"Now we can go on," the wolf told them a minute later. "The Winged Ones have passed."
"What are they doing here?" Shan Kar asked harshly. "Going to watch Anshan," was the curt answer of Tark.
They rode on, veering to keep near the infrequent tree-clumps, until the solid wall of the forest loomed up before them.
The forest was like a dark maw gaping for them. The thought of the intelligent, hostile beasts that roamed its ways made it seem a black witch-wood to Nelson. He didn't want to go into it.
Neither did Lefty Wister. The Cockney's voice snarled in the dimness beside Nelson. "If that blasted wolf has got others waiting for us in there—"
It seemed pitch-dark beneath the trees at first. Then Nelson's eyes became more accustomed to the deeper obscurity. He looked up and saw tall trunks and graceful boughs against the stars, recognized the outlines of larch and cedar and fir.
The forest smelled dry. The rainless months had parched it so that each twig the horses stepped on snapped and broke. Tark was a darker shadow in the darkness, leading the way between the trees by occasional back-glances of luminous green eyes.
"Why don't we follow the river to Vruun?" Shan Kar demanded. "It would be the clearest way."
"To discovery," Tark's thought retorted harshly. "Quorr's clan are the greatest danger. The Clawed Ones roam those river-brakes by night."
Clawed Ones? He meant the tigers, Nelson realized. His skin crawled at the thought of meeting those striped killers here.