In the distance, Jarl still could hear the wailing vocorn pipes; the shouts, the shrieks, the drunken laughter. A thes-wood torch was a flaring pin-point in the blackness. He rolled the acrid taste of Rogek gas about his tongue ... drank in the Mah'ham's stench.
Yes, this was Ceres, a Cerestan night, and he was here, with the warmth and softness of dark Sais pressed against him.
Yet another part of him was far away ... far, far away in time and space and circumstance, armoring his quivering belly in a surface plate of boldness as he strode out on Horla to face the agony of the flame-death.
And there was Wassreck, too, Ktar Wassreck, with his burning eyes and pain-racked body, blasting down through the holocaust to save him.
Loyalty ... it was such a feeble, tenuous thing.
Yet the bonds it forged were stronger than telonium or steel.
Again he cursed, and pushed Sais back. Catching her hand, he turned and led her, stumbling, through the darkness.
"Jarl...."
He clipped: "We're going to the space-port, rey Gundre's carrier waits for us there."
"And then—?"