"Jerran! Jerran, you scuttling mouse, where are you?"
Bang went a musket.
"Here, Revel!" The little straw-colored man popped out of a bush in his path. He bent as Nirea had, gave the rebel a hand up behind him. Then he swerved the horse and went off through the oaks, while the gentry cursed and raved and came after as best they could.
"Discomfortable riding, this, without pants. Ouch! Where shall we head, ancient one?" Revel asked grimly.
"The way we're going. There, see that hill? Up and over that, and we're on a straight path for the forests of Kamden."
Revel was jolted nearly out of his battered hide by the unfamiliar jounce and rock of the steed; but he knew he could stick on it till night if he had to. The only enemies that fretted him now were the golden spheres. You could not distance a god simply by mounting a horse.
"Look up," he said, watching the path. "Are there gods?"
"Yes, but high, following us. They mark our way."
"Let them! Jerran, at nightfall we head for the mine. Our mine, and our cavern."
"You can't go there, you drooling baby, you'd find an army of globes, priests, gentry, and zanphs. They'll be crawling all over the things in that cave, especially after you took guns from it! What is it that draws you there?"