Ilham hadn’t bothered to explain himself yet, but now he did. "You have no idea what you’re getting into," he said. "I am not much of a fighter. But if I learned one thing from watching the Chinese, it’s that you need several people to think about logistics for every man who is carrying a weapon." His eyes strayed to Laks’s leather-covered stick. "So I thought it might help you to have at least one such person in your group—what is the word you use? San-something?"