From the floor beside the fatter of the two men, the guard who did not snore, he took a club. Twice he struck and the gurgling sound changed to a steady deep breathing. Noork knew that now the two guards would not give the alarm for several hours. Thoughtfully he looked about the room. There were several of the hooded cloaks hanging from pegs wedged into the crevices of the chamber's wall, their outlines much plainer here in the artificial light of the flickering torch.
Noork shed his own blood-stained robe quickly and donned one of the others. The cloaks were rather bulky and so he could carry but two others, rolled up, beneath his own protective covering.
The matter of his disguise thus taken care of he dragged the two bodies from the stairway and hid them beneath their own fouled robes in the chamber of the sleeping guards. Not until then did he hurry on down the stone steps toward the prison pit where Tholon Sarna, the golden girl, was held prisoner.
The steps opened into a dimly lit cavern. Pools of foul black water dotted the uneven floor and reflected back faintly the light of the two sputtering torches beside the entrance. One corner of the cavern was walled off, save for a narrow door of interlocking brass strips, and toward this Noork made his way.
He stood beside the door. "Sarna," he called softly, "Tholon Sarna."
There were a score of young women, lately captured from the mainland by the Misty Ones, sitting dejectedly upon the foul dampness of the rotting grass that was their bed. Most of them were clad in the simple skirt and brief jacket, reaching but to the lower ribs, that is the mark of the golden people who dwell in the city-states of Zura's valleys, but a few wore a simple band of cloth about their hips and confined their breasts with a strip of well-cured leopard or antelope hide.
One of the women now came to her feet and as she neared the metal-barred entrance Noork saw that she was indeed Sarna. He examined the outer lock of the door and found it to be barred with a massive timber and the timber locked in place with a metal spike slipped into a prepared cavity in the prison's rocky wall.
"It is Noork," he said softly as she came closer. He saw her eyes go wide with fear and sudden hope, and then reached for the spike.
"The priest," hissed the girl.