"We are being watched. Don't hesitate. Just keep moving." Shura said in a low voice. She was leading the way with Ethan close behind her. The message was instantly relayed to those at the back.

 

The forest path they had taken now was wider. The dense undergrowth had made way for short, sturdy grass and small, thorny plants. As Ethan and Shura rode close together, they kept talking in a low voice. Ethan had been the one asking questions.

 

"Who could attack us here?"

 

"The Sarohans. We are inside their territory anyway. They can come charging at us any time now."

 

"I remember you saying that you know them. Why would they attack you, then?"

 

"Have you already forgotten about those boulders? We have already been attacked once!"

 

"So you think that was intentional! But why would they try to kill a friend, too?"

 

Shura laughed. "Ethan, they have defence systems which are activated automatically. I'm one of the Cereb Guards now, a personal aide of the Priestess of Sun. My Mark of Identity is a proof of that. It doesn't matter to a machine that these people have been my friend and saviour once. Unless we meet real people we'll be under constant surveillance."

 

Ethan nodded. He now understood what Shura meant to say. "What happened back then?" He asked.

 

"That's a long story. I can only tell you that I was hiding from the Guards after my parents were sentenced to death. How I came here I still don't know. I was a small child then and they took pity on me. But the Cerebs demanded that I  would be handed over to them. It was Juran who happened to be here then and took me secretly to Nana. She accepted me as one of her personal guards and gave me her Mark of Identity. Between them, they saved my life and a lot of unnecessary troubles for the Sarohans." Shura laughed sarcastically as she finished her brief narration.

 

'A small child with both her parents gone, running and hiding to save her life! How much  she had to suffer!' Ethan thought bitterly. 'Guess I shouldn't talk about it anymore.'

 

Guided by Kite, the four of them rode silently through the forest.

 

***********************************************

 

"Has your dog run away?" Astor asked Juran.

 

"May be he has gone searching for some prey." Juran said. "These Sarohan dogs like to hunt anyway."

 

He had already noticed that Kite had slipped away as soon as they had started on their journey through the forest. But He had kept silent about it. By now he firmly believed that Shura had arrived there and that only meant that his other friends were with her, too. Astor had told him about the battle outside the wall of Rucco and he had known that it couldn't be anyone else but Shura who had helped his friends. 'She has trained herself pretty well in all these years!' He thought.

 

However, he didn't feel the need of telling anything about it to Astor or anyone else. 'Let them arrive here first. Then we'll see.' He said to himself.

 

The night was slowly coming to its end. These two hours between the night and the dawn were the darkest as even the moon had gone down now behind the mountains. The forest looked like a solid mass of darkness, making it almost impossible to navigate through it.

 

The Sarohans knew their way through the forest even in complete darkness, but it was impossible for Juran and his companions, and they took the help of the small illuminating discs similar to those Liz had brought with her. The soft yellow light surrounded the travellers as they moved slowly through the forest.

 

A few miles from the village the land suddenly sloped down into a deep gorge. A river ran through the mountains there. From the edge of the steep bank it looked like a smoky white ribbon that lay there miles below the feet of the traveller who stood on the edge and peered into the green abyss below. It was a mesmerizing sight during the day, but at this moonless hour before dawn it just looked like the open mouth of a cavernous pit ready to swallow them all.

 

Lucen and his men had been walking in front of the six horsemen who led their mounts slowly through the dark forest all this time. Now the Sarohans stopped in their tracks and the horsemen, too, came to a standstill. "We have reached the river," Juran said to Astor.

 

Lucen, who had been leading the way, called out to others. "We'll wait here till it's light!" He said loudly so that the men who brought the rear could hear him clearly.

 

"Why do we have to wait till dawn?" Astor asked Juran.

 

"There's a narrow pool over this gorge which will take us to the other side where the Sarohan village is," Juran said. "But it's impossible for us to cross that pool with our horses in this darkness. That's why they have decided to wait here till it's light." He explained to Astor.

 

They men got off their rides. The horses needed some rest, too. The area near the edge of the forest was an open grassland with only a few bushes here and there. The men sat on the grass. Some lay on it and tried to take a short nap. Astor was standing by Juran's side. He clearly looked uncomfortable.

 

"What's happened?" Juran asked.

 

"I have a sense that something is about to happen," Astor said uneasily.

 

A huge animal had suddenly appeared in front of them. It seemed as if it came up the abysmal pit in front of them and charged at them fiercely. It looked like a beast from hell made purely of sulphur fire. In an instant, the whole place illuminated in an eerie glow.

 

The Gloam opened its massive jaw and the silence of night fell apart with its deafening roar. From its mouth a stream of fire spread like molten lava and in an instant the ground in front of it acquired the look of a charred coal bed. The Sarohans at the front row immediately fell back while Juran and Astor moved forward to stand by Lucen.

All three men were battle-hardened fighters. They knew  instantly that they were in a grave situation. 

"I'll try to distract it!" Astor said as he cracked his whip. Like a large snake it sprang and coiled around the Gloam's throat. The hellish beast raised his head to the sky and with its front paw tried to tear the whip away. At the same time Juran threw his spear at it. Like a flash of lightening the spear hit the beast, creating a gaping dark wound in its sulphur-yellow chest. The monstrous beast hollered in pain and tore Astor's whip in two. But before it could attack again, Lucen struck the ground in front of it with the stick in his hand and the ground cracked open, creating a huge crater which swallowed the beast completely.

As they men stood there spellbound, the mouth of the crater moved on its on and in a second it closed again. Only the rough terrain lay there in front of them, making it look like the aftermath of a devastating earthquake. But before the men could rejoice, two more Gloams jumped out of the darkness in front of them. Unlike the previous one, they were made out of solid darkness. Only their yellow eyes burned in their dark eyesockets.

Juran and Astor looked at each other. 

"My best weapon is gone!" Astor said with a bitter half-smile. 

"Mine, too!" Juran said.

The two men drew their swords and prepared to fight.