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"So yet still my hands are tied." He put into that all the taunting inflection he could summon. His reception by Tulka had given him one faint clue to the character of these people; they might be brought to acknowledge the worth of one who stood up to them.
"Child " The fist shifted from its grip on the fabric covering Ross's chest to his shoulder, and now under its compulsion Ross swayed back and forth. "Child?" From somewhere Ross raised that short laugh. "Ask Tulka. I be no child, Foscar. Tulka's ax, Tulka's knife they were in my hand. A horse Tulka had to use to bring me down." Foscar regarded him intently and then grinned.
Tulka went into action, his mount flashing forward almost in a running leap at Ross, who stumbled back when horse and rider loomed over him. He swung up the ax, but it was a weapon with which he had had no training, too heavy for him.
"I go to bitter water. My chief there." Tulka was scowling again. "You speak crooked words your chief there!" He pointed eastward with a dramatic stretch of the arm. "Your chief speak Foscar. Say he give much these " he touched his copper cuffs "good knives, axes get you back." Ross stared at him without understanding. Ashe? Ashe in this Foscar's camp offering a reward for him?
Nothing had been said about Ennar's not using his weapons in defense, but Ross discovered that there was some sense of sportmanship in the tribesmen, after all. It was Tulka who pushed to the chief's side and said something which made Foscar roar bull-voiced at his youthful champion.
"They want slave back it is so." "My people strong too, much magic," Ross pushed. "Take me to bitter water and they pay much more than stranger chief!" Both tribesmen were amused. "Where bitter water?" asked Tulka. Ross jerked his head to the west. "Some sleeps away " "Some sleeps!" repeated Ennar jeeringly.
But how could that be? "How you know my chief?" Tulka laughed, this time derisively. "You wear shining skin your chief wear shiny skin. He say find other shiny skin give many good things to man who bring you back." Shiny skin! The suit from the alien ship! Was it the ship people? Ross remembered the light on him as he climbed out of the Red village.
"You take from Ennar ax, knife," Foscar ordered, "as you took from Tulka." He made a sign, and someone cut the thongs about Ross's wrists. Ross rubbed one numbed hand against the other, setting his jaw. Foscar had stung his young follower with that contemptuous "child," so the boy would be eager to match all his skill against the prisoner. This would not be as easy as his taking Tulka by surprise.
Fortunately, his hands were bound so he was able to grasp the coarse, wiry mane and keep his seat after a fashion. The nose rope of his mount was passed to Tulka, and Ennar rode beside him with only half an eye for the path of his own horse and the balance of his attention for the prisoner. They headed northeast, with the mountains as a sharp green-and-white goal against the morning sky.
Ennar, disconcerted by the too-quick success of his attack, was unprepared for this. Ross rolled, trying to escape steel-fingered hands, his own chopping out in edgewise blows, striving to serve Ennar as he had Tulka.
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