"So it is not your fault?" she said.

Could she understand?

"A matter of perspective," he responded. "Something for the philosophers among your guild."

He looked back along the tunnel, feeling urgency take hold again, and resumed his flight. Wynn tried to keep up with him now.

"You could put me up the next grate," she suggested between panting breaths. "Please, Chane, let me go."

"Toret, or even Sapphire, may still try to catch up," he answered, "It is too dangerous yet."

"But you said if Toret finds you, you must obey him." When he did not answer her, she cried out, "If you are a killer, then why are you protecting me?"

Chane pulled her faster through the filthy water.

"Because your life is not wasted in mindless drudgery," he growled, as if the answer were all too obvious. "Most mortals are little more than cattle, and their loss affects nothing."

She jerked back, surprising him enough that he almost stopped.

"You saved me because I'm a sage?" she asked. "Because my head is full of knowledge you find useful?"

"Of course," he responded.

But this was a half-truth, and the rest was not appropriate for the time or place. When he looked back again, the tunnel was not empty. A light flickered in the distance.

"A torch," Wynn said. "Would Sapphire or Toret carry a torch?"

"No," he replied.

"Then it is either Magiere or Leesil, or both. Release me and flee."

Chane glanced at Wynn.

He could let her go, and that might slow the dhampir or the half-elf for a short while. But they would not turn back now, even if they found Wynn safe and unharmed. It had not occurred to him to use Wynn as a tool or a hostage, but such a ruse might soon be necessary.

Chane pulled Wynn after him until he reached an intersection where the tunnel connected with a wider passage. It looked to be one of the main flow routes down to the bay with elevated stone walkways along its sides. At one far corner was an iron ladder mounted into the stone that led up a vertical shaft. It likely led to a grate in one of the city's streets. Chane lifted Wynn onto the walkway to the left of where they had come out and stepped up beside her.

"Be silent," he said. "And put the crystal out of sight."

"Chane, do not do this," she urged.

He shot her a glare and held up the long sword between them. Wynn cowered back against the wall and tucked the crystal into her pocket. Chane settled in front of her near the corner, watching the far wall of the tunnel they'd come down for reflections of light that would tell him the pursuer drew near.

So far, this dhampir had proved less than effective in his scheme to destroy Toret. He was through with schemes.

Toret dropped out of the cellar's passage and down into the sewer tunnel. He looked both ways through the dark but couldn't detect any sign of Sapphire. She had a good start, and he now had a decision to make.

He could head toward the poor districts of the outer ring or closer to the exits to the bay. But which way had Sapphire taken? He'd told her to head for the sea, but she could be… unpredictable.

As her maker, he could sense her presence for a limited distance. His powers had never developed like Teesha's or Rashed's, but he could almost "feel" where Sapphire was if he focused.

Toret closed his eyes, pictured Sapphire-and felt nothing.

Sapphire wouldn't head toward the poor side. She liked the rich districts after nightfall. He'd hoped she might try for somewhere with fewer people out and about. Perhaps the middle merchant district, where most shops would be closed for the night. He turned south along the tunnel.

Wading through mucky water slowed his progress, but with Sapphire's blue velvet gown soaked, it would slow her as well. He traveled more quickly than she would, and yet neither saw nor sensed her. Perhaps he'd chosen the wrong way? Was she foolish enough to head upslope to the inner ring?

When he turned about to reconsider, there was torchlight down the tunnel behind him.

Sapphire wasn't carrying a torch.

Had the hound led the half-blood to the cellar? That beast had tracked Rashed straight to the warehouse back in Miiska. It made sickening sense. He tensed, caught between fear and anger.

Leesil, with his cursed luck, was onto him.

Toret fled along the tunnel, searching for a place to lie in wait. If he was to escape this time, he had to make sure no one could track him again.

He would see that hound rot with the refuse beneath the city.

Chap jumped from Toret's cellar and landed with a splash in the center of the sewer.

"Which way?" Leesil asked.

The hound growled and headed southward against the flow of water. Leesil hopped down, the stench assaulting his nose. Beneath the smell of waste was the distinct odor of brine. He shifted the sack with Sapphire's head to the back of his belt, and quickly followed Chap.

Ratboy wouldn't leave this city-at least not in one piece.

The fine white hairs on Leesil's neck prickled with the strange sensation of being watched. He looked behind, holding the torch out. The light revealed only dank walls and slow-running water. He tried putting the torch behind himself, so his half-elven eyes could sift more easily through the shadows, but he saw nothing.

Chap waded onward, and Leesil followed again, each passing moment a sharp edge sliding across his nerves.

And still they moved on, approaching numerous intersecting tunnels. Each time, he called Chap back long enough to check them carefully. When the way was clear, he let Chap lead again, watching to see if the hound turned. But the dog continued straight south, even at the occasional wider flow ways leading down toward the bay.

After a while, Leesil wondered if Chap truly followed a trail. Magiere's topaz, hanging about his neck, glowed with only a dim aura. There was an undead down here, but they weren't gaining any ground. How could Chap track Ratboy through running water?

Ahead, the tunnel floor slanted sharply upward beyond a wide archway. As he came closer, he spotted a line of jagged points along the opening's top edge and a matching archway at the top of the slope. Raised stone walkways lined both sides of the rise, and Leesil could hear the continuous splash of running water from somewhere above. Chap passed through, working his way up, and a yellow shimmer reflected off the dank walls around Leesil. He looked down.

The topaz brightened right before his eyes.

"Chap, come back!" Leesil called.

A rattle of chains echoed down the rising passage, and the archway's spikes descended rapidly toward Leesil's head. He lurched back in reflex.

Leesil thought he glimpsed a flickering shape roll under the iron gate's edge just before it splashed into the water, and then a spray of salt water made him shield his face. Up-slope, Chap broke into battle cry, and the eerie wail echoed through the sewers.

Holding his torch high, Leesil peered through the gate up the passage. Past the upper archway, the floor leveled off out of sight in a large, round chamber. He couldn't see if there were other entrances or passages leading into it. Chap's snarl sounded from above, but the hound was beyond view over the slope's top lip.

A familiar voice echoed down to him.

"Too bad the gate missed you." Ratboy's high-pitched laugh rolled along the walls. "But now you get to watch me slaughter your beast, and you'll never track us again."

"Chap, come back to the gate!" Leesil shouted, but he already heard the splashing of feet in shallow water and knew Ratboy was closing.

Chap was a born tracker and fighter, like the bear hounds of the Warlands, bred by petty lords and tyrants for hunting mountain bears. Those hounds would go to any length to track their prey and threw themselves headlong into battle if not controlled. Many died on their first hunt. Chap was even more willful than those mere beasts.