Tralk said, “We should take the crodlus too.”
Another one shook his head. “No, these are carriage-trained. We’ll never get ‘em to ride through the sand unless they’re draggin’ something.”
Komir breathed a sigh of relief. He was really worried that he was going to have to convince them that the crodlus would be of no use without the carriage, and Komir had always found it easier to convince people of things that were false than to do so with the truth. If they couldn’t convince them, the raiders would actually take the crodlus, then waste at least an hour while they tried and failed to make the crodlus move while untethered to the carriage.
The carriage shook as Zabaj’s weight was removed from it. Slowly, the mul walked over toward Voras, a rolled-up parchment in hand.
“Let her go, and the map’s yours.”
Voras grinned, showing yellowed, broken teeth. “Nice try, mul. Tralk, get the map.”
Nodding, Tralk moved cautiously toward Zabaj, keeping his bone knife at the ready. “Give it to me, mul.”
Scowling down at the Raider with a look that Komir knew Zabaj had used in the arenas of Tyr back in the day, the mul held out the map. Tralk hesitated a moment and gulped down a swallow before actually snatching the map.
He backed up slowly, keeping his eye on Zabaj the whole time.
“Take a look at it,” Voras said.
Komir stole a glance at his sister. Karalith was fidgeting. “Look, okay, it’s a treasure map,” she said as Tralk unrolled it, “fine, but like I said, it could take months before-”
“Shut up.” Voras bellowed. “Tralk, talk to me.”
Tralk peered at the parchment before him. “Who the frip is Sebowkan the Elder?”
“Ain’t he the king of Tyr?”
Voras frowned. “I thought he was that defiler from Nibenay.”
But the fourth one, Komir noticed, had a faraway look on his face as he spoke very, very softly. “That’s one of the guys that ruled during the Green Age.”
Tralk made a snorting noise. “Was that before or after the Orange Age?”
The third one chuckled at that, but the fourth one still looked serious. “Look, this ain’t no joke. I knew a guy, right, and he told me all about Sebowkan’s treasure-that it was all lost-like.”
“Was lost.” Karalith pouted as she said it. “We found it. We earned it.”
At that, Voras laughed. “Ah, well, you see, my dear, the whole point of the Black Sands Raiders is that we take that which other people have earned.” He turned to Tralk. “Where is it?”
“The woman’s right, it’s only a few days’ walk from here.”
“Good. That map’s easier to move with than this setup. Bad enough we’re coming back to Zeburon without most of our people or our mounts. A treasure map will go a lot farther with him than a carriage full of worthless trinkets.” Voras suddenly threw Feena forward, and she fell facedown in the sand.
“Oof.” came her muffled voice from the ground even as Zabaj moved amazingly quickly.
“Feena.” Kneeling down beside her, Zabaj put an arm on her shoulder and slowly guided her to her feet.
“I’m all right,” grumbled Feena as she spit sand out of her mouth and glared at Voras.
Zabaj stared at the leader. “You have your map.”
“And you have your woman. It’s tempting to kill you.”
Zabaj smiled at Voras, showing his sharpened teeth. “You’re welcome to try.”
“Perhaps another time. Please don’t try to follow us-we know this desert far better than you, and it won’t end well.”
Slowly, never taking their eyes off the emporium’s carriage, the four raiders moved off with their newly acquired treasure map.
As soon as they were out of sight, Komir let out a long laugh. “Well done, Lith.”
Karalith took a mock bow. “Thank you, thank you.”
“This is no laughing matter,” Zabaj barked. “Feena was almost killed.”
Her tone sharpening, Karalith said, “Yes, but she wasn’t, because we gamed those imbeciles into thinking that treasure map that Gash screwed up was good.”
Shooting her lover a glance, Feena then said to Karalith, “And I am grateful, Karalith.” She looked up at Zabaj again. “Those men were desperate-and I’m pretty sure they’re the remnants of the same group that killed Fehrd.”
Komir nodded. “Didn’t need mind-magic for that. When Lith and I talked to some folks from the caravan back at Raam, several of them mentioned that only four of the raiders survived, and they ran off without their crodlus. Can’t imagine there’s more than one group of Black Sands like that in this region.”
Tricht’tha rubbed two of her pincers together, a sure sign of agitation. “I’m just glad we had Gash’s map. What would we have done if he’d gotten it right the first time?”
Karalith shrugged. “Something else. This is what we do, Tricht’tha.”
“Next time,” Zabaj said with a growling undertone, “try to do it without endangering Feena.”
“It’s not as if we chose to endanger her, Zabaj,” Karalith said sharply.
Zabaj snarled. “You could have just given them what they wanted. What if one of them recognized the map for a fake?”
Before Karalith could provide yet another sharp retort, Komir stepped in. “Zabaj, that wouldn’t happen-there are maybe six people in all of Athas who know about that impurity. It was just our bad luck that Belrik’s pet tutor was one of them-hell, that’s why Gash made that mistake in the first place, it’s not something that he would’ve needed to bother about under any other circumstances. There was no chance that a Black Sands thug was gonna know about that impurity.”
Feena put a hand on Zabaj’s huge arm. “My love, it’s all right. Komir and Karalith are right, just leave it-”
But Zabaj wasn’t having any of it. “And what if that one didn’t know about Sebowkan, and they thought it was crap?”
Komir opened his mouth to respond quickly before either Karalith or Tricht’tha could, but a voice sounded from inside the carriage. “What is all that racket?”
They all turned toward the carriage, where Torthal was sticking his head out the rear, his white hair flying off in all directions.
“What is all this yelling about? Shira and I are trying to sleep.” He frowned. “Why aren’t we moving?”
Komir was unable to help himself, he burst out laughing.
So did Karalith and Feena and, in her own way, Tricht’tha.
After a few seconds, so did Zabaj.
“What’s so damned funny?” Torthal asked.
CHAPTER EIGHT
For the first few days, Gan and Rol fought in the undercard.
Gan’s initial fight against Krackis was actually the longest of their matches. It was immediately followed by Rol’s first fight.
Like Gan’s, it was against a goliath.
Unlike Gan’s, it ended with one punch.
Rol walked out onto the arena floor to gasps of disgust, as three of those lesions had grown on his face, marring Rol’s irritatingly attractive visage.
The goliath who faced Rol was less verbose than Krackis-he would almost had to have been-and focused entirely on staring at Rol.
But as soon as Jago told them to start fighting, Rol threw a right punch to the goliath’s head, which whirled from the impact so fast it broke the goliath’s neck, and he fell to the floor in an instant.
The real problem, though, was that the lesions wouldn’t go away.
They showed up everywhere, red and hideous, like giant bumps on his skin.
Calbit and Jago brought in healers, but none of them were able to do any good. But he wasn’t sick otherwise, just covered in lesions, so they kept fighting.
And they kept winning.
After a week, the guards came to bring everyone up for the undercard fight-but they didn’t open the cubicle doors for number four.