Behind the little Chinese, Eric Nelson heard the rattle of the ponies' hoofs on stones and Lefty Wister cursing steadily.
"Cursed native mumbo-jumbo, that's all!" swore Nick Sloan. "Are we going to stand here all night?"
Nelson laid a hand on the other's sleeve. "Wait, Sloan. Shan Kar seems to know what he's doing."
Again a wolf howled, this time a lonely wailing single cry, echoing away, infinitely pregnant with menace.
Shan Kar finally broke his taut immobility, leaping to his feet and jerking the platinum circlet from his head.
"I have talked with my people in Anshan. They warn that a force of the Brotherhood is on its way to cut us off inside the pass, and that their own warriors can't reach us in time to help!"
Talked? Talked how, Nelson wondered swiftly? Had mind somehow spoken to distant mind through the agency of the platinum crown? But how could a people who were desperate to obtain the ordinary weapons of the outer world possess such a super-scientific instrument as that implied?
Shan Kar was continuing urgently. "We must get up through the pass and into L'Lan before they block us! All depends on that!"
Nelson shared the bafflement of the others. In this outlandish situation, they couldn't estimate the true magnitude of perils.
"How many men have the Brotherhood, your enemies, sent out to cut us off?" he demanded.