He glanced away, thinking. At this time of morning the palisade cast a long shadow that stretched halfway across the village. Slaves crouched around the central fire, pounding lupine root. Their haunted eyes followed Cimmis as he passed. White Stone kept his hand braced upon his belted war ax as a reminder to them. Deer Killer, on guard at Dzoo’s door, straightened as they approached. His dark eyes widened. To White Stone’s dismay, he always had a startled look when Cimmis came near him.
“Greetings, Deer Killer,” Cimmis said. “How is our prisoner?”
“I didn’t even hear her move during the night, my Chief.”
Cimmis pulled the door hanging back and ducked inside.
White Stone said, “I thought Wind Scorpion was supposed to relieve you at dawn? Where—”
“You fools!” Cimmis shouted, and rushed back into the daylight. “This lodge is empty!”
White Stone gave Deer Killer a murderous look.
“I didn’t do it, I swear!”
White Stone ducked under the hanging. As his eyes adjusted, he saw the bark container on the far side of the circular structure … but that was all. “It’s impossible! She couldn’t have escaped!”
“There she is!” Deer Killer shouted. “Look! Near Ecan’s lodge!”
White Stone scrambled out. “Where?”
Cimmis stood with a hand up to shield his eyes from the morning glare.
Dzoo stood just to the right of Ecan’s lodge, facing the lava cliff. Wind Woman waffled her red dress around her long legs and played with her waist-length braid.
“War Chief!” Deer Killer blurted. “I swear to you I never left my post! Not even for an instant! I …” A curious expression slackened his face. “She must have flown out. It’s the only answer! She changed herself into a bird and soared out through the smoke hole!”
White Stone made a face. Flown indeed!
“Silence!” Cimmis ordered. The slaves had started to stand up and follow their gazes.
In a clipped voice, Cimmis said, “Come with me. Both of you.” Then he stalked off across the village with his long gray hair flying.
As White Stone hurried after his chief, he shot a glance over his shoulder at the horrified Deer Killer. “I’ll deal with you later. Assuming Cimmis doesn’t order your guts boiled first.”
When they reached Dzoo, Cimmis slowed, ordering, “Deer Killer, make certain no one comes close enough to overhear my conversation. Including the Starwatcher.”
“Of course, my Chief.” Deer Killer trotted the two tens of paces to Ecan’s lodge and stood, eyes half glazed with fear, shivers racking his body.
White Stone asked, “And me, my Chief?”
The hem of Cimmis’s blue knee-length shirt fluttered in the breeze. “Keep your warrior company. Perhaps he has some last requests he might wish to make before I deal with him.”
He protested, “But, my Chief, what if she attacks you? Before I could get to you, she might—”
Cimmis’s dark eyes glittered. “I was a warrior for more summers than you have been alive, White Stone. I can protect myself. Go.”
White Stone glanced dubiously at Cimmis’s shriveled left arm and backed away to stand beside Deer Killer.
Deer Killer leaned sideways and whispered, “I’ve never been this terrified in my life! If she could get out of the captives’ lodge, there’s no place we can hold her. She can fly about as she pleases!”
White Stone glumly watched Cimmis walk toward Dzoo. Just beyond the palisade, the lava cliff rose like a rough-hewn black wall. She had her chin tipped up, as though studying the old owl nests that bristled in the clefts.
Assuming Deer Killer hadn’t dozed off or left his post, how had she managed to escape? “Did you ever find the missing ropes? The ones you used to tie her up in Wasp Village?
“No, War Chief.”
“Perhaps she tied them together and used them to climb out of the smoke hole. Did that occur to you?”
Relief made the young warrior’s eyes widen. “Blessed gods, do you think so?”
“Maybe.” He wondered if Cimmis was going to remember Deer Killer’s dereliction, and if so, who would be given the disagreeable task of ending his life?
Dzoo heard him coming. Her vision of the towering black cliff quivered as his feet struck the ground. Heavy feet, pounding out authority.
He didn’t speak, just took a stand behind her.
She turned and saw what he had become: tall, lanky, with a square jaw. His long gray hair hung over his broad shoulders like a mantle. His eyes were striking—the eyes of a trapped man who sees no way out.
“So,” she said, “you are Chief Cimmis now. It must be difficult for you.”