I returned to Pharaoh Nanjulian and woke him up. He was sound asleep when I touched him, but started to his feet as soon as I laid my hand on his shoulder.
“What is it, master?” he asked, scanning my face narrowly, as if he saw some sign of disturbance there. “You look alarmed.”
“I have seen a man watching us.”
“What kind of a man? Where has he gone?”
“Nay, that I know not. When I opened my eyes just now they fell full upon him. He stood behind that rock, peering over it at me. I saw naught of him but his head, and that was hidden in a black cowl with eye-slits, through which his eyes gleamed like fire.”
Pharaoh shook his head.
“’Tis a Familiar,” said he. “One of those accursed fanatics, master, that dog and pry after honest men like sleuth-hounds, and leave them not until the flame licks their bodies. This is bad news, i’ faith. Which way went he?”
I told him that I thought I had seen a black robe vanishing among the trees below, but could not be certain. At that he seized his staff and went down the slope himself, examining all the likely places in which a man might have concealed himself. But he found naught, and so came back to me, shaking his head.
“You are sure you were not dreaming?” he asked. “Men dream of strange things when hunger is on them.”