She barely whispered, "The Radak guards just now are changing. There is no one outside. We go, quickly."
"Go where?" Shorty demanded.
"To my husband, Taro. He is in a corridor near here. Come now, quickly."
The faintly red corridor outside was empty. Swiftly Tahn led us along it, around several sharp bends, past a cross-corridor intersection. I was tense, expecting every moment that Radaks would leap upon us from the shadows. But so far we had escaped notice, though obviously there were many Radaks near here. Several times we passed the dim oval openings of little grottos, and often there were guttural, chattering voices from within them.
"Won't the guards discover we're gone?" Shorty murmured.
"Perhaps not for maybe much time. I am in charge of you, I bring you food and drink. The guards stay outside, should you try to break out."
Our tunnel was descending now. And suddenly from the dimness to one side, there came a murmur: "Tahn! Tahn—"
A young Lei man was crouching in a shadowed recess. It was Tahn's husband, Taro.
"She has brought you, Earthmen. That is good."
We crouched down with him. He was a youngish fellow, tall, slim and powerfully built. His single draped garment exposed one bronze shoulder. His grey-black hair was chopped at the base of his neck, with a narrow band of bright-colored fabric tied around his forehead. With his high-cheek bones, hawk-like nose and gleaming dark eyes he could have been a stalwart young savage of Earth.