Glade 26, 122
Realistically, the time was optimal.
When people think of the word ‘desert’, it conjures a lot of images into being. The imagination begins with sand, sprawling, mounded up in dunes or stretching off into a horizon shrouded by hazy mirages. Sparse grasses, perhaps bushes, cacti. Above all, a phenomenal sky, almost cloudless, dominated by the great bright orb of the Sun which should in theory be Imogen Ward’s primary object of worship.
But this was a desert of the Northlands, not far from Zaichaer, and the season was yet early in Glade. Sure, the sand and scrubland were there, but the air was chill; not enough, in the daylight hours, that exposure any threat of frostbite, but enough to be a bit unpleasant.
Thankfully, Imogen had learned from her experience with the harsher clime of Kalzasi at the height of Frost, and procured a cheap salve from the Railrunner’s Market before she volunteered for Franky’s mysterious project. It was nothing like the miraculous elixir she had purchased from Sivan a few months prior, but it cut the cold and prevented her scales from shifting in reaction to the malicious clime.
She could imagine Carina scolding her again for not simply wearing a thicker coat, but that was impractical for this particular labor. She thought about it anyway, though, just to enjoy the image.
Thunk!
The Sunsinger and ditch-digger drove the shovel into the dune with a grim determination. She wasn’t one to turn up her nose at work, but piling sand into sacks was a dreadful way to earn a living. None of the shovel-loads were, individually, all that heavy, but after a few hours of the same motion- thrust the shovel, drive it in, lift it backwards, move it sideways, turn it over- her arms were beginning to burn.
”I really would have thought… pfff… that years of swinging a sword would help me here.”
It was a complaint without substance. Obviously having toned muscles and a decade of lifting and swinging heavy metal helped with endurance, but no amount of strength could stop the arms from burning after so many hours of repetitive digging. Well, people didn’t call it ‘hard labor’ for nothing.
Her reverie was interrupted by sudden shouting, and she let the shovelhead fall to the side at once. The sun was getting low overhead, and the cart-drivers were calling the workers in to be ferried back to Zaichaer. It was a reasonable arrangement, and Imogen had taken the carts back the past few days, glad to get back to her little room in the boarding-house and relax her sore muscles.
In fact, it was generally a poor idea to stay out in the desert at night. In early Glade, the sunless black sands quickly dropped to alarming temperatures, and the night was full of predators who would not hesitate to attack a camp. Not being much of a survivalist, and in any event quite unwilling to draw attention to herself, the Sunsinger-turned-day-laborer made her way back towards the road.
There, however, she found a most unusual commotion. A gaggle of workers, perhaps nine or ten in all, were gathered about two of the carts, watching intently while another man- Sebastian, Imogen thought, though she had never found it easy to tell humans apart- spoke in animated fashion.
“-last saw him less than an hour ago.” Sebastian was saying as Imogen drew closer, “I had asked Johannes to meet up at the carts, but he’s gone. Only he’s left his bag, mind, and everything but the shovel, which he must have taken with hisself-”
“C’mon, Seb.” Another man interrupted him, plainly exasperated, “Maybe the boy just went back on an earlier cart. I know you don’t like to hear it, but he’s a lackwit, sure enough, and he could have forgotten the promise.”
“No! No, no, no, you’re not listening. The sand at his dig was a mess, right, like he’d taken off running. You know we’ve all spotted the packs of dogs out in the desert, maybe they got up the courage to chase him! And what if he’s still out there, can’t find hisself a way back? You’ve got to help me find him!”
”Hold your horses, Sebastian, what’s going on?”
The other laborer turned to Imogen, eyes lighting up immediately. “The o- ah, Miss… Imogen? It’s my cousin, you see, Johannes?” Imogen nodded, gesturing at him to go on. She had a vague image of the man, in his twenties, with a long, boring face. She hadn’t talked much to any of the workers-something of a departure from the norm-and she’d never spoken to Johannes even once.
“Well, only it’s that I think he ran off into the sands, and he’d not have done that if he weren’t being chased. If we go now, maybe we can find him.”
“You’re short a few in your own accounts, Seb.” Another worker shook his head, “You want us to all run off into the desert on a wild chase when you don’t even know your cousin is out there? No, you can count me out. I've got a family to get back to.”
In a matter of moments, the laborers sorted themselves out. Two other men agreed to go with Sebastian, confident that they could get back even in the dark. Two men, and, naturally…
”Yeah, I’ll come looking. Let me see if we can get a driver to stay back for an hour, and we’ll head out at once.”
~
Luckily for the posse, the wind had been light all day, and tracking Johannes’ path through the sands was child’s play. More concerning, at least to Imogen, was the lack of any sign of pursuit. Either Johannes had taken his shovel and made a mad dash for the horizon unprovoked, or whatever was chasing him was extremely good at concealing its own trail while hunting. Neither option seemed to portend well.
As they followed the tracks, Johannes’ footfalls grew closer together, indicating that he had slowed down. Either he had lost his pursuer or he was getting tired, in which case their arrival was likely to come too late for him. It didn’t take long to lose sight of the road, though it was hardly possible to forget which direction they had traveled in the sand. More worryingly, they were quickly losing the light. If they weren’t well on their way back to the road when sundown hit, the problems could begin to pile up quite quickly indeed.
~~~
Before an hour had struck, the posse caught up with Johannes. The plain-faced young man was standing in place in the middle of a large, flat stretch of sand, his feet unnaturally close together, sweat on his brow. As the posse approached, Seb called out, relief evident in his strident tone:
“Johannes! Johannes! Over here! Back this way!”
“SEB!” The boy screamed, “Don’t come no closer! Get away! Get away!”
“Johannes?” Sebastian said, confused.
“I said get away, Seb! Away! Shoo!”
As soon as Johannes began screaming, Imogen’s attention turned to the swiftly-darkening desert around them. The boy wouldn’t be shouting like this if he’d been chasing a mirage. They’d been warned about feral dogs at the edge of Zaichaer’s territory, but it seemed doubtful they’d come this far into the sands. Plus, she still couldn’t see-
The sands near Johannes’ feet shifted suddenly, and Imogen realized what manner of predator could have chased him a mile into the sands without leaving any trail. The burrowing creatures moved quickly, barely disturbing the sands as they scattered… and then began to converge directly on Sebastian.
In the dim light, the Sunsinger had hardly noticed it; Johannes was balanced on top of a wide, flat rock. He had positioned himself to defend against his pursuers as they struck at him from the sand, and now they were engaging the posse. By the time Imogen realized the problem, three triangular heads had emerged from the sand to snap at Sebastian’s legs- burrowing vipers.
Sebastian screamed as the serpents dug their fangs into his leg, then screamed again as Imogen bashed them with her shovel, falling over from the force of the blow. This left him easy prey for the snakes- except that the serpents were no longer advancing.
”GIT! GIT! You varmints, you serpents, you crawlers in the sand, go away!.”
Imogen laid into the ground with the shovel, splashing black sand into the twilight sky as though it were water. The snakes scrambled to reverse course, as one after another was stunned or brained by the angry Orkhan’s shovel.
”YOU GET! AND YOU! AND YOU!.”
Another viper, either bold or stupid, struck for Imogen’s calf like lightning- only to find its fangs making no purchase against the patina of opal scales, the bone clicking against the impromptu armor. A moment later, the viper was airborne, a long, black rope sailing towards the stars overhead.
”DEATH, DEATH, DEATH!.”
“Miss, please!”
”I’ll teach you a lesson you won’t soon forget! Let every snake in the desert learn it!”
“Miss, stop, they’re gone! You’re gonna hit someone else!”
It took a few moments (and shovel-blows against empty sand) for the words to penetrate Imogen Ward’s armored cranium. She took a few breaths, shovel still raised overhead, and then looked down to see Sebastian cowering with his arms over his head. The other two men were on the ground, having fallen over as they scrabbled to get away from the madwoman’s swings. Thankfully, it didn’t look like she’d hit either of them.
(She’d known she hadn’t hit either of them. The wild rage was an affectation. Never any question of self-control, with Imogen.)
Johannes reached up gingerly to take her shovel from Imogen, and she realized belatedly that she had still been hefting it up over her head.
”...sorry about that one. Got a bit ahead of myself.”
“Er, no, no, that’s alright, Miss. Thanks. You saved us all for sure.” He didn’t sound all that sure.
Sebastian, on the ground, let out a little moan. Imogen didn’t think her blow was hard enough to break anything, but between the aborted viper-bite and the shovel, she imagined the bruise would be large and exotic.
“I’m sorry, Seb, I know I said I’d meet with you. But the snakes appeared, and they were biting my pant leg, and I was so scared and I didn’t know what to do and I-”
Sebastian tried to whimper in a way which would be conciliatory, which would communicate to his cousin that everything was alright, that there was no need to feel at fault, that they all understood. It sounded more like a regular groan, though.
”Shoot, it’s already dark. Johannes, that’s your name? You take my shovel, I’ll carry your cousin back to the road.”
The two men and Sebastian exchanged looks of horror as Imogen knelt and lifted the man up onto her shoulder.
”Gr- ungh. Well, you’re heavy. Gr-eat. Great. Did the snakes get any of you three?.”
The men shook their heads, and Johannes volunteered: “They only scratched me a bit, Miss.”
”Fine. It’s already late, so we’d better hurry. Come on.” Imogen began to trek back through the sand.
During the walk, she considered the oddity of it. Snakes are not persistence hunters, after all. If Johannes had gotten ahead of them, they ought to have given up, and right quick. And why attack him? She’d thought that perhaps his shovel hit a nest- but again, no viper was going to give chase for so long after scaring a threat off. Had someone cursed Johannes, somehow? Were there snake-attack curses? She would have to keep a closer eye on him on the morrow.
But for now…
~~~
”Ah, yeah. Well, we missed the goddamn cart.”
It was going to be a long, cold night.
Realistically, the time was optimal.
When people think of the word ‘desert’, it conjures a lot of images into being. The imagination begins with sand, sprawling, mounded up in dunes or stretching off into a horizon shrouded by hazy mirages. Sparse grasses, perhaps bushes, cacti. Above all, a phenomenal sky, almost cloudless, dominated by the great bright orb of the Sun which should in theory be Imogen Ward’s primary object of worship.
But this was a desert of the Northlands, not far from Zaichaer, and the season was yet early in Glade. Sure, the sand and scrubland were there, but the air was chill; not enough, in the daylight hours, that exposure any threat of frostbite, but enough to be a bit unpleasant.
Thankfully, Imogen had learned from her experience with the harsher clime of Kalzasi at the height of Frost, and procured a cheap salve from the Railrunner’s Market before she volunteered for Franky’s mysterious project. It was nothing like the miraculous elixir she had purchased from Sivan a few months prior, but it cut the cold and prevented her scales from shifting in reaction to the malicious clime.
She could imagine Carina scolding her again for not simply wearing a thicker coat, but that was impractical for this particular labor. She thought about it anyway, though, just to enjoy the image.
Thunk!
The Sunsinger and ditch-digger drove the shovel into the dune with a grim determination. She wasn’t one to turn up her nose at work, but piling sand into sacks was a dreadful way to earn a living. None of the shovel-loads were, individually, all that heavy, but after a few hours of the same motion- thrust the shovel, drive it in, lift it backwards, move it sideways, turn it over- her arms were beginning to burn.
”I really would have thought… pfff… that years of swinging a sword would help me here.”
It was a complaint without substance. Obviously having toned muscles and a decade of lifting and swinging heavy metal helped with endurance, but no amount of strength could stop the arms from burning after so many hours of repetitive digging. Well, people didn’t call it ‘hard labor’ for nothing.
Her reverie was interrupted by sudden shouting, and she let the shovelhead fall to the side at once. The sun was getting low overhead, and the cart-drivers were calling the workers in to be ferried back to Zaichaer. It was a reasonable arrangement, and Imogen had taken the carts back the past few days, glad to get back to her little room in the boarding-house and relax her sore muscles.
In fact, it was generally a poor idea to stay out in the desert at night. In early Glade, the sunless black sands quickly dropped to alarming temperatures, and the night was full of predators who would not hesitate to attack a camp. Not being much of a survivalist, and in any event quite unwilling to draw attention to herself, the Sunsinger-turned-day-laborer made her way back towards the road.
There, however, she found a most unusual commotion. A gaggle of workers, perhaps nine or ten in all, were gathered about two of the carts, watching intently while another man- Sebastian, Imogen thought, though she had never found it easy to tell humans apart- spoke in animated fashion.
“-last saw him less than an hour ago.” Sebastian was saying as Imogen drew closer, “I had asked Johannes to meet up at the carts, but he’s gone. Only he’s left his bag, mind, and everything but the shovel, which he must have taken with hisself-”
“C’mon, Seb.” Another man interrupted him, plainly exasperated, “Maybe the boy just went back on an earlier cart. I know you don’t like to hear it, but he’s a lackwit, sure enough, and he could have forgotten the promise.”
“No! No, no, no, you’re not listening. The sand at his dig was a mess, right, like he’d taken off running. You know we’ve all spotted the packs of dogs out in the desert, maybe they got up the courage to chase him! And what if he’s still out there, can’t find hisself a way back? You’ve got to help me find him!”
”Hold your horses, Sebastian, what’s going on?”
The other laborer turned to Imogen, eyes lighting up immediately. “The o- ah, Miss… Imogen? It’s my cousin, you see, Johannes?” Imogen nodded, gesturing at him to go on. She had a vague image of the man, in his twenties, with a long, boring face. She hadn’t talked much to any of the workers-something of a departure from the norm-and she’d never spoken to Johannes even once.
“Well, only it’s that I think he ran off into the sands, and he’d not have done that if he weren’t being chased. If we go now, maybe we can find him.”
“You’re short a few in your own accounts, Seb.” Another worker shook his head, “You want us to all run off into the desert on a wild chase when you don’t even know your cousin is out there? No, you can count me out. I've got a family to get back to.”
In a matter of moments, the laborers sorted themselves out. Two other men agreed to go with Sebastian, confident that they could get back even in the dark. Two men, and, naturally…
”Yeah, I’ll come looking. Let me see if we can get a driver to stay back for an hour, and we’ll head out at once.”
~
Luckily for the posse, the wind had been light all day, and tracking Johannes’ path through the sands was child’s play. More concerning, at least to Imogen, was the lack of any sign of pursuit. Either Johannes had taken his shovel and made a mad dash for the horizon unprovoked, or whatever was chasing him was extremely good at concealing its own trail while hunting. Neither option seemed to portend well.
As they followed the tracks, Johannes’ footfalls grew closer together, indicating that he had slowed down. Either he had lost his pursuer or he was getting tired, in which case their arrival was likely to come too late for him. It didn’t take long to lose sight of the road, though it was hardly possible to forget which direction they had traveled in the sand. More worryingly, they were quickly losing the light. If they weren’t well on their way back to the road when sundown hit, the problems could begin to pile up quite quickly indeed.
~~~
Before an hour had struck, the posse caught up with Johannes. The plain-faced young man was standing in place in the middle of a large, flat stretch of sand, his feet unnaturally close together, sweat on his brow. As the posse approached, Seb called out, relief evident in his strident tone:
“Johannes! Johannes! Over here! Back this way!”
“SEB!” The boy screamed, “Don’t come no closer! Get away! Get away!”
“Johannes?” Sebastian said, confused.
“I said get away, Seb! Away! Shoo!”
As soon as Johannes began screaming, Imogen’s attention turned to the swiftly-darkening desert around them. The boy wouldn’t be shouting like this if he’d been chasing a mirage. They’d been warned about feral dogs at the edge of Zaichaer’s territory, but it seemed doubtful they’d come this far into the sands. Plus, she still couldn’t see-
The sands near Johannes’ feet shifted suddenly, and Imogen realized what manner of predator could have chased him a mile into the sands without leaving any trail. The burrowing creatures moved quickly, barely disturbing the sands as they scattered… and then began to converge directly on Sebastian.
In the dim light, the Sunsinger had hardly noticed it; Johannes was balanced on top of a wide, flat rock. He had positioned himself to defend against his pursuers as they struck at him from the sand, and now they were engaging the posse. By the time Imogen realized the problem, three triangular heads had emerged from the sand to snap at Sebastian’s legs- burrowing vipers.
Sebastian screamed as the serpents dug their fangs into his leg, then screamed again as Imogen bashed them with her shovel, falling over from the force of the blow. This left him easy prey for the snakes- except that the serpents were no longer advancing.
”GIT! GIT! You varmints, you serpents, you crawlers in the sand, go away!.”
Imogen laid into the ground with the shovel, splashing black sand into the twilight sky as though it were water. The snakes scrambled to reverse course, as one after another was stunned or brained by the angry Orkhan’s shovel.
”YOU GET! AND YOU! AND YOU!.”
Another viper, either bold or stupid, struck for Imogen’s calf like lightning- only to find its fangs making no purchase against the patina of opal scales, the bone clicking against the impromptu armor. A moment later, the viper was airborne, a long, black rope sailing towards the stars overhead.
”DEATH, DEATH, DEATH!.”
“Miss, please!”
”I’ll teach you a lesson you won’t soon forget! Let every snake in the desert learn it!”
“Miss, stop, they’re gone! You’re gonna hit someone else!”
It took a few moments (and shovel-blows against empty sand) for the words to penetrate Imogen Ward’s armored cranium. She took a few breaths, shovel still raised overhead, and then looked down to see Sebastian cowering with his arms over his head. The other two men were on the ground, having fallen over as they scrabbled to get away from the madwoman’s swings. Thankfully, it didn’t look like she’d hit either of them.
(She’d known she hadn’t hit either of them. The wild rage was an affectation. Never any question of self-control, with Imogen.)
Johannes reached up gingerly to take her shovel from Imogen, and she realized belatedly that she had still been hefting it up over her head.
”...sorry about that one. Got a bit ahead of myself.”
“Er, no, no, that’s alright, Miss. Thanks. You saved us all for sure.” He didn’t sound all that sure.
Sebastian, on the ground, let out a little moan. Imogen didn’t think her blow was hard enough to break anything, but between the aborted viper-bite and the shovel, she imagined the bruise would be large and exotic.
“I’m sorry, Seb, I know I said I’d meet with you. But the snakes appeared, and they were biting my pant leg, and I was so scared and I didn’t know what to do and I-”
Sebastian tried to whimper in a way which would be conciliatory, which would communicate to his cousin that everything was alright, that there was no need to feel at fault, that they all understood. It sounded more like a regular groan, though.
”Shoot, it’s already dark. Johannes, that’s your name? You take my shovel, I’ll carry your cousin back to the road.”
The two men and Sebastian exchanged looks of horror as Imogen knelt and lifted the man up onto her shoulder.
”Gr- ungh. Well, you’re heavy. Gr-eat. Great. Did the snakes get any of you three?.”
The men shook their heads, and Johannes volunteered: “They only scratched me a bit, Miss.”
”Fine. It’s already late, so we’d better hurry. Come on.” Imogen began to trek back through the sand.
During the walk, she considered the oddity of it. Snakes are not persistence hunters, after all. If Johannes had gotten ahead of them, they ought to have given up, and right quick. And why attack him? She’d thought that perhaps his shovel hit a nest- but again, no viper was going to give chase for so long after scaring a threat off. Had someone cursed Johannes, somehow? Were there snake-attack curses? She would have to keep a closer eye on him on the morrow.
But for now…
~~~
”Ah, yeah. Well, we missed the goddamn cart.”
It was going to be a long, cold night.