But the tyrannosaurs killed and killed and killed again. Duckbills and horned triceratops and countless others were slashed apart by those ferocious claws and teeth.
Anya said, quite clinically, “The humanoids must have brought the tyrannosaurs here to wait in ambush for the migration.”
I felt anger, hot rage at the senseless slaughter taking place below us.
“Let’s find some of those humanoids,” I said, stalking off along the ridge line, my spear gripped tightly in my right hand.
Anya trotted along behind me, with Juno following her but clearly not liking the direction in which we were heading. The baby dinosaur made sounds remarkably like whining.
“Orion, what are you thinking of…?”
Grimly I replied, “One thing I’ve learned in the lives I’ve led—hurt your enemy whenever and however you can. Set wants to kill these dinosaurs? Then I’m going to do my best to stop the slaughter.”
She followed me in silence as we climbed higher along the rocky crest line, but Juno kept whimpering.
“Stay here with her,” I told Anya. “She’s terrified, and her mewling will warn the humanoids.”
“We’ll follow you from below the ridge line,” Anya said. “If she can’t see the slaughter, perhaps she’ll settle down.”
She and the duckbill scrambled down the rocky slope a hundred yards or so. I could see them paralleling my path as I made my way toward the area where I thought the humanoids would be. I hunched over so deeply that my left hand was knuckling the ground like a gorilla.
I saw one of Set’s minions within a few minutes, lying belly down on the sun-warmed rocks, watching intently the screaming, screeching battle going on below. I gave him no warning, drove my spear into his back so hard that it splintered on the rock underneath him. He made a hissing sound and thrashed for a moment like a fish. Then he went still.
I felt for a pulse and found none. Brownish red blood seeped from under him. I flattened out on the rock beside his corpse and peered down into the valley. It was difficult to make out details now because of the billows of dust wafting up, but I saw one tyrannosaur standing upright, blinking its hideous red eyes. It had stopped killing. As I watched, it bent over the gory body of a triceratops and began feeding, tearing great chunks of meat from its heavy body.
The other tyrants were still ravaging through the herbivores, still under mental control of Set’s troops. I got to my feet and moved onward.
My spear was blunted and split. Anya clambered up to me and gave me hers. I hesitated, then took it. She kept mine. She could use it as a club if she had to.
Two more humanoids were sitting in a cleft between boulders, their attention focused on the carnage below. It must take all their concentration to control the tyrannosaurs in the midst of such frenzy, I realized. They were virtually deaf and blind to the world around them.
Still I approached them cautiously, coming up from behind. I dashed the last few yards and rammed my spear straight through one of them. He shrieked like a steam whistle as he died. The other leaped to his feet and turned to meet me, but far too slowly as my senses went into hyperdrive.
I saw him turning, saw his red slitted eyes glittering, his mouth opening in what might have been anger or surprise or sudden fear. His clawed hands were empty, weaponless. With all my weight and strength I planted a kick on his chest that crushed bones. He went over backward, tumbling down the steep rocky wall and landing almost at the feet of a suddenly befuddled tyrannosaur.
The great beast, released from its mental control, snatched at its former master and tore the humanoid’s body in two with one crunch of its deadly teeth.
I squatted on my haunches and looked for the tyrant that the other humanoid had been controlling. That one, there, blinking with confusion at the mayhem surrounding it. I closed my eyes briefly. When I opened them, I was standing more than thirty feet above the blood-soaked valley floor, blinking at the dust swirling around me. Bloodlust blazed through me, overpowering the dull ache of hunger that gnawed at my innards.