The Parched sea

moonlit sands, and a heavy sense of impending doom settled over Ruha.

The others stepped out of the tent, then Al'Aif silently motioned for them to follow him. The scarred warrior led the small group across the gulch, then around the shoulder of the mountain. After perhaps an hour of picking their way past thorny salt-bushes and scrub brush, the scar-faced warrior stopped at the edge of a small draw. In the bottom of the dry wadi were the milky silhouettes of Kadumi's camels and the darker outline of his brown gelding. The gelding and two of the white camels were fitted with saddles, while the remaining beasts were loaded with baggage.

Kadumi pointed at the third saddle. 'That doesn't belong to me,' he said. At El Ma'ra, he and Ruha had outfitted their beasts from the possessions of the dead tribesman, but they had only needed two saddles and had not thought to pick up an extra one.

Al'Aif laid a hand on the youth's shoulder. 'Consider it a gift from one warrior to another.'

Kadumi smiled at the older man. 'Thank you, Al'Aif. Some day, I shall repay you a dozenfold.'

'When you are the sheikh of the reborn Qahtan, no doubt,' the scar-faced warrior said, giving Ruha a salacious glance. He turned to Lander. 'Find someplace to hide until morning. The Zhentarim have sent spies to watch us, and they are lurking about in the sands. You will find it easier to find their trails and avoid their hiding places during the day.'

The berrani nodded. 'Sound advice.'

'Go with the favor of Kozah, berrani,' Al'Aif said, turning back toward camp. 'You shall need it.'

'My thanks for our rescue.'

'No need to thank me.' The scar-faced warrior did not look back. 'If I had known you were doing so well on your own, I would not have bothered.'

The trio descended into the wadi and inspected Kadumi's animals. Their humps were firm from a day of good grazing, and their bellies were bloated with a fresh watering. The baggage camels were loaded with full waterskins, a khreima, and kuerabiches filled with dried fruits, meats, and extra clothes. There were even two scimitars, a pair of bows with two fulls quivers, and an extra jambiya.

After he had finished his inspection, Lander said, 'It appears Al'Aif is truly anxious to be rid of us. We have everything we need for a long journey.'

'He is truly a generous man,' Ruha commented cynically. 'But where are we going?'

Taking the three heavy cloaks off a baggage camel, Lander said, 'That depends upon what your tribe does and where the Zhentarim go, at least for me.'

'Why?' Ruha asked. 'What are the Zhentarim to you?'

Draping a cloak over her shoulders, the berrani said, 'The Zhentarim are evil, rapacious, and they intend to enslave the peoples of the desert. I have come to help the Bedine defeat them.'

'How?' Kadumi asked. 'If an entire tribe cannot defeat them, what can you do?'

Lander regarded the boy with an even, honest expression. 'I don't know yet.'

Kadumi shrugged. 'Well, they are our enemies also. We may as well ride together-for a time, at least.'

The youth began to untether the camels. Lander joined him, leaving Ruha to wonder what the stranger really wanted from the Bedine.

Once they had checked the saddles and strung the baggage camels into a caravan line, Lander led the trio up the wadi. When the dry ravine ended, they dismounted and ascended onto the breezy shoulder of Rahalat.

Ruha envied the grace with which the berrani led the way over the broken ground, for she found the going hard on the steep terrain-especially since, as a woman, it was her duty to lead the baggage string. Several times she almost turned an ankle, and once she lost her balance as they topped a twenty-foot cliff.

As she crossed a rocky spine running between a pair of thirty-foot precipices, Ruha decided that it might be best for Kadumi to lead the baggage camels. Before she could speak, the hollow knell of a goat bell sounded behind her. Her first thought was that the animal making the sound belonged to the Zhentarim, for the Mtair Dhafir kept no goats. Bringing the incantation for a wind wall to mind, she spun around ready to cast the spell and push her enemies off the mountain.

There was no one behind her. Without turning around, she asked, 'Lander, Kadumi, did you hear anything?'

'Yes, down there,' Lander replied.

'No, over here,' Kadumi countered.

Ruha turned and saw Lander peering off of one side of the spine and Kadumi off of the other. The bell sounded again, and this time she realized it came from inside her head.

The widow's companions realized the same thing. Kadumi blanched and covered his ears with his hands, while Lander simply shook his head, vainly trying to clear it.

'Rahalat!' Kadumi gasped.

The youth began tugging on his camel reins, trying to turn his gelding around and start down. When the confused beast looked over the precipices to either side of it, it would not move. Lander grasped the boy's shoulder. 'What's Rahalat?'

'The mountain spirit,' Ruha explained.

'She does not want us here,' Kadumi added, still trying to turn his camels around.

'A ghost?' inquired Lander.

Ruha shook her head. 'A goddess.'

'Rahalat was a shunned woman,' Kadumi explained. 'Her khowwan abandoned her here, and she claimed the oasis as her home. She was very bitter and used her magic to prevent any tribe from grazing here.'

The bells sounded again, but this time they seemed to come from all sides. Kadumi dropped the camel reins and started down the mountain, abandoning the confused beasts.

'During a drought, the Dakawa murdered her,' Ruha continued, not attempting to stop her brother-in-law. 'According to legend, the spring turned to blood. For the next ten years, anything that drank from it perished. Now, every tribe that camps at Rahalat must sacrifice a camel to the mountain goddess or the water goes bad.'

Looking after Kadumi, Lander said, 'We can't go back. When the sheikh hears we're missing, he'll search everywhere for us.'

A terrible clatter sounded from above, and the air filled with the bleating of goats. A moment later, a herd of several dozen of the beasts materialized from the boulders on the slope above the rocky spine, then started moving down the mountain. The camels began backing away nervously, their footing coming precariously close to the cliffs to either side.

Kadumi called, 'Come with me, you fools, or you will be driven off the cliffs with my camels!'

'We can't abandon the camels,' Lander said to Ruha. 'Without them, we're dead.'

'And if we stay, we are also dead,' Ruha answered, watching Kadumi descend the mountain. The widow did not blame him for leaving.

Lander was not intimidated, though. He started toward the goats, waving his arms and crying, 'Go back to where you came from! Get out of here!'

Kadumi's brown gelding tried to turn and flee, then slipped and lost its footing. With a terrified bellow, it plunged off the cliff on the backside of the mountain, its body bouncing off the rocks with a series of muffled thuds.

Ruha realized that, whether or not he was a fool to challenge Rahalat, Lander was right about one thing: they could not afford to lose their camels. She waved her hand at the top of the rocky spine, at the same time whispering the incantation she had brought to mind earlier.

The breeze shifted, then whistled as it wove itself into an impenetrable wall in the spot she had chosen. The goats stumbled into the invisible barrier, then began to batter it with their horns or try to climb over.

Lander turned and stared at Ruha with an astonished expression. 'Did you do that?'

'No,' she said, speaking the lie automatically. It did not even cross her mind that Lander might not be offended by her use of magic. Ruha handed the reins to the baggage camel to the confused berrani.