The Parched Sea

by Troy Denning

  Blowing sand and darkness was all he saw.

  At last Lander closed his eye and stopped to consider his options. At the most, he knew, his companions could only be a hundred yards away. In the dark and the storm, the distance might as well have been a hundred miles. Trying to track them would be as useless as trying to out-scream the blustering wind.

  With his compass, he could easily continue toward the oasis, but that would not help him locate his companions. They might have lost their bearings and be riding in a completely different direction. In that case, his own movement would simply put more distance between them.

  The best thing I can do, Lander realized, is wait as close as possible to the point where we separated. Perhaps Bhadla will be able to retrace his steps when he realizes that I’ve disappeared.

  As the Harper turned his camel toward the shelter of the great dune behind him, he heard a camel’s bellow to his right. Though the roar was faint and muted by the wind, Lander cringed. There was a note of urgency and terror to the bray that no storm could muffle.

  He started forward in what he guessed to be the general direction of the sound. In the howling wind, one roar alone would hardly be enough to lead him to his companions, but it was all Lander had to follow. Besides, it occurred to him that his guides might be tormenting the beast so that its cries would lead him to them.

  Lander rode a hundred steps forward and stopped. No bellows sounded. He turned his head to and fro, trying catch a glimpse of a silhouette or the hint of some sound other than the interminable wind. There was nothing.

  Finally the Sembian glimpsed a bulky shadow stumbling toward him. He urged his mount forward when he saw that it was a limping camel. When he came closer still, Lander recognized the beast as Musalim’s and went forward to grasp its reins. The saddle was empty, and the camel seemed dazed and weak.

  Lander inspected the beast from his own camel. There were no wounds, but a dark blotch stained the saddle. He touched the stain and found it warm and sticky. Musalim’s blood, he guessed. Lander dropped the dazed beast’s reins and drew his sword.

  When he turned back toward the place from which Musalim’s camel had come, the Harper glimpsed a shadow rising out of the sand. It was about the size of a man, but the legs and arms seemed to stick from the body at peculiar angles, like a reptile’s.

  Lander needed to see no more to know that Musalim, and probably Bhadla too, had ridden into an ambush. The Sembian slapped the flat of his sword against his camel’s shoulder, but the sluggish beast refused to charge. The shadow raised a crossbow and a pair of yellow, egg-shaped eyes flashed in the dark night.

  The bolt took Lander below the right collarbone, nearly knocking him from his saddle. His arm went numb, and the sword dropped from his hand. Grasping the reins with his left hand, the Sembian jerked his camel around. The beast reacted slowly, resentftil of Lander’s harsh manipulations. Two more shadows rose out of the blowing sand.

  “Turn, you stubborn scion of Malar!”

  A bolt struck the camel’s flank, and Lander felt the beast quiver. It decided to obey and sprang away with the proper sense of urgency.

  The wounded Harper dropped the reins and slumped forward, sprawling face-down over the beast’s hump. Agony assaulted him in crashing waves, but Lander hardly realized it. He was only dimly aware of his knees squeezing his mount’s hump and the fingers of his good hand clutching its coat. Lander could not tell how long the camel continued to gallop. He knew only the agony in his chest, the warm wetness trickling down his arm, and the black waves assaulting his mind.

  Eventually, the camel slowed to a trot. It could have been hours after the ambush or just minutes. Lander could not tell. He tried to sit upright and realized the effort would leave him unconscious. He settled for holding on.

  At last the camel collapsed. It did not lie down or even stop moving. The beast just belched forth a plaintive moan, stumbled once on its buckling legs, then, in midstride, it pitched Lander face-first into the sand.

  They lay together in a twisted heap, the camel wheezing in shallow gasps and Lander moaning in disjointed pain. The sand worked its way into their wounds and welled up against their windward sides, but neither the man nor the beast showed any sign of caring. Soon, the camel stopped panting, and Lander was alone in the storm.

  Four

  By dawn the god of tempests, Kozah, had vented his wrath. The storm died, leaving a hot, dreary calm in its place. The heavy, windborne sand dropped back to the ground, but a pall of silt lingered high in the heavens, diffusing At’ar’s morning radiance and setting the eastern horizon ablaze with crimson light. Ruha knew it would be many more days before the dust returned to the ground and Kozah’s mark disappeared from the morning sky.

  The widow went to the oasis pond and knelt at its edge, then rinsed the night’s grit from her mouth. She and Kadumi had spent the night huddled under the remnants of her khreima, but the wind had worked its way under the heavy camel-hair tarp, covering her aba with sand and coating her nose and mouth with dust. More than once during the night, she had awakened with the feeling of being suffocated and found herself spitting out a mouthful of powdery silt.

  Kadumi came and stood behind Ruha until she put her veil back in place, then kneeled beside her and splashed water over his grimy face. “Kozah must be angry with At’ar again,” the boy said. “Maybe he saw the faithless harlot entering N’asr’s tent. I have not seen such a storm in a year.” He looked toward the camp.

  The boy’s camels were couched near where he and Ruha had slept, though so much sand had gathered against their windward sides that they looked more like a string of miniature dunes than a line of dromedaries. Beyond the half-buried beasts, the fallen tents of the Qahtani were covered by small knolls of sand. The only clue to what lay beneath the drifts were protruding bits of dyed cloth. Mounds of yellow sand buried even the stone-covered graves Ruha and Kadumi had dug for Ajaman and his father’s family.

  “I don’t think Kozah is angry with At’ar,” Ruha said, astounded by how tranquil the oasis looked compared to the gruesome scene she and Kadumi had found yesterday. “I think he is offended by the sight of the massacre.”

  Kadumi’s mouth tightened, and he surveyed the oasis with narrowed eyes. “Then let us hope we can reach your father’s tribe before this caravan of fork-tongued monsters,” he said. “It would not be good if they made Kozah angry again.”

  The boy glanced at the sky for several moments, then looked back to Ruha and said, “With the dust from yesterday’s storm still hanging in the sky, at least it will be a cool day. We’ll trot our mounts. With luck, we won’t lose them.”

  Ruha caught his arm, concerned. Pushing camels hard over long distances dehydrated them, which could be fatal for both animal and rider if they happened to collapse too far from water.

  “Do you think it’s wise to take such a risk?” she asked. “Even with favorable weather and extra mounts, we’re a day and a half behind the caravan. If the drivers know where they’re going and want to get there fast, we can ride all your camels to death only to find more corpses at Rahalat.”

  “The Mtair Dhafir are allies of the Qahtan. It would be dishonorable not to alert them to the danger,” Kadumi said, freeing his arm. “Besides, I thought you’d want to warn your father’s tribe.”

  “I do, but I don’t want to die trying—especially since the strangers could already be there.”.

  “The caravan might have reached Rahalat already,” Kadumi conceded, “but I don’t think so. Whoever they are, they’re not from Anauroch, so I don’t think it’ll be easy for them to find the shunned mountain.”

  “They found El Ma’ra easily enough,” Ruha pointed out.

  Kadumi scowled. “Is there some reason you don’t want to go to the Mtair Dhafir?”

  Behind her veil, Ruha bit her lip. Her brother-in-law was right, she realized. She was not anxious to return to the Mtair Dhafir because of the reception she would receive. Forcing herself to put aside her a
nxiety, the widow shook her head. “No, we must warn my father’s tribe. I just don’t want to risk our lives for no reason.”

  “The caravan might be slower than you think,” he said, “or it might not know about Rahalat. We can’t tell about these things. The only thing we can do is get there as fast as we can.”

  Kadumi turned toward his camels again. This time Ruha followed, feeling a little foolish at being lectured by a thirteen-year-old boy.

  They wasted little time preparing to leave. While Kadumi watered his animals and filled half-a-dozen waterskins, Ruha packed some food and their belongings into a pair of kuerabiches. After tying the sacks onto a saddle, the pair mounted and, ignoring the bellowed protests of the camels, started westward at a trot.

  The storm had spread a deep layer of shifting sand over the ground, but the unsteady footing did not bother their mounts. With the broad, fleshy pads of their feet, the camels sank less than two inches with each step and barely slowed their pace. Ruha and Kadumi rode all day, changing mounts every hour to avoid exhausting them. Other than these brief pauses, they did not stop. By midday, they had reached the region of the great white dunes, and by dusk Rahalat was poking its gray crown above the horizon.

  They stopped long enough to eat a meal of camel’s milk and sun-dried fruits in weary silence, then continued their bone-jarring ride in the dark. They circled a few miles north, just to be sure that they did not overtake either the caravan or the one-eyed stranger. The pair did not stop or allow themselves any rest until the moon’s milky light began to fade and their sore backs felt like they would crack with the next step. When they did lie down, covering themselves only with their night cloaks, they did not even notice the bone-chilling cold.

  They rose with At’ar and continued westward in the dawn’s ruddy light. Rahalat now loomed directly ahead, its gray crags obscuring the largest part of the western horizon. Ruha could even see the shunned mountain’s familiar slopes of loose rock and the boulders strewn about its base. Remembering that they had been nearly seventy miles away at this time the previous morning, the widow found it difficult to believe they had come so far so quickly.

  Ruha and Kadumi rode for several more hours, and the sand gave way to stony ridges. As they started up the first rise at the base of the mountain, an amarat sounded. The pair stopped their camels side-by-side and waited for someone to challenge them.

  “We made it,” Kadumi announced. “If guards are posted, there’s still a tribe.”

  As he spoke, a short, gaunt sentry appeared from the other side of the ridge. He waved Ruha and Kadumi the last hundred yards up the hill, then awaited them with his hands on his hips.

  As the widow and her brother-in-law reached the summit, Ruha recognized the sentry as Al’Aif, a ferocious warrior who had killed more men than anyone else in the tribe. The left side of his face was marred by four red scars where a lion had mauled him, and a sentry’s dagger had left his right eyelid folded over at the corner. Al’Aif was also one of the men who had insisted that Ruha be banished from the tribe.

  For the moment, Al’Aif seemed content to ignore Ruha. He eyed Kadumi’s string of white camels appreciatively. “A fine string of goouds,” he commented to the boy, using the special term that applied to mature camels. “I have heard that the sheikh of the Bordjias lost ten white camels.”

  Kadumi smiled proudly. “He did not lose them. Kadumi of the Qahtan took them,” the boy bragged.

  The frank admission elicited an appreciative smile. “The Bordjias are our allies,” Al’Aif said. “I hope you did not kill many men when you stole them.”

  Kadumi shrugged. “No, not many.”

  Al’Aif chuckled at the boy’s swagger, then eyed Ruha. “I thought the Mtair Dhafir rid of you.”

  “And I of them,” she answered, lifting her chin. “But I return out of duty, not desire, Al’Aif.”

  Kadumi frowned at the apparent enmity between the two. “We are all that remains of the Qahtan. We have come to warn your sheikh of the danger that destroyed our tribe.”

  Al’Aif raised an eyebrow. “Does this danger have to do with black-robed men and a caravan larger than ten tribes?”

  “How did you know?” Ruha and Kadumi asked together.

  Al’Aif pointed to the south. “They are camped at the Bitter Well. They have sent two jackals with tongues of sugared water to speak of alliances.” The Mtair gestured at one of Kadumi’s camels, then said, “If you’ll lend me a ride, I’ll take you to camp. I want the sheikh to speak with you as soon as possible.”

  Al’Aif led the party to a gulch filled with the drooping, twiggy branches of ghaf trees and lined with tasseled sedges of qassis bushes. The tinkle of a tiny stream rang from the bottom of the draw, and the camels, thirsty from yesterday’s hard ride, bellowed angrily at not being allowed to stop and drink.

  As the trio rode into camp, the old women and the children gathered outside their tents. When Ruha passed, many of them hissed and trilled disapprovingly. One little boy even yelled at her to go away.

  Kadumi’s outrage showed on his scowling face. “This is a disgrace,” he uttered, addressing Al’Aif. “Do the Mtair Dhafir treat all their guests so wretchedly?”

  “They do not mean to offend you,” Ruha said. “Their disdain is for me alone. There is something you should—”

  Al’Aif lifted a hand to silence her. “They believe Ruha has shamed the tribe by violating her purdah,” said the gaunt Mtair. “To them, it looks as if she is returning to her father.”

  The older warrior’s words satisfied Kadumi. “Of course,” the boy said, smiling and nodding to the angry women. “I should have realized how her return would look to such an honorable tribe.”

  Behind the boy’s back, Ruha raised an eyebrow to Al’Aif. The last thing she had expected him to do was lie on her behalf. The Mtair responded with a quick shrug, then nodded toward her father’s tent and continued forward. Ruha could not guess the meaning of the gaunt warrior’s gesture.

  Outside the sheikh’s khreima, they left their camels with a herdboy. Al’Aif entered the tent without announcement, as was the right of any warrior in the Mtair Dhafir. He motioned for Ruha and Kadumi to follow.

  Inside, Ruha’s father sat upon a gaily colored ground carpet at the far end of the tent. He was a bony old man with cloudy eyes and a wispy gray beard. Across from him sat a man wearing a black burnoose. Though his face was swaddled in a turban, the cloth had been pulled down to reveal a silky mustache and sharp features. In front of each man sat a small silver cup filled with hot salted coffee.

  Behind the stranger stood a second man, this one with skin and hair as pale as white sand. A hooded robe of deep purple hung off his shoulders, and a pair of silver bracers encircled his wrists. He held himself in the humble posture of a servant, but when his flashing blue eyes inspected Ruha and her companions, the widow immediately suspected that this man was more than he wished to seem.

  The sheikh and the seated stranger continued speaking in low, muted tones, neither appearing to notice the trio’s presence.

  Al’Aif stepped forward. “Sheikh Sabkhat,” he called.

  Ruha’s father scowled. Addressing the seated man, he said, “Excuse me, El Zarud.” As the sheikh looked in the trio’s direction, his eyes seemed glazed and vacant. “What?”

  Al’Aif pointed at Kadumi and Ruha. “I bring visitors from the Qahtan,” he said. “They have come to warn you about the strangers.”

  “Warn me?” the sheikh frowned. “Of what? The Zhentarim are our friends.” He waved a hand to dismiss the trio, then looked back to Zarud with a smile.

  Kadumi’s jaw dropped, and he seemed too surprised at the sheikh’s rudeness to speak.

  The gaunt Mtair turned to Ruha. “I have never seen him like this.” Al’Aif put his mouth close to the widow’s ear so that Kadumi would not hear his question, then whispered, “Is it magic?”

  Ruha now understood why the gaunt warrior had lied to Kadumi. He believed the strangers were us
ing magic to influence the sheikh and wanted her to confirm his suspicions. The widow placed her veiled lips next to the scarred man’s ear, then whispered, “I had never thought to see the day when the mighty Al’Aif asked a witch for help.”

  The Mtair shrugged sheepishly. “The enemy of my enemy is my friend,” he said, repeating an old Bedine saying. “Now, tell me what you can about what is happening here.”

  Kadumi frowned at their secretive exchange, but the boy still seemed too confused by the sheikh’s behavior to question his companions.

  Ruha looked toward the other end of the tent and noticed the pale stranger watching her with his stony eyes. When she met his gaze, the man did not look away.

  “Well?” Al’Aif prodded.

  The widow studied her glassy-eyed father for a few moments. The sheikh was listening intently to the muted words of the seated stranger and was repeatedly nodding his head in agreement. Her father had always been a careful listener, but there was something in the steady rhythm of his bobbing head that made her think he was not so much listening as being mesmerized. She had no way of telling for sure, but it seemed to her that something had separated her father from his wits.

  Ruha looked to the Mtair and nodded.

  “As I thought!” Before the widow realized what was happening, Al’Aif drew his jambiya and started toward other side of the tent. “Out, dogs and sons of dogs!” he yelled. “Release the sheikh, or your brothers will lap your blood from the carpet!”

  “Al’Aif!” roared Ruha’s father. “You dare defile the hospitality of my khreima?”

  The sheikh’s protest did not slow the warrior. In four steps, he was at the back of the seated stranger, the blade of his weapon pressed against the man’s throat. “Forgive me, Sheikh,” he said, “but they have used magic. You’re under their power.”

  “Don’t be foolish,” snapped the sheikh.

  The pale stranger frowned in concentration, then began to fumble about in the pockets of his robe. Guessing that he was preparing to cast a spell, Ruha reached for her own dagger and started across the room. Before the widow had gone two steps, Kadumi dashed past her and pressed the tip of his jambiya against the belly of the purple-robed man.