In the press of battle, groups of cursing, fighting men swirled around Flane and Vawdar as they sought to back away. Five mekniks glimpsed his lean face beneath the black hair and howled, "Flane! Flane!" to the starry, three-mooned sky.
Now the dular fought for his life. With his spine to a wooden door, he snarled softly, green eyes following the points that faced him, his longsword alive to each thrust. Parry, lunge, recover. Riposte and thrust. He fought five men in that doorway, and one stepped out untouched. Over five fallen bodies the swordsman leaped, to keep death from the throat of Vawdar.
The black-cloaked men reformed their ranks, swept around them as a shield. There was one of them who did not fight, who stood, still and silent, looking on. Flane went for him, crying, "Who are you? Why do you make our fight your fight?"
The arm he held in his powerful hand was soft and slender. The hood fell back, and in the moonlight Flane gazed into a white face in which red-brown eyes stared back at him. Massy coils of red hair that blew in the breeze came loose, and flicked across his face. He breathed in the faint perfume of the girl, and looked at her full, red mouth.
All red, she seemed, and the smooth sheen of her skin was like the satin-stuffs that came from distant Yeelya. Flane grinned at her.
"Girl," he whispered, "you walk with death tonight!" and drew her with him out of the path of a thrown knife that clanked against a brick wall behind where they stood.
"Fall back!" a tall stranger cried to him, and Flane drew the girl and Vawdar with him into an alleyway.
"We have mounts beyond the Dragon Gate," she said hurriedly, stumbling along. "We came for Vawdar, knowing the rebellion that threatens his life."
Flane turned to Vawdar, seeing his face redden in the crimson light of the flambeau inset in the wall overhead.