.

the top by sheer force. The others, scrambling up behind him, called out to him.

      ‘Do you see them?’

      ‘No,’ said Mumpo, standing on the ridge where the bandits had stood, looking west.

      One by one the others joined him, and understood why he had fallen silent. From the ridge to the far off western horizon the land was riven by a maze of deep cracks. Here and there the jagged fissures met, or crossed each other, in a crazy network that extended for miles. The cracks varied in depth, some no deeper than a man, some seeming bottomless. From the surface they all looked the same: shadowy slits without any distinctive markings, without any visible plant life, without the marks of human habitation. The bandits and their captives had vanished into the labyrinth leaving not even a trail of footsteps on the hard windswept plains.

      Bowman closed his eyes and turned his face to the west. He was tracking Kestrel by other means.

      ‘They’ve not gone far,’ he said. ‘They’re moving fast. But I can find them.’