The Auxiliary would continue its investigation while seeking out other threats, but they were going to have to be more flexible in their thinking to anticipate whatever else might lie on the horizon.

For Mongo, however, he only needed to concentrate on the task before him. He and Adom were to draw as much fire from Rio and Ellis as they could and that was exactly what brought them here to Bin Musa. There were reports of an ambush being set for them there, so the plan was for Mongo and Adom to spring the trap while Rio and Ellis were rerouted to the south.

To provoke the supposed ambushers, they were travelling down the main road through town. They were risking collateral damage among the civilian population, but the boss signed off on this plan. It was seen as more important to probe their enemies' resolve. How far were they willing to go? That would determine how far the Protectors would go to put a stop to them. It was a dangerous game to play, but it was necessary. That was what Mongo was told and that was enough for him.

There were a dozen black-clad gendarmes encircling them to keep the crowds at bay as they were escorted along the way. Unlike Rio, who travelled more inconspicuously, as the decoy it was Mongo and Adom's job to draw attention and so crowds like this were not uncommon for them. If Mongo had been a smaller man, getting caught up in the crush of so many people would have been more intimidating. He was thankful for Ellis' sake that he did not have to experience this.

The gendarmes would shout at the people to stay back, but their voices were drowned out by the cry of "Al-Walad al-Mawida! Al-Walad al-Mawida!"

The Protectors had of course been briefed on the countries they would be passing through on the Warrior's Road, but Mongo never did have much of a head for minute details, so he could not remember the exact numbers. He did know that Libni had a relatively high percentage of Ahorazedis in the population. All throughout the Magreb, the numbers were usually somewhere between 30 and 40 percent. Murabit and Feniki stood out in his mind for being notably higher and lower respectively. Of course, you did not have to be Ahorazedi to believe in the Prophecy or at least be drawn to the curiosity of an event like this, and so the crowd actually represented a broad cross-section of the local populace.

Adom politely waved to the crowd like some visiting dignitary, all while the circle closed in on him and Mongo. Eager hands reached past the gendarmes in a bid to touch the Child. A woman managed to squeeze past the gendarmes, losing her balance as she broke through and falling to the ground. Although she looked like an entirely normal civilian, that did not mean she was harmless. Mongo moved in to intervene, but Adom raised his hand for him to stop. Likewise, he did the same to stop one of the gendarmes from dragging her away.

He then stooped down in front of the woman and reached out to touch her cheek. It was a small gesture, but it was enough to overwhelm the woman with emotion so that she burst into tears. It reminded Mongo of when one of his sisters would go to his mother and cry in her arms, the sort of release you can only have when you find your rock of comfort. It was a touching act of compassion on Adom's part, only Mongo knew it was not really compassion at all. It was only part of his mimicry. He did not feel emotions like normal people did. All he could do was observe and emulate as part of his disguise. This was the sort of thing that he thought would be suited to the idea of the Child of Promise, so that was what he did.

Adom helped the woman to her feet and guided her to be swallowed back up into the crowd, then they continued on their way. After this little display, the crowd pressed more eagerly against the circle of gendarmes as they continued on their way. Perhaps it was because of the crowd's fervor that the ambush they were expecting never came.

Rio wanted to be annoyed at him, but they had already put in a full day's walk and she had never succeeded in pushing him more than about 37 or 38 kilometers in a day, which would not be enough to get them to the next town. A little more time making progress while backup caught up with them would have been nice, but it seemed to be asking for too much.

Their timing was just right. It was late enough that they missed the evening rush of people getting some shopping done after work or grabbing a meal on their way home but not so late that vendors were starting to close up. The idea was to grab and go, so that precluded vendors selling things like soup. While there were plenty of stalls and booths, there were also sit-down restaurants that would have takeout windows catering to customers on the move. One in particular happened to catch Rio's eye, or perhaps more accurately her nose, which was no mean feat in the bazaar that was awash in all manner of rather strong aromas.

The main thing this place was selling through its takeout window was sfiha meat pies. Rio had seen sfiha made in a range of sizes, but these were on the smaller side, so she got a dozen. If there were any left over, they could always be saved for breakfast, even if they might be a little dodgy by then.

She gave the bag of sfiha to Ellis and told him, "Here. Don't burn your mouth now."

Taking a bite of one, Ellis said, "You're right about that. I don't even like mutton that much."

Ellis shuddered at the thought. He should have counted himself lucky. He just had the initiate's weeklong course. The advanced course was six months out in the wilds. If you could get through that, you could get through just about anything.

When Rio bought the sfiha, she asked the vendor about a cheap place to stay and was directed to a three-story hotel with an open-air atrium for the main lobby. There was just enough of an overhang to cover the front desk. It was probably hell on the staff if they had to be there during the heat of the day. Maybe that was why check-in usually did not start until later in the afternoon.

Rio went up to the front desk and asked the clerk, "You got any vacancies?"

Fortunately, Libni was part of a nine-nation economic union that shared a common currency, so Rio did not have to worry about exchanging her petty cash every time she crossed the border. Of course, the Auxiliary would take care of that for her, but it was one fewer logistical hurdle to consider. She had heard that up in Iona, most of the countries had gone entirely electronic or at least nearly so, but here in the Magreb you would be lucky to find a 50-50 split. Outside major chains, most smaller vendors only took cash. Either system had its merits and demerits, Rio knew, but in terms of sheer convenience, just being able to swipe a card to cover your expenses was so much easier.

After taking the cash, the clerk put a guest registration card down in front of Rio and offered her a pen, saying, "Would you fill this out, please?"

As Rio was filling out the card, the clerk ducked down under the desk. If she had not done this, Rio would not have reacted in time. She turned, recognized the threat before she could even fully process what it was and narrowly dodged as a small ax embedded itself in the front desk. A second ax flew at her in quick succession, but this one she batted out of the air just as she drew out her staff and extended it. The one throwing the axes was a cloaked figure, who after seeing her sneak attack had failed, undid the clasp on her cloak and shrugged it off, revealing a woman dressed like a belly dancer, all in pink to match her hair. She looked more suited to be a carnival act than an assassin, but perhaps that was all to lower the guard of hapless targets.

The woman had another brace of axes hanging off her hips and before one of them could embed themselves in Ellis' skull, Rio took hold of him and threw him over the counter. Yes, the clerk was back there and likely was a collaborator with the woman attacking them, but Rio did not imagine she was much of a threat. Dealing with the actual threat came first.

The ax woman did not fail to take advantage of the opening Rio had provided for her and threw another ax, striking Rio in the shoulder. Between Ironhide and her mantle, the ax was not able to bite into her, but it still managed to be painful. The ax woman did not let that deter her, but as Rio moved to defend herself, a whip cracked and wound itself around her arm.

Rio traced the whip back to another woman, seemingly identical to the first but in green instead of pink. Rio gave an instinctual tug of her arm, but when the whip's owner pulled it taut, Rio did the opposite of what most people would do under the circumstances. Instead of vainly trying to pull away, Rio rushed at woman in green. The effect was much like letting go of the rope in a game of tug-of-war, but the woman in green was well-trained enough that she was only slightly unbalanced before tossing aside her whip and coming at Rio with a knife. She was fast. Rio only narrowly dodged the first slash and then the woman drew a second knife to thrust at Rio's gut. Had she been unprotected, Rio would have had an extra hole in her. Fortunately, no ordinary blade could get through her defenses.

And then Rio heard the telltale hum of a vibroblade being activated. Tech like that did not come cheap, but the Ghaddafi Syndicate would have that kind of money, if these women were in fact from the Ghaddafi Syndicate like the mercenaries at Abou El-Rachid. Glancing blows were not much of a danger, but neither her armor nor Ironhide could resist more than a few seconds of sustained contact.

Rio retracted one end of her staff, thinking it better to wield it like a baton for a close-in fight. She and the woman in green were sizing each other up, looking for an opening. This would have been all well and good, but Rio was not just fighting one person. She could not afford to be distracted from the opponent right in front of her, but she could not ignore the ax woman either. However, those two were not the only ones she needed to worry about.

Anyone who did not have a Protector's superior conditioning would have almost certainly died in that moment. Rio heard it coming and darted to the side as a javelin struck the floor she could only afford a quick glance to see it came from a third woman in blue up in the second-story balcony. She could not afford anything more than that quick glance because the woman in green wasted no time to exploit the opening, lunging at Rio. If she had been wielding a sword or a shortspear, the lunge might have connected before Rio could do anything about it, but the knife did not have the length to cover the distance quicker than Rio could counter. She struck the woman in green on the wrist, but she did not hit hard enough to disarm her. The woman in green did not even let the blow stagger her for a moment and instead snaked her other arm out to try to get a cut in. She still had not quite closed the distance, though, but Rio instinctually dodged rather that press her counterattack.

This shift in the momentum of the fight was seized upon not only by the woman in pink, who threw yet another ax, but also by the woman in blue, who leapt off the balcony to join in the fray. The woman in blue came at Rio with twin vibrobladed hand-sickles.

Now that she was dealing with three opponents at once, Rio abandoned her short stick approach to the woman in green and extended the other end of her staff back out for her preferred medium stick style. Especially with them using vibroblades, she needed to keep her distance. While the legendary staff of Sun Wukong was said to be capable of extending from the thirty-third layer of Heaven down to the eighteenth layer of Hell, Rio's Wukong Staff could only extend to a maximum length of about five meters, but unless she was wanting to pole vault, she usually kept it to about two meters like a standard staff. She could control the speed it extended, so even without relying on her own muscles, she could strike as hard as a professional fighter. Her opponents were unarmored and probably did not know a technique like Ironhide. So long ask she could land her blows, she should be able to make short work of them. That first part would be the real trick, though. They were both fast and agile, more so than Rio, and there were three of them.

She thrusted at the woman in green in front of her and extended her staff to the rear to try to get the woman in blue behind her. Neither hit landed. The women were as slippery as greased eels, but Rio was expecting as much. Hitting them would have been nice, but warping their attack vector was her main goal. As confident as she was in her abilities, she was not going to let these three get in close. Speaking of the three, the woman in pink thought she could get in while Rio was preoccupied with the other two. Rather than try to engage with all three at once, which was sure to be a losing proposition, Rio pushed forward against the woman in green right in front of her and put more distance between her and the other two.

As skilled as these women were, being on the receiving end of nearly 100% of Rio's attention was enough to put them on the back foot. The woman in green could not dodge or block all of Rio's hits, but despite being staggered by the blows, she nevertheless pushed forward, trying to get in closer, where her knives would have the advantage over Rio's staff. However, Rio had a surprise for her she was not expecting.

All the Protectors carried a ceremonial balisong as both a symbol of their brotherhood and as a last-resort self-defense weapon. Because Rio engaged the women as a stick fighter, they would not expect her to come at them with a knife. A good knock to the head threw the woman in green off just long enough for Rio to pull her knife and stick the blade in her neck. The woman dropped one of her knives to try to hold back the bleeding while still making a thrust at Rio with her other hand. This was easy enough to dodge and Rio poked a few new holes into her exposed belly in the exchange.

This came at a cost, though, as this gave the woman in pink the opening to stab Rio in the gut as well. Rio's armor and Ironhide only gave her a couple seconds' defense, but it also meant that the woman in pink had to spend those precious seconds forcing her blade in, which left her vulnerable in turn. Rio did not waste the opportunity and stabbed the woman in pink in the neck while blocking an attempt to attack with her other hand. She twisted her knife to open up the wound more and nearly blinded herself with a burst of arterial spray.

It was mostly instinct, even just blind luck you could call it, but Rio swept the leg of the woman in pink to take her down and by doing so, she happened to dodge a swipe from the woman in blue's hand-sickle. When Rio turned to face her, she saw that her face was warped by grief and fury at the loss of her two companions but was too well-conditioned to cry out. No, they were more than just companions. The three of them had the same face, the same build. They were almost certainly sisters, triplets even. That would make the loss all the worse, but Rio had no pity for them. They sealed their fate when they tried to interfere with the Prophecy and fully earned everything they got.

The woman in blue's movements were still crisp and smooth. She was not letting her emotional state disrupt her training. Had things been different, she might have done well as a Protector, but she and her sisters were on a different path and this was the end of it.

Using the her staff's extension, Rio managed to hit to woman in blue in the stomach hard enough to make her double over. Before she could recover, Rio struck her knee to unbalance her, then came down hard on her head to drop her to the floor. The blow should have been enough to knock her out, so all that remained was to finish her off, take Ellis and withdraw to safety.

It should have been simple, but the woman in blue had one last trick up her sleeve. As her arm flopped on the floor limply, something rolled out. It only took a second for Rio to recognize what it was, but that second was all the time she had. It was a grenade. Where the hell had she been hiding that?