One of the Karauna roared at us. His thirst quenched, he seemed delighted to see us slaving for him. Like a victorious conqueror, he thumped his chest with his fists, and bellowed quite a long narrative, which Nostril translated in a quaver:

“They have been so hotly pursued that they were near dead of thirst and starvation. They several times opened the veins of their horses to drink their blood for sustenance. But the horses got so weak that they desisted from that, but at last cut off and ate the horses’ ears. Ayee, mashallah, che arz konam? …” and he tailed off into another spate of praying.

The confusion also diminished, as the seven Karauna ceased to mill about the spring, and let their mistreated horses get to it, and came to where we had laid all our food around the fire. With bared teeth and guttural growls, they indicated that we should all stand aside, well out of range to interfere. The four of us backed away, and the Karauna fell slavering upon the provender, and in the next moment there was confusion confounded. Three more horses came plunging suddenly out of the darkness, bearing three howling riders swinging swords.

The Mongol patrol had returned! I might better say, the Mongols had all the while been lurking somewhere nearby, and not even I, the camp guard, had suspected it. They had known that we would be an irresistible bait to the Karauna, and simply had waited for the bandits to walk into the trap.

But the Karauna, although taken unawares and unmounted and with their attention fixed upon the food before them, neither surrendered on the instant nor fell before the flashing swords. Two or three of the dirty brown men magically turned bright red before our eyes, as blood spurted from the cuts given them by the Mongols. But they, like the not immediately wounded others, whipped out swords of their own.

The Mongols, having leapt in on horseback, could make only that one flailing slash before their mounts carried them a little way past the fray. Not turning their horses, they slid from their saddles to continue the fight on foot. But the Karauna, in their avidness to feed, had not tethered or hobbled or unsaddled their own mounts. They must have been mightily tempted to stand and fight, with the food all laid out for them, and they being seven against three. Probably only because they were weak with hunger—and knowing that three well-fed Mongols were their fighting equal—they bounded astride their pitiful horses and, beating their blades down on the swords of the Mongols now afoot, put spurs to their horses and surged out of the firelight in the direction from which they had dragged me.

The Mongols considerately hesitated long enough to glance around at us, and ascertain that we were not visibly injured, before they caught their own horses, vaulted to their saddles, and were off in hot pursuit. Everything had happened in such a furious tumult—from the moment I had been clouted to this sudden quiet fallen on the oasis—that it might have been a simùm desert storm that had swept down and embroiled us and swept on past.

“Gèsu … ,” my father breathed.

“Al-hamdo-lillah … ,” prayed Nostril.

“Where is the boy Aziz?” Uncle Mafio asked me.

“He is safe,” I said loudly, to be heard above the ringing still going on in my head. “He is in my tent.” And I gestured toward where the dust of the horses’ departure was hanging in the air.

As soon as he could get some clothes on, my uncle went running off in that direction. My father saw me rubbing my head, and came and felt of it. He remarked that I had a palpable knot there, and told Nostril to put a cup of water to heat.

Then my uncle came running back, out of the darkness, shouting, “Aziz is not there! His clothes are, but he is not!”

Leaving Nostril to bathe my head and bind a poultice of salve about it, my father and uncle went to beat the bushes for the boy. They did not find him. Nor did any of us, when Nostril and I joined them, and we did a methodical back-and-forth pacing of the entire oasis. Consulting together, we tried to reconstruct what must have happened.

“He would have left the tent. Even undressed and in this cold.”

“Yes, he would have known they would loot it soon or later.”

“So he sought a safer place to hide.”

“More likely he was creeping close, to see if he could aid us.”

“Anyway, he was in the open when the Karauna suddenly fled.”

“And they saw him and snatched him up and took him with them.”

“At the first opportunity, they will kill him.” It was Uncle Mafio who said that, and he said it in the voice of one bereaved. “They will kill him in some bestial manner, for they must be furious, thinking we arranged that ambuscade.”

“They may have no opportunity. The Mongols are close behind.”

“The Karauna will not kill the boy, but hold him hostage. A shield to ward off the Mongols.”

“And if the Mongols hold off, which they may not,” said my uncle, “think what the Karauna will be doing to that little boy.”

“Let us not weep until someone is hurt,” said my father. “But whatever the outcome, we must be there. Nostril, you stay. Mafio, Marco, mount up!”

We laid the sticks to our camels. Since we had never pressed them before, the beasts were so startled that they did not think to complain or balk, but went at a stretch-out gallop, and maintained it. The movement made my head seem to pound upon the neck-top of my spine with an excruciating beat, but I said nothing.

On sand, camels run faster than horses can, so we caught up to the Mongols well before dawn. We would eventually have met them in any case, as they were leisurely returning toward the oasis. The dry fog having settled to the ground by then, we saw them at some distance in the starlight. Two of them were walking and leading the horses, and supporting the third in his saddle, where he sagged and wobbled, being evidently badly hurt. The two called something to us as we approached, and waved their hands to indicate where they had come from.

“A miracle! The boy lives!” said my father, and lashed his camel harder.

We did not pause to speak to the Mongols, but kept on going, until we saw far off a scattering of dark, motionless shapes on the sand. They were the seven Karauna and their horses, all dead and much hacked and arrow-punctured, and some of the men lay separate from their severed sword hands. But we paid them no mind. Aziz was sitting on the sand, in a large puddle of blood from one of the fallen horses, his back propped against its saddle. He had covered his bare body with a blanket he must have pulled from the saddle pannier, and it was drenched with gore. We jumped off our camels before they had entirely knelt, and ran to him. Uncle Mafio, with tears pouring down his face, fondly rumpled the child’s hair, and my father patted him on the shoulder, and we all exclaimed in wonder and relief:

“You are all right!”

“Praise the good San Zudo of the Impossible!”

“What happened, dear Aziz?”

He said, his little bird voice even quieter than usual, “They passed me from one to another as we rode, so each could take a turn, and so they did not have to slow their pace.”

“And you are unhurt?” my uncle asked.

“I am cold,” Aziz said listlessly. Indeed, he was shivering violently under the threadbare old blanket.

Uncle Mafio persisted anxiously, “They did not—abuse you? Here?” He laid a hand on the blanket between the boy’s thighs.

“No, they did nothing like that. There was no time. And I think they were too hungry. And then the Mongols caught us up.” He puckered his pale face as if to cry. “I am so cold …”

“Yes, yes, lad,” said my father. “We will set you soon to rights. Marco, you stay by him and comfort him. Mafio, help me look about for dung to make a fire.”

I took off my aba and spread it over the boy for an extra cover, uncaring about the blood that soaked into it. But he did not hug the covers about him. He only sat where he was, against the sideways saddle, his little legs stuck out in front of him and his hands lying limp alongside. Hoping to cheer and enliven him, I said: