A sigh was his answer and he fell silent looking at the fire, the smoke, the wheel of the paling stars.
The raft came two hours after dawn arrowing from the horizon directly toward the rising pillar of smoke. Dumarest watched it from where he lay buried in the vegetation far to one side of the fire. Melome, still asleep, lay where he had placed her close to the shelter of the wrecked vehicle.
She woke as the raft landed, rearing upright as Zucco strode toward her. He was tall, arrogant, wearing yellow and black, cruel colors which matched the expression on his face. The wand in his hand reached out, touched her arm, drew back as she screamed.
"Hurts, doesn't it, you bitch. Think of it the next time you're tempted to run from the circus. Where's the scum who helped you?"
"I didn't run! I-" She screamed again as the wand touched her body. "No! Don't hurt me! Please don't hurt me!"
"Where's Dumarest?"
"I don't know! I was asleep!"
"Where's Dumarest?" The tip of the wand hovered an inch from her face. "Why is he so interested in you? What can you do for him?" A sneer thickened his tone. "Aside from the obvious, that is. Talk, damn you! Talk!"
From where he sat at the controls of the raft Valaban said, "Take it easy, Jac. This isn't the way to handle the situation. The girl isn't to blame."
"Stay out of this!"
"I'm in it. Shakira-"
"Never mind him. I'm in charge and I don't intend wasting time. If you don't like it then you know what you can do." Zucco returned his attention to Melome. "Well, bitch, are you going to talk?"
"We crashed. I fell asleep. When I woke he had gone." Her arm waved at the surrounding vegetation. "He must have tried to make it on foot."
"In which case we can spot him." Valaban jumped down from the raft, staggered a little, regained his balance. "He must have left tracks and couldn't have got far. Let's load the girl and go looking."
"I told you to stay out of this." Zucco's voice was cold. "The next time you open your mouth I'll shut it for good."
"You could try." Valaban took a step closer, one hand buried beneath his blouse. "But it'll earn you a ruined face. I may be old and slow but this makes us equal." His hand appeared holding a flat gun, a twin to the weapon Reiza carried in the ring. "Now let's load the girl and lift. For all you know Dumarest could be within yards of us. Maybe hiding under the wreck and waiting his chance to jump us."
The truth but he had realized it too late. As he had guessed wrong as to the location. Like an animal, Dumarest had moved silently through the vegetation, taking advantage of the argument to get close, rising to lunge forward as Zucco turned to face the girl.
Valaban fell as Dumarest slammed against him, snatching the gun to level it as Zucco turned, snarling, the wand lifted in his hand.
"Drop it!" Dumarest fired as the man hesitated, the shot whining inches to one side of Zucco's body. "The next one you get in the face. Now drop that wand!"
He stepped forward as it hit the ground, thrusting back the man with the heel of his left hand, the muzzle of the gun held steady in his right.
"Melome! Get up and get over here. Move!" He didn't look toward her as she obeyed. "Take hold of his hand, girl. Grip it tight."
"No. I don't want to touch him."
"He won't hurt you." Dumarest stepped back as he heard a rustle to his rear. "Stay out of this, Valaban. Move over to the fire and lie face down. And you," he snapped at Zucco as the old man obeyed. "Down and kiss the dirt."
"Go to hell!"
"You've a choice." Dumarest tightened his finger on the trigger. "You've three seconds to make it."
A moment and Zucco was down, lying with his face to the dirt, trembling with the helpless rage which consumed him.
"Right, girl, put your hand on his neck." A glance at his face and she obeyed. "Now sing, Melome. Sing!"
Dumarest jammed his hands against his ears as the air filled with the wailing cadences of her song.
It was different, driving through the bone and flesh and muscle of his hands, without the wail of pipe and pulse of drum and yet still it caught at his mind and sent it wheeling in a succession of phantom images. An effect lacking its true power because of the lack of contact. From where he lay beside the fire Valaban groaned and cupped his ears with veined and blotched hands.
Zucco lay as if dead.
A man lost in terror-a captive of the song.
Bound and helpless by the fantasies of his mind and suffering a greater punishment than any physical torment. Dumarest watched him and then, as Melome looked toward him, dropped one hand and sliced the edge across his throat.
An unmistakable signal and he lowered the other hand as she broke off her song.
"Into the raft, girl. Quickly!"
He followed her into the vehicle as Valaban sat upright, shaking his head. It rose as Zucco twitched, climbing as the man rolled over to sit with his face buried in his hands. Figures which dwindled as the craft soared into the sky.
"You did it!" Melome came to sit beside him. "You got us away."
"For now."
"You had it planned," she said. Her voice was excited; a youngster enjoying a treat. "You left me asleep to act as bait and then, when they didn't expect it, you attacked. But what if there had been more?"
"Your song would have taken care of them."
"A weapon," she said. "You used it as a weapon. But I wasn't in contact so-" She answered her own question. "Zucco. You had him helpless. They would have had to obey." She laughed with pure delight. "Earl! You're so clever!"
Lucky would have been a better word. Had Zucco not given way to his spite, pandered to his sadism, the plan would have failed. As it could still fail.
Dumarest checked the controls. The raft was moving as it should in the direction indicated on the instrument but he sensed something was wrong. Why had Zucco come for them at all? Why had Valaban come with him? Any crew would have done and the circus had rafts and men to spare.
Questions lost in a sudden blast of pain.
As before it came without warning, a red tide of agony which doubled him over the controls and filled the universe with screaming torment. An eternity which lasted for seconds for when he could see again the raft was still on an even path, the ground below no different from what he remembered.
"Earl?" Melome was beside him. "Is something wrong?"
"Can you handle a raft?" A stupid question; how could she have learned. "Listen," he said urgently, "if anything happens. If I should fall sick, touch nothing. Understand? Stay away from the controls."
"Yes, Earl, but-"
The rest was lost as again fire caressed him, acid burned every nerve, vises crushed bones and sinew. A man flayed and set unprotected in the sun. As if smeared with honey and covered with ants. Boiled, broken, seared-all the torments ever devised inflicted in a wave of utter torment.
"Earl!"
Sweating, he reached for the controls. The escape had been an illusion, the trap Shakira had constructed still held him fast. More pain would come and more after that until he was helpless to do more than breathe. And Melome was in the raft, frightened, liable to do anything in her panic.
"Please, Earl, talk to me. What's happening?" She caught at his arm as the raft began to turn. "What are you doing? Where are we going?"
"To the circus," he said. "Back to Shakira."
He sat in his office of a dozen scents; odors and tangs echoing strange and alien places. Again he wore lavender, this time ornamented with a tracery of black which gave the appearance of somber scales.