Tarrin pulled up and stopped, looking down at the city in the shallow valley. "What is it?" Sarraya asked.
"I think I need something to disguise me."
"Why don't you just go human?"
"Because I'm very tired, and I don't feel like dealing with the pain right now," he told her bluntly. "Think you can make me something to cover me?"
"Child's play," she winked, waving her hands grandly. A large, voluminous cloak simply appeared in midair, made of soft, thin leather, almost like cloth. It had a deep hood, and it was undyed. The tan garment would blend in well with the arid plain, making it a sensible garment. Tarrin caught it before it fell to the ground. Sarraya grinned and flitted up to his face, then pointed her finger at his face--
--and everything suddenly turned purplish. Not only that, there was a sudden weight on his face.
Recoiling, Tarrin reached up and found something sitting on his nose, wrapping around to hug his skull to keep it from falling off. He grabbed it and pulled it off his face, and found himself looking at a strange formation of what looked like purple glass. It was shaped to fit over the eyes, resting on the nose, and for a human they would rest atop the ears as well. Since he didn't have ears there, they rested on the bone ridges above where his ears used to be.
"What is this?"
"It's called a visor. The Selani make them," she replied. "They shield your eyes from the sand, and their tint protects your eyes from the brightness of the sun. In your case, they're also going to hide those cat's eyes of yours. The humans won't look funny at you if you wear it. Any serious traveller around here has one."
"Strange. Allia didn't have one, and she never mentioned it."
"It's something so common, she probably wouldn't have thought to say anything. If you didn't notice, Allia tends to leave out anything she considers common knowledge."
"I noticed."
"The problem is that her common knowledge is pretty uncommon," Sarraya grinned. "How much has she told you about the desert?"
"She told me about what it's like. She also described some of the animals that live there. I still can't believe there are lizards as big as a barn."
"Believe it," Sarraya laughed. "I've seen them. They call them krajats. There are others that aren't that big, but are no less nasty. The desert is a very dangerous place."
"What do they eat?" he demanded. "There's not much out there."
"Each other, most likely," Sarraya shrugged, then she looked him over from top to bottom. "Well, that cloak manages to hide about everything. Since those furry feet kind of look like boots if you don't look very hard, you shouldn't cause a panic."
"Thank you so very much," Tarrin grunted, sliding the visor back over his eyes. Before he put on the cloak, he realized that the hilt of the black-bladed sword under his pack was going to cause a problem. Sarraya solved that by slitting it, so the hilt could come up through it, then using her Druidic magic to seal up the excess so that the cloak hugged the scabbard, to keep blowing sand from seeping under the cloak. She even thoughtfully created a leather hood for the scabbard that tied on, to protect the delicate wire-wrapped hilt from the damage of blowing sand, should they get caught in the storm. That done, Tarrin started off towards the city at a fast walk, which was nearly a running pace for a human. His long, long legs consumed ground with every light step, carrying him towards the lone city in the vast empty wilderness.
As he neared, he got a sense of the randomness of this city. Fences and pens seemed to be erected wherever was convenient outside the walls, turning the trek to the visible gate something of a zigzagging course. Animal manure made every breath of air a riot of unpleasant smell, not to mention making him pick his steps with exceeding care. There were herd animals everywhere, in flocks and groups, staked to the ground alone, wandering aimlessly on ground long since stomped free of grass, kicking up a ceaseless cloud of dust that hung in a pall just over the ground. There were sheep, cattle, horses, goats, and even stranger animals that he'd never seen before. Long-legged animals with huge humps on their backs, which were even taller than he was. Stocky cattle-like animals that had rounded horns rather than straight ones, like a ram, yet were grayish instead of brown. There were even strange long-necked animals with wooly fur, like a sheep, yet stood as tall as a horse. Tending the animals were dark-skinned people that looked like Arakites, but these people were rather skinny, wearing simple homespun tunics or robes, all the men of which wearing a simple white turban on his head, and all of the women wearing a shawl. Many people had similar covers over their eyes as his own, looking to be made of glass or mica. Tarrin wondered idly just how they were made, since the ones on his face did not distort his vision in the slightest. They only dimmed the bright sunlight and cast everything with a slightly violet color. Most glass was wavy or cloudy when one looked through it. That these visors were perfectly polished so that they didn't distort things was remarkable.
Moving through the patchwork of pens and wandering herds, Tarrin made his way towards the city. Most of the people around him didn't pay him all that much mind, although some of them did stare when he came close to their animals. The herd animals, smelling his predator's scent, bleated or cried out in sudden fear, shying away from him, and that reaction made their tenders wonder what had spooked them. Tarrin didn't pay the animals that much attention, keeping one eye on the city, one on the storm, and turning from time to time to see where the airborne trailers were. He judged that he would make the city well before the storm arrived, for he got an idea of its size as moment after moment passed, and the storm didn't seem to get any closer. It truly had to be huge, and still some distance off.
Moving near to the humans gave him a serious lesson in how different things were for him now. They were so small. Before, the tallest humans--aside from certain exceptions--topped out at the base of his chin. Now, he hadn't passed a single human whose turban or shawl reached his collarbones. He felt like he was an adult moving through a group of children. Looking at the people around him without staring, he realized that he truly was Triana's size now. Probably eye to eye with the massive Azakar. He was used to being tall, but he felt distinctly unusual to tower over everyone else. They were children now, little children who would break in his paws if he was too rough with them. Was that how Triana felt when she dealt with humans? Did Azakar feel the same way?
Still musing over it, Tarrin finally reached the city's gates. They were open, and they were busy. The gates were very wide, and through them filed both people and herd animals, being shepharded either in or out. Beyond the gates was a large open area, probably where herds were gathered before moving or just before sale, and inside the simple wooden gates stood two disinterested men wearing a leather cross harness and a plain white kilt-like skirt, and each holding a pike. There was a crest in bronze at the crossing of the leather straps crisscrossing the men's chests, that of a sun cresting a flat horizon. The cross harnesses left most of the men bare from the waist up as the kilts left their legs bare from the knee down to their tied sandals, and their skin was deeply burnished by the sun and the wind. Each wore a small conical helmet, to which was attached a long tail of hair that wavered in the growing breeze heralding the approaching storm. Judging from the rather nonsensical outfits, these guards were purely ceremonial.
"Sarraya, are you still around?" Tarrin asked under his breath.
"Of course I am," she replied from nearby, though she was hidden from sight. "What?"
"Just checking."
As he passed by one of the guards, he noted idly that he was nearly as tall as the man's pike. The guard stared at him for a long moment, but looked away instantly as Tarrin lowered his visored gaze on the man and did not look away.
"Tarrin, pull in your tail," Sarraya hissed in a low whisper. He couldn't hear her wings either, but from the sound of her voice, she had to be right near his ear, which was flattened a bit under the hood. "You're bulging."
He attended to that quickly, pulling his tail off the b
ack of the cloak, pressing it up against his leg and wrapping the excess around his shin and ankle to keep it out of mischief. If anyone noticed, they didn't tell him anything as he passed through the gate and beyond the large pen, moving into the city beyond.
And he was not impressed. This nameless city smelled ten times worse than any city he'd ever visited. It was so bad that he had to put his paw over his nose, giving away the fact that he wasn't just a really tall human. The place was a cesspool of every bad smell he could remember, peppered with brand new horrible smells he couldn't identify. The city streets were unpaved dirt, dirt coated and salted with sand as people's feet and animals' hooves ground the sand into the packed soil of the street. It was a good thing Saranam saw little rain, else the entire city would sink into the quagmire of mud that would surely result. The lack of deep ruts in the streets said that there was little rain here to make paving the streets necessary. But there was water, usually ditches running close to buildings made of brown mud bricks, liquid waste and urine tossed out from the low-built structures' upper story windows. Dead rats and other unpleasant things floated in those open cesspits, which flowed slowly but inexorably downslope, towards the river. The streets were populated with people dressed in plain, rugged robes and mantles of sturdy wool or that cotton-fiber, or plaxat fiber, the super-strong plant fiber clothing the Selani made. He could easily see all of them, for there was nothing to obstruct his view of the streets except for buildings. Not even the herd animals they kept in the city stood at his height, though there were some outside that were taller than him, and that allowed him to see as far down the street as he wished. There was a noticable lack of horses, or of litters or carriages that marked the wealthy. Everyone in this city seemed to work for a living, that, or the wealthy didn't come into the part of the city in which he currently moved.
His first encounter with a Saranite was abrupt. A child, no more than eight, bumped into his leg, then staggered back and fell down on his behind. The child's eyes were at the same level as his knee when he was standing, but now they were just over his ankle. He stopped and looked down at the young Saranite lad, who looked like an Arakite except for being a bit thinner. The boy got a good look at Tarrin's foot, then he stared up at him in slack-jawed awe. He sat there for a very long moment, then in a sudden burst of activity, he scrambled to his feet and rushed away.
The smell of roasting meat seeped in over the horrible miasma in the city, stirring his stomach to respond. That honestly surprised him, given that the place smelled so bad that, if he would have thought of food before that moment, it would have made him throw up. It had been a very long time since he'd had anything filling, and the growing he did while in cat form had burned much of the food he'd managed to eat during that time. Even with the place smelling as awful as it did, he found the need for a good meal irresistable.
Mutton. It was mutton. Most humans didn't like mutton, but to Tarrin it had a texture and flavor that was quite good. The smell was coming from a wide-doored building just down the street, a place that had the look of an inn or tavern. It had no conventional door, just wide shutters that were tied open. There was a window flanking each shutter at the door, which themselves had small shutters opened to each side of them. A piece of faded red cloth, with fringe that had been tattered long ago, was stretched over the door, attached over the shutters and held up by a pair of poles staked into the sandy ground to provide patrons with a bit of shade before entering or leaving.
Now that he noticed them, he saw alot of those shutters. They flanked windows, they were outside doorways even when there were doors. There was not a single door or window he could see that did not have shutters attached, and he understood why. If sandstorms were a fact of life in the region, then the people would obviously have prepared their homes and shops for them. The shutters would keep blowing sand out of their buildings. The slightly scarred and pitted look of the mud brick of the inn showed that sandstorms did come in, and that also explained why he hadn't seen any painted or whitewashed buildings. Everything was of that same mud brick, and it had to be. The blowing sand would scour away whitewash or paint, would strip off polished exteriors of stones and maybe even gouge out the mortar holding them together, leaving them worn and weakened. As damaging as the blowing sand was, it was only sensible to make buildings out of something that was cheap to replace and easy to repair.
The doorway was too small. He almost bumped his head on the entrance as he entered, as he turned to look towards the street warily as a shout arose, turning back around and realizing his peril at the last moment. He very nearly smacked his nose on the wall over the door before ducking under the mud brick wall and the doorframe which was attached to it. He was used to ducking under doors, but that was the first time he'd ever had the top of the door staring him in the face, taking up his entire field of vision when he bothered to look in that direction.
This height was going to take a lot of getting used to.
The interior of the inn was a bit hazy with smoke from a firepit against the right wall, over which roasted an entire lamb. There was boisterous carousing from the twenty or so men who were inside, drinking, eating, and talking among the tables set out in the floor and the booths built against the wall on the opposite side of the firepit. There were two lanky men behind a bar across from the door, and four serving women in very low cut dresses moved quickly and effortlessly among the tables with wooden trays bearing food and drink. It was much like many other taverns he'd seen in his time, but judging by the rather beaten look of the furniture in this place, it wasn't known for its well-mannered patrons. This place was more of a seedy dive than a respectful eating establishment.
Considering who he was, a seedy dive was probably a better place to be than some posh luxury inn. So long as they were willing to give up that roasted lamb, things would be just fine. There was bit of a lull in the conversations as a few of the patrons took notice of him, an unnaturally tall figure covered in a deep cloak. If he were them, he'd take notice too. It was only natural. Tarrin was very much out of place here, and he felt that way keenly. He didn't fear these strangers, not in the same ways that he felt in Dala Yar Arak, but the first twinges of anxiety at being among strangers was beginning to rear up. Probably the two months of being with nobody but Sarraya had dulled him a bit to his feral rejection of people he didn't know and trust. He didn't accept these people, but he didn't feel the same fear that he used to feel to come into their presence and possibly expose himself to whatever danger they posed. Then again, he was so hungry that he didn't really care if he feared them or not. The screaming coming from his belly, awakened by the smell of the roasting lamb, was enough to make him fight a Roc over it.
Money. He didn't have any money. He'd need it to get the lamb. "Sarraya, are you here?" he asked in the unspoken manner of the Cat.
"I'm right here," she said in a whisper. That was when he realized that she was sitting on his shoulder. The cloak's weight caused him to miss her negligible weight.
"I'm going to need some money."
"I'll whip up something for you when you sit down. I'll make a belt pouch and put it on your lap, just so you know where to reach."
"Thanks," he replied sincerely as he stepped deeper into the tavern. Most of the men were quiet now, watching him stride in on his long legs, moving directly to intercept one of the serving women. She was forced to stop in front of him, barely reaching his chest, staring up at him with wide eyes and an open mouth. She was a pretty little girl, with pattern Arakite dark skin, black hair, and brown eyes. She was barely more than sixteen, with a chest not exactly equipped to being hugged by an open neckline, but she had a pleasing silhouette that made up for her lack of bust.
"C-Can I serve you, good master?" she asked hesitantly in Arakite.
"I want the lamb," he replied in fluent Arakite.
"It's not fully cooked yet, good master," she replied. "If you're willing to wait--"
"I'll take it as it is."
"
If you really want it, good master. I'll have someone cut you--"
"You misunderstood me," he said in a calm voice. "I want the lamb. The entire lamb. I'll pay a fair price for it."
"Uh, uh, yes, good master. If you want the whole thing, I'll get it for you. Please find a seat, and I'll tell the barkeep what you want."
That posed him with something of a problem. There was no way he could hide what he was if he ate, but he really had no desire to take the lamb somewhere else. He was tired, and he wanted to sit down and eat it like a civilized person. And he intended to do just that. He'd just sit out of the way of everyone else,
and if they made an issue of it, then he'd deal with them then. Judging by the condition of the men in the tavern, there wasn't a single one there that could even make his eyebrow twitch. None of them could challenge him.
And that gave him a strange sense of security, a sense that made them seem non-threatening despite the fact that they were strangers. He still didn't trust any of them, but knowing that none of them could hurt him, for the first time in quite a while, made him feel confident to be among them. Always before, that knowledge that they couldn't hurt him didn't make any difference. In fact, it made it worse, because he knew they couldn't hurt him, yet he still felt fear, and that made him angry. That anger amplified his fear, which made him angrier, and created a deadly circle that usually made him very easy to rouse to violence. Not this time. He looked at the men around him, most of them staring at him in silence, and he felt very little anxiety being among them. True, there was a bit of apprehension, but nothing like he would usually feel to be in the middle of a bunch of unsavory types like these.
The time away from the others and in cat form really had had an effect on him. He just wondered how long it would last until he went back to normal.
He moved through them, towering over everyone else like an Ungardt in a nursery, until he reached an empty booth in the back corner. He undid his sword and pulled it out from under his cloak, then laid it on the booth's table near the back. Then he gathered up the cloak and sat down, having to fold his legs a bit to get them under the table without lifting it off the floor with his knees. When he did so, he felt a sudden weight on his lap. He parted the cloak and looked down, and saw a seamless leather pouch resting on his lap, and the weight inside told him that it had something inside it, like gold. Sarraya's handiwork.
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