The evening after the Corridor of Death ordeal, the gathered Swordmasters sat in a large dining tent with the 43 surviving members of the original class of 150. These students were now treated as colleagues, finally awarded the respect and camaraderie of fighting men.

But at such a cost . . .

Rich, cold spice beer was served in tall mugs. Off-world hors d’oeuvres lay spread on porcelain dishes. The proud old instructors were congratulatory, wandering among the rugged trainees they had shaped for eight years. Duncan Idaho thought the students’ revelry carried a hysterical tinge. Some of the young men sat in shock, moving little, while others drank and ate with wild abandon.

In less than a week they would regroup at the main island’s administration building, where they still had to face a final round of oral examinations, a formal checking of the intellectual knowledge they had absorbed from the Swordmasters. But after the murderous obstacle course, answering a few questions seemed anticlimactic.

Released from their pent-up tension, Duncan and Resser drank too much. Over years of rigorous training, they had consumed only meager fare to toughen them up, and they had developed no tolerance for alcohol. The spice beer hit them hard.

Duncan found himself growing maudlin as he remembered the struggles, the pain, and all his fallen schoolmates. What a waste . . .

Resser reeled from his triumph, full of celebration. He knew his adoptive father had expected him to fail all along. After separating from his fellow Grumman students and refusing to quit his training, the redhead had won as many psychological battles as physical ones.

Long after the yellow moons had passed overhead, leaving a wake of sparkling stars, the party broke up. The students— bruised, scarred, and drunk— wandered off one at a time, forsaking further revelry to face battles with impending hangovers. Inside the main huts, dishes and glasses were broken; nothing remained to eat or drink.

Hiih Resser walked barefoot with Duncan into the island darkness. They wandered from the big house toward the cluster of lodging huts farther down the broad white beach, their steps uneven on the rough ground.

Duncan clapped a hand on his friend’s shoulder in a brotherly gesture, but also to help keep his balance. He couldn’t understand how the enormous Swordmaster Rivvy Dinari managed to walk with such grace.

“So, when all this is over, will you come with me to see Duke Leto?” Duncan formed his words carefully. “Remember, House Atreides would welcome two Swordmasters, if Moritani doesn’t want you.”

“House Moritani doesn’t want me, not after Trin Kronos and the others left the school,” Resser said. Duncan noted no tears in his friend’s eyes.

“Strange,” Duncan said. “They could have celebrated with us tonight, but they made their own choices.” The pair walked down the slope toward the beach. The sleeping huts seemed very far away, and blurry.

“But I still have to go back there, to face my family, to show them what I accomplished.”

“From what I know of Viscount Moritani, that sounds dangerous. Suicidal, even.”

“Nevertheless, I still have to do it.” In the shadows he turned to face Duncan, and his somber mood slipped away. “Afterward, I’ll come to see Duke Atreides.”

He and Duncan peered through the darkness, stumbling around as they tried to adjust their eyes. “Where are those huts?” They heard people ahead and a clank of weapons. Warning signals went off in Duncan’s fogged mind, but too slowly for him to react.

“Ah there, it’s Resser and Idaho.” A blazing light stabbed his eyes like luminous ice picks, and he raised his hand to shield against the glare. “Get them!”

Disoriented and surprised, Duncan and Resser bumped into each other as they turned to fight back. A group of unrecognizable, dark-clad warriors fell on them in an ambush, carrying weapons, sticks, clubs. Unarmed, Duncan called upon the skills Ginaz had taught him, defending himself next to his friend. At first he wondered if this was some kind of additional test, a last surprise the Swordmasters had sprung after lulling their students with the celebration.

Then he saw a blade, felt it slash a long shallow wound in his shoulder— and he no longer held back. Resser yelled, not in pain but in anger. Duncan spun with fists and feet, lashing out. He heard an arm crack, felt one of his toenails gouge open a sinewy throat.

But the mob of opponents pounded Duncan’s head and shoulders with stunsticks; one attacker struck the base of his skull with an old-fashioned club. With a grunt, Resser tumbled to the soft ground, and four men piled on top of him.

Drunk and maddeningly sluggish, Duncan tried to throw off his attackers to help his comrade, but they struck him at the temples with the stunsticks, flooding his mind with blackness. . . .

When he came to consciousness, struggling with a sour gag in his mouth, Duncan saw a seaskimmer beached nearby on the dark shore. Farther out, with no running lights, the shadowy hulk of a much larger boat bobbed in the waves. His captors threw him unceremoniously aboard the skimmer. The limp form of Hiih Resser tumbled beside him.

“Don’t try to get free of those shigawire bindings unless you want to lose your arms,” a deep voice growled in his ear. He felt the fiber biting into his skin.

Duncan ground his teeth, trying to chew through the gag. On the beach he saw pools of blood, weapons broken and discarded into the rising tide. The attackers carried the wrapped forms of eleven men, obviously dead, onto the narrow skimmer. So, he and Resser had fought well, like true Swordmasters. Perhaps they weren’t the only captives.

The shadowy men shoved Duncan into a crowded, stinking lower deck, where he bumped into other bound men on the floorboards, some of his comrades from class. In the darkness he saw fear and rage in their eyes; many were bruised and beaten, the worst injuries patched with rag bandages.

With only a faint groan, Resser awoke beside him. From the glint in his friend’s eyes, Duncan knew the redhead had assessed the situation, too. Thinking alike, they rolled together at the bottom of the skimmer, back to back. With numb fingers they worked carefully at each other’s bonds, trying to break free. One of the shadowy men uttered a curse and kicked them apart.

At the front of the skimmer, men spoke in low tones with heavy accents. Grumman accents. Resser continued to struggle against his bonds, and one of the men kicked him again. The motor started, a low purr, and the small craft got under way, heading out into the waves.

Farther out at sea, the ominous dark boat waited for them.