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faded. Together they headed along the trail as fast as Paket’s stiff old legs would go.
    Halfway down the hill, they veered off the trail and dropped into a shallow canyon. Thereafter, the going was slow, for they had to push their way through the thick undergrowth. Elrabin could hear Paket’s hoarse panting, but the old Kelth never complained and never asked to stop.
    It was Elrabin who called a halt at last so the old one could rest. Wheezing for air. Paket sank down on a boulder with wispy golden grass growing at its base, and closed his eyes.
    Worried, Elrabin watched him a moment, but didn’t make the old one waste his breath in explaining how he felt. It was obvious anyway that he was in considerable pain.
    Guilt touched Elrabin, but he shoved it away and turned his back on Paket to peer ahead down the slope. They were upwind of the fields, so the smoke was blowing in the opposite direction. Still, the stench was enough to choke Elrabin’s nostrils.
    He squinted and swiveled back his ears, calculating. It had been maybe two hours since Ampris had been captured. The guards would take her back to the compound’s slave quarters first. There, her missing ownership ring and lack of a registration implant would give her away. Then the Viis owner would probably be consulted. Being a Viis, he would not want to turn her in as he was supposed to according to the law on runaway slaves. He would probably keep her.
    But she would be in chains, confined, under orders. She’d been free long enough that the pierced hole in her ear had grown together. They’d have to punch a new one so they could fit an ownership ring through it.
    Elrabin snarled silently to himself. He had worn both ring and collar himself. How well he knew the feeling of degradation.
    His greatest worry was that Ampris would fall into despair over her capture. She might do something foolish, might risk death, might invite death, might fight until her captors were forced to hurt or kill her.
    Think of your cubs, who grow but still need you, Elrabin thought her way. Do not lose heart, my old friend.
    Behind him Paket lurched to his feet with a groan he tried to conceal. “Wasting time,” he said.
    Elrabin looked at Paket and swiveled his ears in fresh worry. Paket looked winded still, despite the rest. Perhaps it would have been wiser to bring Tantha instead.
    But as soon as the thought crossed his mind, Elrabin dismissed it. Tantha couldn’t follow orders, and Paket could and would. End of second thoughts.
    “We’ll get there,” Elrabin said aloud, to reassure both Paket and himself. “Got to wait until dark anyway.”
    Paket limped steadily along. “You think the patrollers will be gone by then?”
    Elrabin knew why he was asking. Most of them had possessed the usual registration implant, but Paket had been a worker in the quarries before he was condemned to Vess Vaas. The quarries branded their workers with an ion-release tattoo that couldn’t be eradicated. So Paket was still traceable if he crossed paths with the authorities. Bringing him was a very big risk, except that Elrabin figured the patrollers were already long gone.
    “I’ve seen how the patrollers on ag duty operate.” Elrabin answered finally. “Check a field for blight, condemn it, and set the fires. Then they go. Got no reason to hang around. They ain’t here looking for runaways. Their scanners won’t be calibrated for that kind of check.”
    “Yeah,” Paket said bravely. “I figured that.”
    Again guilt touched Elrabin and he ducked his head while he quickened his pace. He’d been lying his whole life. What was one more falsehood now?
    The truth was, a bounty lay on the head of every runaway, whether that individual was wanted dead or alive. Sometimes when he happened to be in a city, Elrabin would tap in access on a public vid link just to check to see how big his reward had grown. Galard Stables was still operational, although no longer the undisputed champions of the