty-four hours.
Shael bit into the pie with the sort of greed that she had never shown for even the most rare of sweetmeats. The crust was crumbly and rather stale, but the inside was full of tart fruit. She was more than two-thirds through it when she recognized the purple juice dripping off her fingers. She gagged. It had been almost inevitable. Bilberry preserve was common hereabouts.
She was hungry and more pragmatic the next morning, after an amazingly good night’s sleep. She’d tossed 中古車 買取 and turned on the finest feather beds before. Now a few armfuls of heather and a smelly blanket had seemed wonderful. She brushed away the tiny black ants that had been making the most of her discarded dinner, and ate it herself. Sleep and food had done much to restore her mind’s tone. She sat and looked at the bangle, thinking.
It gave her a direction of travel. Here she had what was potentially a source of riches and power, if she could use it where they could not reach her. Her background had taught her more about the Morkth than most humans cared to know. She knew, for instance that there were two factions of Morkth, and that their internecine fight was more bitter than their hatred of humanity. She also knew they struggled with high altitudes and low temperatures. Their attacks were almost always limited to the coastal cities and the fertile lowland plains. Therefore she would go to the mountains. She could see the purple line of them from here.
S’kith too had thought he would aim for the mountains. He had needed a goal, a geographical target of some kind. Now these lower life forms were hounding him in such a fashion that he began to doubt if he would ever reach the blue jaggedness he could see before him.
CHAPTER 5
Slave markets have a peculiar scent. The pheromones of human fear and desolation are concentrated there. The noses of those engaged in the trade become blunted to it, just as butchers become used to the sight of blood: besides it was not a profession for the overly squeamish. It was the lifeblood of the city of Castern, and in 引越 some way or another it impacted on all its citizens’ lives. Which was why the townspeople were building the gibbet right in the middle of the market square. This man would hang where all the slaves could see him. There’d be no trap door’s sudden drop for this one. No. He was going to dangle and jangle a bit. His throttling dance would be something the merchandise would remember. The fine upstanding citizens of Castern wanted to make a real example of him. He was worse than a slave who had killed his owner. He was a slave who’d killed a slave merchant, as well as committed another murder and a bit of cannibalism and rape. It was the latter crimes that had had him hunted by the countryfolk,