Rhodes said, "Watch the Book," and flung it to one side. They had come out into the daylight on the high limestone crag which jutted above the desert floor and Rhodes as yet could see no more than shadows against the fierce sun. The shadows came apart and one went toward Haazahri and the Book, and the other toward Rhodes. Tears sprang from Rhodes' eyes in the effort to see. Neither man was armed. It seemed right, somehow, that they battle for the Book which had been born with the birth of a civilization, with their bare hands.
Then he was closing with Felg and heard Haazahri scream and knew the noise of their fighting would summon the guards, who would take the Book from him.
"My life!" screamed Felg hysterically. "You destroyed my life!"
The words meant much to Felg, but meant nothing to Rhodes. Felg was mad—and strong with the strength of madness.
He forced Rhodes slowly back, and back meant toward the edge of the precipice and Rhodes got a quick vision of it as he was spun around, the world down there, far down, the tiny sand-car gleaming in the sun and the long stretches of sand and far away the huddle of stone structures that was Haatok gleaming in the sun. And then, still being forced back, he saw Haazahri, sprawled on the sand before one of the three great columns of the ruins of Balata 'kai. Blood trickled from her mouth and she was not moving. Of The Book of the Dead and Gawroi he saw nothing.
Then his own madness matched and surpassed Felg's own. Haazahri, he thought, Haazahri. His hands found Felg's throat and held there a moment, but not long. He shifted them and got Felg's weight up and Felg screamed a thin sound in the high air and then he sent Felg's body hurtling down, the scream fading, over the precipice.
He did not wait to see it land, but ran to Haazahri. He touched her breast and she was warm, warm! her heart beating....
"Haazahri," he murmured.
Her eyelids fluttered. "Go after him! Quickly, for he has The Book. I'll follow."
He whirled and sprinted for the broken, ruined staircase on the side of the cliff. Down it he went, tumbling, falling, sliding from rock-ledge to rock-ledge. The staircase, what was left of it, turned and twisted, and he could not see Gawroi below him.