"If we could only find an impregnable position," Nard Rost told them, "until help can reach us."
"You reached them at last?" demanded Besan, tapping Nard Rost's bracelet broadcaster.
The instructor nodded. "About ten minutes ago. Signals are very faint but they're sending a dirigible. By midday probably."
"Besan," said Relsa Dav tensely, "to the right!"
Lifa whirled and her hand stole inside her scanty garment to where the sacks of goorn dust and her knife rested.
A smaller rift, a miniature gorge snaking down into the gulch they followed, lay revealed. And sprinting down its rocky floor came four well-armed warriors of the pursuing band! In a matter of seconds they would be blocking the trail ahead.
Besan looked ahead and at the rocky slope to their left. A steep trail, a brushy wet-weather watercourse, led upward to the gulch's bare rim.
"Quick," he ordered. "Up with you!"
They scrambled upward, the girls ahead and Nard Rost after them. The savages realized that they had been seen and their shouts boomed through the air to their fellows behind.
The watercourse climbed yet more steeply so they were forced to pull themselves upward by projecting roots and branches. A moment later they stumbled, one by one, over the lip of the little gulch and paused to catch their breath.