Zhilin said to him, "You may cut your feet, but you will save your life; but if you are caught they will kill you, which would be worse."
Kostuilin said nothing, but crept along, groaning. For a long time they went down the valley. Suddenly they hear dogs barking at the right. Zhilin halted, looked around, climbed up the bank, and felt about with his hands.
"Ekh!" says he, "we have made a mistake; we have gone too far to the right. Here is one of the enemy's villages. I could see it from the hill. We must go back to the left, up the mountain. There must be a forest there."
But Kostuilin objected. "Just wait a little while, let us get breath. My feet are all blood."
"Eh, brother! they will get well. You should walk more lightly. This way."
And Zhilin turned back toward the left, and up hill toward the forest.
Kostuilin kept halting and groaning. Zhilin tried to hush him up, and still hastened on.
They climbed the mountain. And there they found the forest. They entered it; their clothes were all torn to pieces on the thorns. They found a little path through the woods. They walked along it.
"Halt!"
There was the sound of hoofs on the path. They stopped to listen. It sounded like the tramping of a horse: then it also stopped. They set out once more; again the tramping hoofs. When they stopped, it stopped.