She Who Hesitates... Doesn't Get to Make a Decision

Because Astra now found abstract thought difficult, pondering these issues took her several minutes. As a result, a decision on what to do was taken out of her hands. Though her vision was keener than human eyesight, several score of horses inevitably kicked up a fair amount of dust from the trail, even though they were doing no more than a fast trot so as not to outpace her, and this cloud of dust was easily seen. Those digging were too engrossed in their work, but one of the people around the booths had evidently spotted it, for some of them now began to advance along the trail towards the Dunchovians. Astra consoled herself with the thought that, if there should be trouble, the Dunchovians would have a substantial advantage from being mounted rather than on foot.

She was now able to see that there seemed to be some fragments of wall revealed in the substantial hole that the diggers were excavating. They must have stumbled on the ruins of some old building. (Perhaps a change in the course of the river had taken it too near the structure, so that its foundations had been weakened or it had become prone to flooding, and it had been abandoned, to be covered over the centuries by silt brought downstream by the river.)

1. The people from the booths get close enough to hail the Dunchovians (who of course have seen them by now), and ask them their business.
2. There had once been other buildings. Astra's weight breaks through the earth covering a long-abandoned cellar or catacomb, and she finds herself falling. (It might be dark enough down there to send her to sleep; also getting out could be a problem.)
3. Meanwhile, the earlier delay caused by the discussion between the two Dunchovian tribes means that the two pursuers are not too far behind.

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