The horse and rider and the dogs swept toward the group standing on the hilltop and passed over them. There was no way to see the features of the man, the horse, or the dogs, for they all were black, like silhouetted shadows moving across the sky. The hoofbeats pounded so hard that they seemed to raise echoes among the hills, and the baying was a torrent of sound that engulfed them as they stood there. The rider raised the horn to his mouth and blew a single blast that seemed to fill the sky, and then the rider and his pack were gone. They disappeared over the southern tree line, and the sound gradually diminished with the distance until nothing could be heard, although it seemed to Duncan that he still heard the ringing of the hoofs long after the sound of them had gone.

Nan came tumbling out of the sky and landed beside Duncan. She skipped a step or two to gain her balance, stood in front of him, and craned her head upward. She was jigging in excitement.

"Do you know who that was?" she asked.

"No I don't. Do you?"

"That was the Wild Huntsman," she screeched. "I saw him once, years ago. In Germany. That was when I was young and before I settled down. The Wild Huntsman and his hounds."

Meg had slipped off Beauty and was tottering toward them.

"He always was in Germany," she said. "He never was anywhere else. That proves what I've been telling you about all these things of evil gathering with the Harriers."

"Was he looking for us?" asked Conrad.

"I doubt it," said Meg. "He's not really hunting anyone or anything. He just rides the skies. He whoops and hollers and blows that horn of his and his dogs make such a racket they scare you half to death. But he doesn't mean anything by it. That's just the way he is."

"Who is he?" Duncan asked.

"No one knows," said Nan. "His name has been forgotten. He's been riding the skies so long there's no one who remembers."

Snoopy came scuttling down from the ridgetop.

"Let's get moving," he said. "It's just a little farther. We'll be there by first light."

"Where are you taking us?" asked Duncan. "We have a right to know."

"I'm taking you to where you should have been all the time. Back to the strand."

"But that, or just short of there, is where we ran into enchantment. They'll be waiting there for us."

"Not now," said Snoopy. "There's no one there right now. You'll be safe. They would not think that you would come back."

Ghost jiggled in the fading moonlight, just above their heads.

"That is right," he said. "All the blessed day not a sign of anyone at all. I'd say the way was clear."

"We'll have to rest," said Duncan, "before we try the strand. All of us are practically dead upon our feet from loss of sleep."

"Andrew's getting sleep," said Conrad.

"He's the only one of us," said Duncan. "He'll pay for it. When we get there he'll stand guard while the rest of us get some rest."

14

• The slimy monster hurled itself out of the swamp, scaly, triangular, horned head, with fringed jaws and darting snakelike tongue, mounted on a barrel-sized snakelike body, towering above him, while he stood thigh-deep in water, the muck of the marsh sucking at his feet, anchoring him so he could not get away, but had to stand and face the monster. He bawled at the monster in anger and revulsion as it hung above him, hissing, dominating him, sure of him, taking its time, not in any hurry, hanging there like a stroke of certain doom while he waited with his toothpick of a sword—good steel, sharp and deadly and well fitted to his fist, but so small a weapon that it seemed unlikely it could inflict more than a scratch upon this scaly monstrosity that eventually would pick its time to strike.-

• The swamp was silent except for the hissing of the monster and the slow drip of water from its shining hide. It had a strange unearthliness, as if not entirely of the earth nor quite yet of some other place—a moment and a space poised on some freakish borderline between reality and unreality. Tendrils of trailing fog roiled above the black and stagnant water—black molasses water, too thick to be actual water, but a devilish brew that reeked and stank of foul decay. The trees that grew out of the water were leprous, their gray and scaling trunks bearing the mark of an unknown and loathsome ailment with which the entire world on the other side of the borderline might be afflicted.-

• Then the head came crushing down with the body following, arcing and coiling and striking him as if some giant fist had descended on him, brushing aside his sword-arm, buckling his knees, throwing its smooth and muscular loops about his body, enfolding him in its strength, driving the breath out of his lungs, crushing his ribs, dislocating his shoulders, folding him in upon himself and a voice bawling, "Be careful of that dog. Tie him tight, but don't put a mark upon him. He's worth more than all of you together. If he be so much as bruised, I'll hang the man who does it by his thumbs."-

There was sand in Duncan's mouth—sand, not water—and hands that held him, not the great snake body. He struggled, trying to lash out with arms and legs, but the hands held him so tightly that he could accomplish nothing. There was a knee thrust into the small of his back and another pressing on his shoulders. His face was pressed hard against the ground. His eyes came open and he saw a dead and fallen leaf, with an insect crawling slowly on it, fighting its way across its smooth and slippery surface.

"Tie that big one tight," said the bawling voice. And then, "That horse. Watch out. He'll kick the guts out of you."

Somewhere Tiny was growling fiercely, somewhere Daniel was fighting off, or trying to fight off, his captors. And from all around came thumping sounds and the grunts of struggling men.

Duncan felt heavy cords cutting harshly into his wrists, and then someone jerked him up and flipped him over. He lay on his back and stared up at the sky. At the periphery of his vision he saw the figures of uncouth men looming over him. From somewhere far off came an eerie keening.

He fought his body erect, pushing with hands lashed behind his back to lever himself upright, till he was sitting flat upon his rump with his bound feet thrust out straight before him.

A few feet away lay Conrad, trussed up like a Christmas goose, but still struggling to break free.

"Once I get my hands on you," Conrad roared at the men who had just stepped away from him, "I'll rip your livers out."

"Friend Conrad," said one of the men, "I extremely doubt you shall have that chance."

There was something about the man that seemed familiar to Duncan, but his head was half turned away and he could not be sure. Then the man shifted slightly and he saw that it was Harold, the Reaver.

Duncan's mind struggled to grasp reality. But it was difficult to grasp reality, for the transition had been too swift. He had been dreaming—yes, that must be it, he had been dreaming—of confronting a snakelike monster that had lunged out of a swamp, the dream more than likely touched off by the similar monster he had seen emerging from the inky pool in the enchantment swamp. And then, suddenly, he had not been dreaming any longer, but was being caught and tied by this vicious, ragamuffin crew.

He glanced around him, trying to take in the situation at a glance. Andrew was tied to a small tree, his hands roped against the tree, other ropes about his middle. There was no sign of Meg, although she must be somewhere, and no sign of Daniel either, but the patient little Beauty stood hitched to another tree, a heavy rope looped, halterlike, about her head and neck. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Tiny, his four feet tied together, his jaws held shut by loops of cord pulled tightly about them. Tiny was struggling fiercely, throwing himself about, but there seemed little possibility the dog could fight his way to freedom. Conrad still lay a few feet away, looking more than ever like a Christmas goose ready for the oven.