Now in Arabia there was no archer more skilful than Rabyah, and he bent his bow against the pursuers; and with his first shaft he pierced the throat of a son of Sulaim, so that the horseman died upon his horse, and with his second he nailed the thigh of another to the ribs of his animal, and with a third he shattered the sword-arm of the strongest Sulaimite; and seeing that it was Rabyah, the men of Sulaim fled from his archery; and he drove them back yet farther, sending his arrows humming like Djinns behind them. And when he had thus kept them back a good while, he turned and rode after the women again.
Then the men of Sulaim rode furiously in pursuit of him, and shot arrows after him in vain. For though all the black horses strove until they were sweating like well-filled water-skins in the great heat, only Nubaishah's stallion could follow after Rabyah's gray mare; and the gray mare's skin remained dry.
And so soon as Rabyah—after having urged on the toiling camels of the women still faster—turned once more and laid an arrow across his bow, the drum-beat of pursuing hoofs broke up into a sound of scraping and of stumbling, while the men of Sulaim scattered and drew back in dismay. And many times Rabyah thus checked them. Only Nubaishah, the son of Habib, ever sat firm upon his black stallion and faced the humming shaft, and dexterously avoided it or turned it from him with marvelous surety of eye and trueness of hand.
So, fleeing and turning, halting and proceeding, pursuers and pursued ever drew nearer to the jagged teeth of the western hills; and in the black-toothed line of them appeared the bright gap of the Pass of Ghazal, ever widening and brightening as they rode. And now the great stones upon the way made long black shadows over the plain; for the sun was setting before them. So they rode into the edge of the shadow of the hills, and Rabyah turned to make a last stand, and the pounding of the pursuing hoofs became a shuffling once again as the band of Sulaim drew rein in a cloud of dust. But now in Rabyah's quiver there were no more shafts.
Then Oumm Saiyar cried out to him from afar off: 'Sword and spear, son! Sword and spear for the women of the Beni-Firaz! Give them sword and spear for thy mother's sake, for thine own Raytah, who waiteth in the tent.'
And again and again did Rabyah charge them with spear and sword, scattering them even as a hawk scattereth quails. Only Nubaishah, the son of Habib, fled not, but yielded way cunningly to let him pass, and always thereafter circled menacing about him, like a vulture sweeping close to the sand.
And it happened at last that as Rabyah bore down upon a man of Sulaim, Nubaishah suddenly circled by him rapidly as a whirling wind, and thrust with his lance as he whirled, and the lance-blade burst its way through Rabyah's shirt of Persian mail and into his entrails.
And Nubaishah laughed, and drew back the blade of his wet spear between his stallion's ears, and smelled the odor of the blood upon it, and shouted, 'Thou hast thy death-wound, O Rabyah!' For never had swarthy Nubaishah lifted his spear against a man to slay him and failed in his purpose—so keen his eye, so subtle his hand.
But Rabyah, seeking to deceive him for the women's sake, shouted back with all the deep power of his voice, 'Thou liest in thy throat, Nubaishah!'
And Nubaishah laughed again, and shook his head in scorn, and circled away among his men.