HE TURNED AROUND AND walked back to the native, reached down and shook it.
“Snap out of it,” he ordered.
He expected pleading, cowering, terror, but there was none.
Sipar got swiftly to its feet and stood looking at him and there was, he thought, an odd glitter in its eyes.
“Get going,” Duncan said. “We still have a little time. Start circling and pick up the trail. I will cover you.”
He glanced at the sun. An hour and a half still left—maybe as much as two. There might still be time to get this buttoned up before the fall of night.
A half mile beyond the knoll, Sipar picked up the trail again and they went ahead, but now they traveled more cautiously, for any bush, any rock, any clump of grass might conceal the wounded beast.
Duncan found himself on edge and cursed himself savagely
