• Peigra's Blog:

Calton's Shadow, Pt 6

By: Peigra

The desert, at night, was a beautiful, endless thing of both beauty and danger, and Peigra tried not to keep their pace slowed to marvel at it all.

Her time with Rira’s clan had been along the water, in a cove that had gotten sun in the morning and late afternoon, blocked by a high ridge of stone that jutted high into the skies above the settlement, and kept them, for the most part, shaded and a bit cooler than the surrounding areas. Certainly during the heat of the day, it was preferable to be in the shade than the sun.

The nap had done Peigra some good, and she had eaten a good meal, as had the others. With any waystation, even a cave for what it was, there were supplies that could be taken, and every traveler left something if they had it to spare. Rope, boots, firewood, extra bags, anything was left for someone else’s benefit, but the necessities were always used and replenished. Despite the heat, some of the men went back towards the river, and brought back some wood that would dry in the desert’s heat quickly, and be ready for the next group. It seemed as if there would never be enough wood, though Peigra was told that the trees suckered easily, and their small saplings were used to keep the larger trees productive.

Cut, they also provided a wonderful sap that, the bark peeled, sweetened the oatmeal that had been soaked and warmed in a kettle. There was a think plank of what might have been kat`el, a form of flaked jerky that could be added for protein to other mixes such as beans or berries, and the keg with its tiny bung with the ale that Soir claimed was not as good as Genda’s. She felt some guilt at not having anything to add to the food, and felt Xanik’s wink as he motioned her to the food. She was guest, not just their escort, and was given the honor of filling her plate first.

Baltik got some of the oatmeal, the pig that he was, and sweetened with the sap, he lapped up the bowl that Peigra brought him, and much of what remained was given to the mounts afterwards so the kettle could be cleaned for travel and cooled. A spring, running in a dug culvert along the inner cave’s wall, provided fresh water, dribbled down through the rock from water above, and always clean and cool.

Packs were checked, saddles inspected, and all gear was taken out and re-stowed into bags. Only one of the oiled bags had leaked, and that was when one of the mounts had gone underwater on the other side of the river, and it had not been sealed tightly enough with the ropes. What was in it had been clothing, which dried during the day outside the cave, everything wet spread out on the sand and shaken out, inspected, and rolled back up for their journey.

She shook out what she could, but not as vigorously as she should have. Sand, as she had learned quickly in the Before, got everywhere, and it was the same with dust and mud on the farm, in that it found its own ways back into your boots, between your toes, causing that itch on your thigh beneath your leggings while you were riding.

Into her packs went the cloak, now dry change of clothing, and her boots and socks, carefully packed, and she set the small bag of honey balls tightly beside a spare container of water at the bottom of the pack, to keep them as cool as she could. The sweater she tied around her neck, knowing she would sweat for a while but once the sun was gone she would need it. In the lighter pair of leggings and her thinnest tunic, she wrapped her braids tightly on her scalp and pinned them high and a bit toward her face, and took the linen to cover it, and most of her face, with the turban. She also had a pair of goggles, to help see against the glare of the sun on the sand, but would not need them at night. Xanik had warned her to put the turban on, even at night, as it would keep her hair secure, and better something clawed at her and got the turban’s linen than her braids.

The mounts were recovered from their swim, fed and rested as well, and they were lined up with saddles, packs and restless, most of them back in familiar lands where the sun beat upon their coppery coats and their only fear was being taken by bandits for trade. Baltik, off by himself, had behaved despite Peigra’s fears, and took the saddle, girth and packs well as the sun vanished over the spine that the caves were dug into. Xanik had gone to each animal, including the horse, and checked their feet, ensuring they were still sound to be ridden, and traded out two mounts for spares as he was not pleased with their feet.

The moment the shadows began to curl on the sands, Xanik gave the command for them to follow the wall, and they moved as a line.

The wall, a line of mountains that blocked most of the rain from the region, was ominous, and it was a common landmark that Bahmi used, the various ridges, spines and bumps along its top all having names. She knew some of them, from the Before, having had to learn them out of necessity when she went out with the hunting groups to gather her herbs.

Along the spine, crashing in great dunes, the sand was piled in odd formations that she wished there was more light to see, but the light was quickly fading, and only Baltik would know where they were going soon. The small, saddle-sized lanterns, nothing more than small globes with a tiny candle inside that could be stuck on the saddlehorn, had been lit, and as always, Peigra worried she would knock it over and hurt Baltik with the hot wax. It was an old fear, from childhood, and not one easily dismissed. Every child feared fire.

Baltik was setting his hooves carefully, and he had never enjoyed sand and the constant lack of forward motion as opposed to how much ground he could cover on something a bit more firm. Beneath her, his muscles rippled as he moved, and she tried not to push him to keep up with the others. He was not meant for sand distances as the vaiyuu, with their thick pads and odd, two-toed feet that could bend differently. She would need to check his hooves and legs carefully when they stopped; other times, she had snipped back the thick fur around his fetlocks, but she had not remembered to do it this time. It kept sand gathering there to a minimum.

Despite the heat of the day, once the sun faded, the sands released what heat they had and cooled rapidly, and she put the sweater on with some awkwardness of not wanting to stop Baltik, who was probably laughing beneath her at her attempts. She managed to get both arms in, and had to bend forward and keep an odd grip with her hands to fit it over her head; she knew better than to use her legs to support herself, especially with Baltik wanting to charge ahead, as he always did. Any excuse was good enough for him.

For all the small lights were woefully dim in the great, spreading darkness that smelled of dry and sand and the odd, tingling scent of rock being coated with cool dew, Xanik was driving them in a steady pace. They kept along the wall, skirting the dunes that apparently he could see, up front, and Peigra wondered how they were avoiding them at all.

Others passed them in long trains, to the left, heading towards the river, or to other small settlements, and all she saw were their faces and lights and shadows of mounts and then they, too, were gone as if they had never been. Clearly this was a well-traveled way, and she had little choice but to let Baltik follow where the others were leading.

Somewhere, in the darkness that enfolded everything, the line of mounts came to a near-crashing halt. Despite the turban on her head, which Peigra was grateful for, as it was keeping her head warm, she was as lost as Baltik beneath her, who had gone off the path to avoid running over the vaiyuu and rider in front of them. She circled him and led him back to their place, and noted that others were turning their mounts, settling them, but also others in front were coming back.

“We must find the cave we passed, and quickly,” Xanik was saying, and Peigra frowned, but there was no way she would ever find anything here. These men were her survival now, hers and Baltik’s, and she waited for Xanik to take the lead again, moving past them all and backtracking the group.

What was ahead of them that he was hiding from, she did not know. None of them were making any comments on it, and Baltik raced to the right, hard, to avoid another collision not long after they turned around. Peigra let him prance a moment, and reined him in, circling him and leading him back to the lights, which were, one by one, going into a cave between several sand dunes.

“In, little bug,” Xanik was saying, and motioned her in, gloved hands looking odd in the shadows. She made to slide down from Baltik but the Bahmi said “no time” and slapped at Baltik’s rump. He gave a toss of his head and a protest, and Peigra and the horse went within the cave.

The shadows from the saddle lamps were odd on the walls, and she looked at them, smelling dry cave and old smoke and the faint, musty smell of moisture somewhere beyond. The group was huddled with their mounts in a large area, and many of the men had gotten down, and were tying their mounts in the small cubbies dug off the larger cave.

Peigra slid down, knowing Baltik would never fit in one of those, and waited for Xanik to come in before sliding down the horse’s side, and keeping him in the entrance, patting his neck for reassurance, but whose, she was not certain. Xanik got down from his mount, passed the reins to someone, and motioned Peigra in as he reached up, and as one, all the lights on their saddles went out as the men blew them out, Xanik doing Baltik’s as Peigra watched the wick suddenly go black.

The overwhelming darkness reminded Peigra of when she had been dying, bottomless and consuming, and only Baltik’s reins in her hands, his whuffing from the run against her shoulder, was any sign that she was not alone. The men had gone still, as had their mounts, and Baltik slowed his breathing also as she listened to him.

Whatever they had turned from, it was close, as she heard something outside, echoing on the mouth of the cave, and Xanik was grunting. There was another grunt, and something thudded to her right, and the smell of sand was overwhelmingly gone, replaced with the old smoke and the musty water and sweaty mounts and their riders.

Peigra said nothing, and was quiet, as she had been on the farm when bandits had come on occasion. The smoke from the small saddle lights hung in the air, moved about by the circulating air and the pockets of heat and sweat from the mounts. Baltik she could not see, but he was there, behind her, as he had been in the past, and she took some of his strength. The darkness had not frightened her as a child on the farm, but she had learned, after leaving the farm’s security, that the darkness could hide awful things she did not want to mention, in fear of their reappearance. The blackness that left nothing but the senses to listen, to attune themselves, and be the lifesaver that they should have been, and sometimes were, but not everyone survived the darkness unscarred.

From the darkness beyond, there was another thud, and a great, piercing shriek that grated to the bone, and Peigra tried to cover her ears to stop the noise. Whatever was out there, it was not only large, but angry now, and there were several large thuds and the crunch of something. She had heard several odd things while she had been with Rira during the old woman’s tutelage, but nothing such as this. There were creatures that scurried in the heat of the day, and things that skittered at night, never the two coming into contact with one another except as predator and prey in the unlikeliest of encounters, usually fatal for one combatant. As with all the lands, something had to die that others lived.

The shrieking began to fade as there was another scraping noise, and there was a deep silence in its wake, the darkness that frightened Peigra, but old, bone-deep instincts were hard to outgrow, and the fear of the something that shrieked held her still. She did not know how long it was while they stood as they were, the mounts uncertain and wanting to mill about but held where they were by firm tugs and soft whispers.

There was a scraping noise, and Peigra could still not see much, but there was no longer just an enveloping darkness but some form of pattern, and a light that blinded as Xanik came into view as he lit a small, hand-held lantern and held it up in front of him. Whatever it had been, there were pockmarks in the wall now, but if they had been there before, Peigra did not know. There was something on the floor that, as and Xanik moved out, searching, and the light’s shadows faded, he gave it a wide sidestep. With his departure, brief and not far, the light departed and the shadows consumed again, leaving the group in darkness. Where Xanik had stood, there was one of the men, his hands on a lever cut into the wall, and Peigra had a moment to study it when Xanik came back. “We ride, and quickly.”

He reached up to the reins of his mount, held by another, and with a long, thin piece of wood, he lit the saddle light and passed the burning stick around. For his great height, Peigra had to have Genda light Baltik’s saddle light as he gave her a boost into the saddle, and the cave around them was tall, illuminated suddenly in the shadowy, moving lights from the saddles. She had a moment to look before Xanik was moving, his light leading them, and she felt something, a hand, collide with Baltik’s rump to get him moving. She had no moment to spare as she guided Baltik out, and the horse shied from whatever the lump was on the floor that she could not identify, and Xanik was waiting outside for her. “If I tell you to run, give him his head,” he said to her, and she felt some fear. The desert was not where she wanted to be lost without a guide, especially now, where most of the landmarks seared into her mind were on the ridges above and lost in the blackness of the night.

At one point, Rira had taught her how to read the stars and their positions, but Peigra had never been very good at doing so. There were one or two stars that were easily identifiable, gatherings of them that made shapes, but for the most part, her sense of direction had been lost when she had come back from the Before, and she had no means to explain it. She had always known where the farm was, knowing it by smell, and could always find her way back to it, but the desert’s smells had been different, and had taken some time to learn.

This desert was the same that she had left, save that none of the scents now assaulting her nose were familiar. All of the ones she had encountered were tainted with water; her entire life there had been water nearby, save when she had been taken from the farm and water could only be seen and not romped in. This part of the desert did not see water often, so rarely that nothing smelled as she remembered, or it had changed so greatly from the Before to the Now, which was possible.

Xanik was moving, and Peigra was surprised to be behind him, as she had been the one near the end of the train the last time. Behind her, she thought, was Soir, making complaining noises to his mount about something she could not quite make out, but had to do with the quality of ale from some tavern. Odd that she pictured him imbibing on bit`qk until even the sands floated away.

They moved, and quickly; Xanik did not wait for the others as they came out of the cave and was riding hard. What little rest they had gotten was all he was allowing them, and Peigra gave Baltik’s neck and stroke when she could, reassuring him, and giving him the occasional touch of her magick. He was young, still so young to be doing this, and she felt some guilt at having taken him from what might have been a hopeful sale...

But there would not have been a sale, not for Baltik, destined for another fate than the sale, and she felt his whuffing snort beneath her as they rode. He had been waiting for her, and if she had not been able to rectify the damage done between her resurrection and her family’s present state of mind, at least she had her horse back.

Sometime while they were riding, she began to notice an odd smell in the air, and Xanik’s light went left, and quickly, and she barely had time to hold on as Baltik did the same. Behind her, snaking around, the others moved. She sniffed again; old blood, carnivore, and it was big, whatever it was, and they were downwind from it. Baltik was not shying from it, as he had encountered nightmares in the Before that still haunted Peigra, but there was always something faster, more cunning, stealthed and waiting, and she shuddered. So much for a peaceful herb gathering trip.

The smell faded as they ran, and she began to smell something familiar, a tang that touched her nostrils in a heave of familiarity, and as the first shadows came over the waters to her left, the lightest of hazy yellows on the horizon, she began to smell it, the wonderful, heavy smell of water. Faint, but it was ahead of them, somewhere, and she took a deep breath as she pressed down against Baltik’s familiar smell, horse and leather and sweat and the feel of him beneath her, ever moving, ever watchful.

She was more grateful than he would ever know for having him back, a second time, where she might be able to let him live better than he had been, in that horror of Before.

The light crept ever more and more to their left, illuminating some of the sands they were traveling, and Peigra got her first look at where they were. Brief glimpses to her right, to the spires on top of the massive wall, were all she had to guide where she was, and they were closer than she believed they had been.

There was a sudden fear, as she was not certain what she would say when she saw the Rira of now.

Of all the changes in Peigra’s life, in the Before, none had been so gut-wrenching but the old shaman, Rira, who had been surprised to find her greatest, most eager student in her waning years, who had been neither a Bahmi nor her Bloodline known to anyone alive in the deserts. In her robes with their strange, dyed patterns, Rira had been an imposing, and frightening, being when she was first encountered.

Their first meeting had been, as every important one had seemed, in a battle that had been but a skirmish for later atrocities. Peigra had been the only one with any herbs to help the wounded, and what she had had in her packs had not been enough. Rira had watched, saying nothing, and had insisted that the tiny thing with the odd hair be brought to her, and in a hazy three days, everything Peigra had known, had dreamt of, had been ingrained in her system to do with healing and herbs had been brought out through a strange ritual of smoke and magick that, even now, was best left in the haziness of the past.

Rira had been a mistress of her art, and how to get what she wanted out of it, and those around her, for the good of her people. Peigra had learned from her, learned much of what had become the foundations of her own magick and her knowledge, but in the end, Rira had been the mother figure that Peigra had needed as the war had escalated, the foundation to return to when she needed solace from the atrocities happening through the lands, creeping slowly into even the furthest regions. Purda had always been a part of Peigra’s life, but Rira understood war, had been born and raised into it, and understood that not all warriors had wounds that were physical.

She had wept when the call had gone out to send the children away, and Rira had insisted Peigra go, to preserve her knowledge, to save the future, and Peigra had refused. Hindsight was a difficult thing to swallow, and had she the chance to do it again, Peigra would go the second time it was offered. To teach the children, to make them understand, and demand through their actions and their beliefs and words, that the Before, Peigra’s past now, would never come to be.

The sun was blinding when it sent the first shaft of illuminance across the water, and Baltik gave a noise beneath her, shying from the sudden blindness and she patted his neck. The sand would warm quickly, and Xanik was pushing them as he could before they would have to rest again.

The water was inviting to her left, and she wished they could have stopped, even a moment, but water was always deadly. Every living thing needed water, and control of waterholes, springs, river crossings had become a constant battle of survival. Peigra had been part of a scouting group that had come under attack while crossing a river, a river that had been crossed by four other groups that same day without incident. There was no meaning of the words “safe” and “oasis” and “rest” around water, not in the Before.

The water, for all its danger, was still beautiful.
Xanik’s mount was the one that faltered first, and Baltik’s quick toss of his head to the left was all that saved him as the vaiyuu lowered its head to the sand and tossed itself head over heels, throwing Xanik, the saddle, packs, everything, scattering it all to the sands. Vaiyuu were known for long-range carriers, and could ride for miles on the sands, but their endurance with heavy loads was varied, and many ran themselves into the ground, literally, as their strength waned. The thick snap of its neck as it fell was testimony to its death, and Baltik showered everything for several feet around him as he dug gouges in the sands coming to a stop.

The train scattered behind them, noises of protest and concern, and Peigra slid down from Baltik, knowing he would not go far, and went to Xanik. He was shaking himself off, on his knees in the sand, and rubbing his head as he looked about him at the sudden change in his riding position. Whatever he mumbled, it was quick, and Peigra could not translate it into any of the known words she had learned, and Xanik held up his hand, fist closed, to the others as they came closer.

Most of them, save the spare mounts, were panting hard, heads down, and they were all riderless now. Peigra reached Xanik first, and touched him above his heart, hands glowing, without caring if he was for or against her healing abilities, and filled him with as much as she felt he would need. Broken bones might not have been an issue, if they were close to a camp, but she had no idea how far they were from anywhere safe, and Xanik still had to ride to wherever help could be located.

Rubbing his head still, Xanik took her wrist, not snapping it, but the intent was there, and Peigra tried not to visibly wince as he growled at her in a low tone. “To reveal yourself is not the way of the prey that escapes the hunter that lives another day,” he warned her, and she frowned. Who in the group was not supposed to know she had a healing ability? Temur would not have sent her with someone of questionable morals, would he? Or was there something more Xanik did not want known?

Either way, his grip on her wrist lessened, and he pushed her away, waving off as if she were trying to help him up or feeling for his heartbeat, but his eyes were narrowed and unpleasant, and she backed away from him. Genda was there, and the others now, and she watched them searching Xanik for wounds, bruises, and two men were looking to the fallen vaiyuu.

Baltik nickered, and Peigra went to him, holding his neglected reins and pressing her face against his head. Intrigue again, and so soon after her expansion back into the world outside of Meridian’s boundaries, and it sat, stone-like, in her gut. She had not counted on her return to be without any dangers or shadows, but her time with the Bahmi had been, for the most part, free of such things. Then again, in the Before, Port Scion had been the root of all evils, it seemed, and that was nothing but a smoking, desecrated hulk between two cities that never spoke anymore. Perhaps the evils of the City had been transferred elsewhere.

The familiar lips nibbling one of her braids made her smile. Despite it all, Baltik was, as always, reminding her that he was there, and she was worrying too much. “You’re still a wretch,” she teased him, and went to the saddlebag with the water and the honey balls. She took the wide pan and set it in the crook of her arm and elbow, holding it as she poured water there for him to slurp up as best he could. Tiny amounts so as not to shock his system, and enough that he was not so dehydrated he would falter as Xanik’s mount had.

The pan and water bottle went back into the saddlebag, and as she had feared, the honey balls were almost melted into one lump. With some difficulty she pulled a lump off and fed it to him, hand flat, and let him lick her hand clean. “Beast,” she said, nuzzling his head as he smacked his lips. “You just came back for more honey balls.”

The metal rings for his halter and those on the saddlebags jangled as he shook himself in denial of her accusations, and one large eye looked down at her, as it always did, when she knew he was much smarter than she, and knew something obvious she was missing. He had given her that same look several times, and she had learned quickly to respect it, and to look around her at everything that could be seen and thought about.

The last time she had seen the look, she had been unable to change her course, and had lost something so precious that it still hurt too much to think of.

She turned, watching the men. They had hauled Xanik to his feet, and the packs were gathered. The spare saddle had been taken from the fallen vaiyuu, and it would be left for the scavengers. It was not their choice, as the dead were honored, especially these sleek beasts, but there was no time for such things. Xanik was already yelling for a spare mount, that his bags needed to be gathered and they had to be on their way.

He was looking at Peigra as he urged them on, and she wondered why, other than the obvious, that the sun was beating down on them, they were against the water almost, and no shelter to be had unless they made some. The spare mount that Xanik was setting his bags on was a bit larger than the dead one, and he got on as soon as the bags were strapped on. “We ride,” he said, and Peigra felt some trepidation. One or two of the men had watered their beasts, and she had seen Genda do his, but the others were still tired, and the sun was growing dangerous in the skies.

Xanik was off, and Peigra shook her head, and Baltik lowered himself slightly for her to leap up onto him. Awkward as it was now, when he was full grown she would need to be looking for rocks and fences to get up onto him.

They did not go far, but their pace was quick, and Peigra began to see something odd ahead of them, in the sand, and wondered if she were having the hallucinations that many often did in the sands. Knobby and odd, it protruded in an odd means, and the closer she got, the less she could identify it for what it was. There were taller, waving things above it, candle-like.

Xanik was heading for the odd structure, and Peigra followed, now at the back with the spare mounts, and looked at it. It was curved, finger-like things coming out from a central spine, and she finally realized she was looking at a ribcage of what could only have been a creature so immense that killing it would have taken hundreds of warriors.

Several of the bones were cracked, and had been moved in the sand and stuck, providing some shade and shelter from the blowing winds that were beginning to gust. Xanik rode beneath it, and in the area where the bones had been moved, there was substantial shade, but it would not last. Shaded now by how the sun and the bones were aligned, it would last them several hours if that, and they would need to move. The palm trees that were rising from the bones were odd, but they also signaled something of importance.

In the center, beneath the bones, was a patch of green surrounding a pair of springs. The tiny seedlings from the larger trees were feeding on the water and a great many lizards scurried off to other places on the bones to sun themselves. Peigra ducked Baltik beneath the massive thing, and reached out to touch it, marveling at it and the ingenuity of the Bahmi for not only having moved the bones for shelter, but knowing how to utilize them for travelers weary and in need of water also.

Peigra did not water Baltik, and waited as she slid down him. The others were letting their mounts drink, pulling their heads away, walking them around, and giving them another drink. Too much water and they would be useless, and Peigra patted Baltik’s neck. Her hand touched the odd mark on his shoulder, and she rubbed it gently, and sighed. What it meant, only time would reveal.

Xanik was moving from mount to mount, checking feet, packs, feeling pulses as he stuck his great thumb against their necks. He came to Baltik last, and Peigra, staring at him, as he moved his hand beneath Baltik’s mane to feel the horse’s pulse. “He rides strong.”

“He’s still growing,” she said, uncertain why, and Xanik nodded.

In a different tone, as he ran his hand down Baltik’s leg, lifting the hoof to inspect it, Xanik said, “We are not far from the clan, but we will have to ride hard. Is he capable in the sun?”

To that, she did not know. Baltik was two, and by all rights, should still have been in training as opposed to under saddle with a rider. Most horses did not get riders until their third year to give their growth the safety margins required for long life. At two, Baltik still had years ahead of him of growth, another two to four, and he already towered over everything. She wondered if using him as she was would stunt him. “I don’t know,” she answered honestly, and Xanik nodded. “He’s young, and he likes to run.”

“If he falters, we have no means to save him.”

To that, she nodded. She had known when they started from the cave that Baltik was a liability, as horses were not long distance travelers in the desert, at least not the farming horses from Freemarch. There was one breed, the deep coppery-gold hides infamous, and Peigra’s family had been trying for many years to acquire a stallion to breed with their messenger mares. The horses were not sold outside of the clans, those few that existed, but Peigra had seen the herds in their secret valleys, where they were hidden and reared and bred, and had kept that secret as she had all the others.

Xanik inspected each of Baltik’s hooves, and deemed him sound, and she allowed the horse to drink at the spring finally. He was smart enough not to make himself ill, and she let him drink as she looked to Xanik. “Who are you hiding me from?”

“Our hearts and our swords are dedicated to winning what must be won, but there are some who might oppose what you are.”

She stared at him, and frowned. “Because I’m a woman, and not a Bahmi, and an Ascended, or because of all three?”

His great smile reappeared again, and he patted her head with his huge hand. “Temur said you were a cautious one. Do not push him, but you must keep up with us. We will be riding hard, and along the water, and the sand heat and the water heat do not come together pleasantly.”

She did not mention that Baltik had done so before, but that was exactly the point, it had been in the Before, and not now. This was the first journey off the farm for her horse, and she was pushing him hard, and he was not protesting, but eventually the sand would leech itself into him and he would tire. In the past, she had worked him a day, two at the most, and let him rest three, or left him behind and took one of the oddly colored desert horses. Baltik had tugged her off the vaiyuu in the Before time and time again, and she had finally given into his demands that if she was not to use the stallion, she could at least use a horse and not the vaiyuu.

“We’ll try to keep up,” she promised Xanik.

“We are not far, but to get there, we will need to ride hard. From here, there are no springs, and what water we have must last. The sandwalkers are not generous who they take down.”

So, they were near a known encampment of the sandwalkers, which gave Peigra some idea of what was ahead of them now. Collectively, they were a nuisance, and the name sandwalkers was a general term for anyone who was neither Bahmi nor guest to the sands of the desert. A known camp meant that they had been cleared out many times and still returned, which kept the nearby clans on edge, but also honed their children’s hunting and tracking skills.

Xanik rested them all for two hours, when the sun began to bake the bones and they gave off an odd, metallic taste that stuck in the nose and mouth. The shade was fading also, and the springs were exposed to the sun, baking them, and they would soon no longer be drinkable until sundown had cooled them again.

Onto Baltik again, and Peigra had checked his feet for sand balls and wear marks and found none, so he was holding up as he could, and had given him another honey ball before they started. She was near the spare mounts again, and knew it was on purpose, so that Baltik could follow and not become so exhausted he would collapse.

To their left, the waters came closer, and Peigra wanted to take she and Baltik into them, to cool off and wash the sweat and sand that was clogging everything. She had gone to bare feet to spare her skin between her toes, and had stripped down to her thinnest tunic again for the day’s heat. The turban was much too hot, but she had no choice. Her hands were swimming in her own sweat but they were covered, as was her head, and her feet were baking quickly, exposed to the sun and the sand.

Occasionally, as they ran, she touched Baltik’s neck, feeding him what she could to keep him going. He had great stamina, even at his young age, but there were limits, and she was pushing them, and they both realized it. Necessity was an odd mistress who demanded obesiance and gave nothing back but success or failure, and nothing between.

Another of the mounts went down, and their rider and bags were spilled all over the sands. The sudden stop brought the line to a halt, and the switch to a new mount was done quickly, with Genda and Soir keeping watch, in case they had been seen by the sandwalkers. Up, and moving again, the line continued, the sun above, the sand below, the water to the left and the wall, further away, to the far right, looming heavily.

Sun and spines began to near one another as another vaiyuu went down, and Peigra felt a great pity for the mounts that were dying. Xanik’s disregard for them was out of necessity, but there was still a great shame that Peigra felt for a third dead corpse in their wake. They were on the move again, and Peigra fed Baltik what she could of herself, to keep him moving, so afraid now as the sands were merciless with their heat, so afraid of falling down and unable to get Baltik up.

The odd noise came from their right, and Genda gave a cry that turned all the mounts and heads, as he broke off from the line and went right. Peigra wheeled Baltik to the left, circling him and letting him walk, keeping him moving, but slowly, and pressed her hand against the odd mark on his right shoulder, feeding him again and feeling it leeching her own strength as she did.

Genda had his arm raised, his fist closed, and was making an odd noise that was echoed back, and Peigra looked, to the sudden rise of the sands, no, not the sands, the sand-covered heads that had been lying, watching, tracking them. It was a handful of children, and an elder with them, watching their tracking and judging them. The man rose, and held his fist up high to Genda’s noise, echoing it again, and Peigra knew they were close. The children were very young to be away, three, maybe four and no doubt away from their mothers for a small reprieve.

“Hoi, you are close,” the elder Bahmi said, his hair pulled back in a great jangling set of braids and beads. Only the elder hunters of a clan were allowed to wear them, and Peigra could not see the colors to see his rank or his specialty. Each elder hunter had a certain task or specialty that they passed on to the children, as they believed no one man could teach everything, nor know all.

Vaiyuu appeared, nine of them, and the children were on them in one great scrambling of hands and feet and pushed bottoms and scuffling, and the elder’s mount came to his call and stood by him, waiting. “We lead,” he said, and motioned to the children, and Genda moved his heaving mount along their line. The children always had to be inspected when they were that young, and their saddles were all straps and odd holes where they could tie themselves in without risk of falling off.

The elder and Genda walked the line, on either side, and corrected the occasional loose knot or forgotten one and, all mounted, including the elder, they moved on the sands, but at a much slower pace. Xanik was not pleased with it, but there was little choice, and they followed, giving their own mounts a chance to catch some rest.

Nothing was familiar, and yet, everything was around Peigra, and she shook her head, wondering how it all would have been the same. In the Before, this area had been overrun, in the end, by the dragons and the sands blasted to bare rock. She had heard the stories of the few who had survived to come and take refuge in the other lands, and it had been one of the last tragedies before the world itself had ended.

There had been smaller tragedies, personal ones, and Peigra tried not to think of them, and concentrated on Baltik. She would need to re-learn all the landmarks, and felt a sudden change in the temperature and looked up as the sun crested the spines and was gone, but the light remained. Finally, some relief, and she sighed, knowing that cool was coming. She touched Baltik’s neck again, urging him forward with a bit of magick, wondering what she would say to Rira, if the woman would even recognize her, let alone know who she was in this time. It was all so confusing, Before and Now, and sometimes she felt disorientated as to what had happened as opposed to what was happening.

The camp was in a low cove, the same low cove as before, with the springs at the head of the cove where the children, each morning, went to get fresh water for the morning grains to be soaked. Heads rose at the sharp whistle from the elder hunter, in the lead now with Xanik, and the children all mingled in with the group now, and every last one staring up, as they could, at Baltik’s black bulk.

Stopped, at last, Baltik gave a great toss of his head and sprayed sweat everywhere, and Peigra chuckled. Ahead of them, Xanik was down, gripping the wrists of two of the Bahmi who had come up to greet the newcomers, and motioned back to them all.

Peigra was not watching them, she was watching the oddly-colored cowl, and the thick, spiraled walking stick. It had grown that way, generations ago, smoothed to an odd sheen from the oils of the hands that had held it in the past. The tale was that it had been found as such by one of the shaman, and the walking stick chose the next shaman by whomever could heft it, as only a shaman could lift it, and all others would have found it as heavy as the spires that were now blocking the sun. No one had ever been able to explain it, but no one had doubted it.

The odd figure coming up to stare at them all, the cowl hiding her face, tattooed and her weathered hands holding the walking stick. She moved, but not towards the children, as she was one that they all respected, and were taught early to, as one of them might be the next one to wield the walking stick as their own.

The figure was moving, and Peigra slid down, feeling the stone in her gut expanding. Baltik nibbled one of her braids and she pushed him away, distracted and rightfully so, and stood as she could. Her feet were suddenly burning in the hot sands, and she tried not to shift, knowing the skin would peel from them for days and she would be smarting from it.

Followed by others, the walking stick and its wielder came, and stopped, beside Baltik and Peigra, and she swallowed. A weathered hand pulled the cowl back, and Peigra stared at Rira’s oddly flecked eyes, a deep brown that seemed to be the mark of her use of the clan’s magick and visions.

As was her rank, Peigra bowed to Rira, and made the welcoming gesture with her hand to Rira, and hoped she had not forgotten how to make it. Her hands were shaking, and she was being foolish.

“Ran`tk,” Rira whispered, and reached out a weathered hand, touching Peigra’s face, and she winced. It felt so...so familiar, so much goodness within it, and she reached up to touch Rira’s hand with her own. “You have come back to me.”

“I got...lost,” she said, not knowing why, and Rira, ever Rira, pulled her against her, robes flung aside, and against her tunic, against her heartbeat, where all children were nurtured after their birth.

“You are no longer lost,” Rira said against her turban. “And you still have so much to learn from me, that you have come back?” Peigra burbled a chuckle and nodded against Rira’s tunic, hugging her tightly.

Rira looked to Baltik, and touched his neck with a hand. “And you brought the demon with you again?” Peigra giggled now, and nodded, and Rira stroked Baltik’s sweaty neck, and he sniffed her and rubbed her hand with his nose. He had done that in the Before also, knowing that she often had treats for him, hidden deep in her sleeves where he could not reach without damaging her clothing, which was not allowed.

From some unknown pocket, she produced a small, packed something, what looked like the odd grass seeds from the breeding fields in the south, and Baltik did not hesitate to gum it out of Rira’s hand.

“You both have much to learn still,” Rira whispered against Peigra’s turban. “And we have so little time.”