Battle Cry

by Lara Lee Hunter

  “The man that had the sword told me that he had turned the soldiers into art. He said he made a garden of his art. I guess they just found them.”

  Lauren said, “And we shall bear the blame for that as well. We better get going before they decide to ride out this way. They’ll be smart enough to look behind the nearest biggest wall of sand they can, and that would be this one.”

  **

  They fled deeper into the desert. The wind blew sheets of sand into their faces, stinging their eyes and noses. It got into their mouth and when they did try to drink, water stuck in their throat, making it hard to swallow. It was Lauren who suggested the scarves that they had been given at the Temple. They were meant to be gifts to a priestess at a temple and the city that might or might not exist. Lauren pointed out that they were thin and pliable and would keep the sand out of their noses and mouths so they should use them for that purpose.

  Even with that small barrier against the misery, the sand was a constant reminder that they were no longer in familiar territory. The landscape seemed ever the same: dull. It was filled with brown, and filled with shifting sand dunes that rose and fell like ancient civilizations, rebuilding only to fall again every few moments.

  They had been wandering for the first three days, being sure to use the tool that Praxis had pressed into Reena’s hand. He had called it an accomplice, and said if it failed that they should follow the brightest star above, the North Star. Reena knew that star because she had been following it most of her life, but in the woods they called it the Loan Maiden.

  After traveling through the first night in the bitterest of colds with the sand blowing into their skins so harshly, the next day they all had small red marks on their flash. So they decided to try traveling during the day. That only lasted about three hours before all of them realized that it was utterly impossible.

  The desert at night was terrifying, filled with strange creatures that scuttled along the sand, their skeletal little bodies poised to strike. The first night one of them did strike at a member of their tribe. Reena had never gotten to know that man very well, but she still mourned his death as he thrashed and rolled about on the sand, his face contorted as the poison ran through his system.

  “It’s like werebane only in an animal’s tail instead of the plant.” That was what Lucas had said as he stood over the man looking at his still and lifeless body. “Perhaps we should pluck a few of those little creatures, get a little revenge at the same time we make a weapon against those who might need one pulled against them.”

  The next day after they had discovered that the desert during the day was even more abysmal, they had woken to a sunset that was spectacular. The sky was filled with Vermillion in carnelian streaks across a deep blue dome whose outer edges were tarnished gold and silver. The sun had hung in a bloated orange red ball while the moon, a phantom on the eastern edge of the sky hung next to a few pale stars.

  At that moment Reena realized that even a place so desolate and barren as the desert could have some beauty to it. But a few hours later, after that howling wind had cranked up and the sand had begun to blow, she was beginning to wonder if she had ever seen that beautiful sky at all.

  When dawn came they all slumped into the best shelter they could find. The first day out they had learned that there were no trees, very little stone and absolutely nothing to erect a tent against. Even if they did erect the tent with the poles the wind would blow it down on them. After waking up in a sweltering tangle of leather and limbs they had devised a method in which they merely rolled into the shelters and used it as both shade and camouflage.

  This particular night they got lucky and found a small overhanging cliff that would shelter them. They sat there, exhausted and disheartened, and watched the sunrise while they ate the last of the fresh deer meat and ground radish.

  “We’ve got to figure out whether or not there’s really water in those plants.” Deal patted his hands together like he was giving himself a round of applause for the suggestion.

  Lucas ruffled the younger man’s hair fondly. “Do you have any idea how we plan to do this son?”

  Deal said, “As a matter of fact, yes I do. I was thinking… Do you remember outside the temples? The way they had those little wooden things stuck into the side of the barrels?”

  Lucas said, “Yes, I know exactly what you’re talking about, why? Oh never mind, you are thinking we could make something similar and use it to tap into the this thing?”

  Deal’s grin grew wider. “I don’t think we’re going to have to make anything to fit into his cactus.” He reached into a pocket of his leather breeches and pulled out one of the small carvings. “I stole this from one of the temples.”

  Lauren gasped, her face going pale. “You stole something from the house of the gods and goddesses? Don’t you know what bad luck that is?”

  Lucas answered for Deal. “Don’t you know think we have had about enough of bad luck? Perhaps the gods placed it in his path. Without it we would all be dead, do you think that would serve the gods and goddesses?”

  If Lauren wanted to argue that logic, she chose not to and Reena was fairly certain she saw the woman’s lips moving in a silent prayer.

  Deal said, “What about the cactus right over there. It’s big enough, it’s bigger than me anyway. If any one of them have water in it should be in that one.”

  Dax joined in the conversation with a comment of, “Wait, how will we know if it’s drinkable?”

  Deal shrugged. “I was just going to drink it.”

  Lucas said, “Boy, you’re brave, I’ll give you that, though not very smart.”

  Deal managed to look both wounded and amused at the same time. “What does that mean?”

  Reena said, “It means if the water isn’t drinkable and you drink it, you’ll be dead.”

  Deal’s forehead wrinkled and his face fell at the dismal prospect of his own death. “I hadn’t thought about it that way.”

  Lucas said, a trifle sarcastically, “Oh? I had not noticed.”

  Lauren said, “To see if it’s drinkable we really do have to drink it, or find something that needs water to survive and give it to it. If it dies do we know it isn’t drinkable.”

  A giant blackbird with an ugly ruffle of yellow feathers around his neck had been hovering above them for days. Lucas had said that it was a carrion crow, a death eater. When the strange little scuttling insect had stung and killed one of their tribe, many of them had flown down and they had had to fight the disgusting and vile creatures off in order to keep them from carrying his body completely off and devouring it. They wound up building a cairn out of what rocks they could salvage. None of them bothered saying that it was highly possible that the birds had come back after they were gone and taken their bodies anyway, it was just comforting to know that they had kept them from it as long as they could. The birds landed with an ungainly flop, and hopped towards them.

  Deal made a face and waved a hand in front of his nose. The bird’s scent was strong, musky and incredibly odiferous. “Give it to that damn bird.”

  Lucas said, “I take it back, you might be smart after all.”

  Tapping into the cactus proved to be a harder feat than they all could have imagined. Its outer skin was hard, almost impenetrable and those silvery spines that clung all over it that everyone claimed to be poisonous were definitely sharp, but apparently not lethal as Lucas stung himself repeatedly and did not die.

  Night had completely fallen, black and almost completely devoid of starlight except for the few pale little bursts of light around the still ghostly circle of moon before they figured it out. They stripped the spines off, having discovered that they were stiff and unyielding and thinking that they might make some kind of weapon on them.

  The outer skin revealed an even tougher inner skin. That frustrated Lucas so much that he grabbed his little hand axe and ran at the cactus with it over his head with screams coming from his mouth. The hatchet sank into the tough inner
skin and stayed there, wedged into it while he stood there looking silly and scratching his head. It took three men to remove the hatchet.

  Just then one of the women suggested that rather than try to cut into the very heart of the thing they simply tap into one of its upraised arms. Since they had nothing to lose and the inner skin was still resisting her efforts to break through it, they decided to give it a try. Reena took up her sword and slashed at it expecting to meet resistance strong enough to break the sword and her arm, but instead the cactus had sliced off neatly to reveal a smaller jointed section within.

  Deal used Lucas’s hatchet to open the small joint and stuck the spigot within. A tan, milky liquid began to spill out. Everyone took a step back, their faces creasing with revulsion that quickly turned to wonder as the liquid lightened and began to run clear and fast. Lucas gathered up some of it into a small brownstone with the depression in the middle and set it near where the bird was flapping around on the ground. Instantly it came over, stuck its head into the stone and stuck the water back with the noisy slurp that made all of them shutter.

  “I still don’t think this proves anything,” Lauren said as she watched the bird. “I think that disgusting thing could probably drink the worst of water and survive.”

  Deal said, “You are probably right but we don’t have anything else to test. If the dang thing doesn’t die I’m going to try it and see if the water is any good because, quite honestly, the water that’s been in these bags all these days has gone limp and lifeless and I would absolutely love to have something colder to drink.”

  The bird didn’t die. It took to its wing and flew overhead, its shadow blotting out the moon for long moments. They all watched it go and then Deal turned to the plug he placed in the cactus. He removed the plug and allowed the spigot to open once more, and once more clear water that looked and smelled like water came forth. Deal put his face close to the spigot and drank a small mouthful. He recapped it and sat down to wait; there was nothing else to be done and they all knew it.

  When Reena awoke the next evening the first thing she wondered was whether or not Deal was still alive. He was, and he was grinning like he had just won some huge prize. He was propped up against the rocks and his sunburned face wore a broad grin that was not only irresistible but infectious. It didn’t take them long to decide the water was worth trying and soon they all had their fill.

  To Reena the water tasted slightly gritty, a little alkaline, but it was refreshing and so much better than the remnants of the water they had from the city. It was extreme water and it wasn’t the freshest of waters, but at least it was water. They had been on the verge of running out, so it was a relief to know that they had a source. That is, as long as the cactus grew along their route.

  That put a new worry into her mind though. What if the cactus didn’t grow very far into the desert? How far did they grow into the desert and would there be more when they needed them the most? She decided there was nothing she could do about that if there weren’t any except to be prepared for that to happen. They found larger cacti that night and drained them dry, filling up the rapidly emptying water bags and as many spare containers as they could manage. There were a lot of them, and they sweated a lot during the day even as they slept. They were going to need as much hydration as they could get.

  The next two nights were much like every other night. They put 1 foot in front of the other, plodding along. The sand gave way below their feet, threatening to trip them and knock them to the shifting desert floor with every step. The death birds flew overhead and the moon just grew paler. The cold got worse it seemed; in some places it was deeper and the valley that they were passing through was deep, cut between what appeared to be two sand mountains with a channel between. There was no need to ask directions or to wonder if they were going in the right way, as there was only one way that they could go there.

  They broke free of that little bottleneck that night and morning found them staring at a ring of trees in the distance. Reena blinked twice, wondering if they had somehow managed to turn around and make a giant circle. It looked just like her woods, her homelands and when she looked over at Deal she saw that he felt the same way.

  Lucas said, “It isn’t the same. It looks the same but — look there, look at those trees. See how they come to an almost flat top instead of a hard point?”

  He was right, but if they weren’t near their own woods then where were they? Reena had begun to wonder if what they were looking at was one of the devil tracks of the desert cold, if it was all just a vision sent down by the gods to tease and provoke them.

  Lauren said, “It looks like the desert surrounds the entire place. Could a city be sitting in the middle of the desert and nobody know about it?”

  Lucas shook his head, “there are no buildings, if it was a city there would be buildings.”

  Reena said, “I’m going to go check it out.”

  Deal said, “Me too! I mean, really what is the worst thing that could happen? We could find out that there’s really nothing there except more sand? I have to at least go check it out.”

  They were all weary and exhausted and with every step they took toward the small green oasis they were certain that it was going to vanish. Reena was pretty sure that it would be impossible for them all to be having the same dream yet they did seem to be. As they drew closer she could hear the sounds of life coming from within the small grassy expanse: horses and voices raised in conversations and laughter, and odd tinkling clatter that might’ve been music and a few other sounds as well, including the shrieks of large birds.

  As they drew even closer they began to smell a delectable aroma that had to be food. Reena’s belly growled loudly and she looked around to see if anyone else had noticed the sound. All of their own bellies were answering in kind. The scent was unfamiliar and yet it was so good it drew them forward.

  They were all walking cautiously, their hands very close to their weapons and their eyes scanning the trees and the open spaces between them for any danger.

  The sand ended abruptly, just terminated at the end of a grassy mat. The grass itself was tough, springy and dark green, almost a dusty green rather than a bright and brilliant one. The trees were tall and unfolded long limbs with needles similar to the ones in her own woods, but there were also other trees, ones that none of them had ever seen before. They were almost stocky and their trunks looked as if somebody had hewed them into diamond shapes within. The trees spread out long and drooping leaves that looked like water fronds and in some plants the leaves were heart-shaped, almost like fans.

  They broke through the trees, which was in fact a scant covering to find themselves staring at a large encampment. Reena’s mouth fell open; she was pretty sure that she had a bruise on the bottom of her jaw from how hard it hit her breastbone.

  They had all seen rudimentary tents in their lives, but this was nothing like the ones they had known. They were vast, covering lots of ground. They stood higher than any man and they were richly decorated with brilliant colors: scarlet, a sunny lemon yellow, and even glowing oranges.

  A man came walking towards them and it was obvious by his appearance that he was somebody important. He walked with his head held high, his shoulders squared. His hair was long and black, pulled behind him and held in a simple band. The ends of that long hair drifted over his shoulder, while his robes were coarse but beautifully colored and decorated.

  Behind him were many other people. Most of them had the same coloring as the man walking towards them: dark hair and eyes, and all of them also wore robes similar to what he wore. On their feet they wore plain and simple sandals and Reena wondered how it was that they survived out here, in the middle of all this nothingness. And why.

  The leader of the tribe stopped in front of them and said, “Greetings. I am Damien, I am the leader of the Nomads. You are the first people from either city to find your way here in centuries. Most get lost in the desert long before they make it here.”


  Deal sputtered out, “We traveled at night so maybe the gods could not play any tricks on us. Reena said an old man told her that the devil would trick us out there in the desert, but we never saw any.”

  If Damien were upset about being addressed by such a young man his face did not show it; in fact he looked absolutely amused. “I often think the gods play tricks on many of us and for reasons all their own. Then again I think we often play the worst tricks on ourselves. Would you share fires and our food?”

  Lucas gave Reena a meaningful look and she realized that everyone from the gathered tribes of the woods was waiting for her to speak. She had forgotten once again that she was the leader of this small and ragged tribe. She stepped forward and said, “Yes, we will. You will have our complete thanks for allowing us to share with you. Also, we have some food as well that we would like to share with you.”

  She fumbled in her pack but Damien held out a hand and said in a gentle voice, “You do not have much to spare and you have a long way to go yet if you’re looking to cross the desert to the city beyond. We can spare you some things but you should save what you have.”

  Reena wanted to say that they did not want to take from this tribe, that they did not want to remove from their camp the things that they might need to actually survive, but she knew that to do so would be an insult to their hospitality.

  Damien led them toward the tents and the fire set up in front of the largest one. All of his people followed close behind, striking up conversations with the members of Reena’s tribe. She was a trifle uneasy from Damien’s words. She wanted to ask about those words, but it seemed they had arrived at the middle of the dinner hour and now was not the time to ask those types of questions.