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years crawling through the nine hells. That paltry pack of gold he’d abandoned back on the road with Gerd was nothing. This was the mother lode. If he’d lost this to the river, he’d have unsheathed his knife and ended the savages’ worries once and for all by slitting his own bloody throat.
    He held the sparkling crystal between unsteady fingers and raised it to eye level. “Thank the g-gods!” he whispered.
    The red gem was the size of a particularly large walnut and carved in the form of an eye with a heavy, sensuous lid. It appeared more liquid than stone, like a glass amulet filled with blood. A ray of sunlight pierced the crystal and bathed his hand in its red glow. The warmth of the light filled his skin and spread pleasantly up his wrist and into his arm and shoulder, penetrating his muscles and sinew before settling into his bones. Wherever the strange warmth spread, the pain faded to silence.
    He knew it was a kind of delirium, of course. He was no man’s fool. This was a delusion brought on by his traumatized state. No doubt, he’d taken a concussion and was hosting mild hallucinations. Only fools and savages put their faith in mystics and healing amulets, and he was no man’s fool. He was a man of science.
    Nonetheless, it was a very appealing, very well timed delirium, and he took it for the solace it provided.
    This little stone was going to bring him a king's ransom back in the civilized realms. Once sold, he’d have enough gold to live out the rest of his days like the noblemen he loathed. Unfortunately, the savages valued it as much as he did. He knew they viewed him as a grave robber, as a dog who swindled the dead for profit, and he couldn’t have agreed more nor cared less. He claimed the gem under the unwritten but time-honored precept of ‘finders, keepers’.
    Satisfied his treasure was safe, he packed it and the coins back into the pouch and restored it to the place of security beneath his shirt. Then he leaned his head back into the tree and closed his eyes as the warmth he’d hallucinated while holding the stone dissolved back to the loveless cold of reality.
    Time was running out. He couldn’t wait any longer. He had to get up off his ass and run for everything he was worth. So with a deep breath and a muttered prayer, he steadied himself. He braced his hands against the massive roots burrowing into the soil on both sides of him, but just as he was about to make the push to his feet, he spied a lump of brown goo on his thigh. Its oils were oozing most smugly into the wet green leather of his britches.
    “My tobacco,” he cursed as he flicked the soggy lump off his leg, “Bloody hell! Is there no limit to the insults?”
    More irritated than worried now, he peered around the side of the tree. Across the river, the first of the warriors had arrived. The savage had its cloak thrown back over its shoulder and was already pulling an arrow from the quiver on his back. Beam gave him a point for enthusiasm.
    From this closer vantage, he could now see that the savage was wearing chainmail, after all. The mail was sleeveless, in the Vaemysh tradition. He’d woven mud-stained grass through the links to dull the metal. However, one small spot beneath this one’s arm flashed a spike of sunlight back at Beam as he readied his arrow, and the sight of it fully vindicated him. The spark he’d spied back on the road came from this warrior's exposed mail. That was the rip in the squad’s stealth. That was what had betrayed them. He immediately forgave himself. This savage had been the complacent one, not he.
    He braced himself against the coarse bark and groped his way to his feet. His strength was returning, and with it came anger. The bastards had nearly gotten him killed. He again peered around the curve of the tree and was about to lob a curse at the bastard when he was struck by something odd. This savage had his nearly white hair cropped short and spiky in the tradition of men from Northern