Shadow Seer [18+]

~ Twenty Seven ~

The desert was harsh, unforgiving, and desolate, but it was the most beautiful thing Sanaa had ever seen. Their group travelled for days through the never ending sea of sand that for the moment had remained flat enough on their trail that Sanaa could remain in the carriage. When their path proved too treacherous for her to remain within, Amir used his magic to carry the wheels over the sand until it was safe once more to lower. Sanaa would have wondered why he didn't just do this for everyone the whole way, before she realised how throughly it drained him. His words to her, after the banquet where Ghassan had been attacked came back to here. It was daytime. Under the harsh sun, Amir would be weaker because there were fewer shadows to control. She knew he could create his own, turn into shadows, smoke and ash as he saw fit to travel, but what if that was directly linked to his surroundings? She understood then, why his notes only came at night.

She'd had two more since the first one and always when Miri had left the tent. The second had said, Forgive me. The other simply, I meant every word. She took him to mean his declaration of love, but Sanaa couldn't get it out of her head that he didn't love her enough to fight back. She now understood the consequence of taking Ghassan's life but even now, despite the sweetness of the words arriving in her tent, he was still hiding from Khalar. The Grand Vizier made it clear whenever possible that he was Ghassan's eyes on this journey and that he would not hesitate to put their lives at risk if he found them too close together. Amir hardly spoke to her during the four days they'd been travelling and when he did, his words were clipped so not to arouse Khalar's suspicions about his feelings towards her. She hated it, the secrecy and lies, especially when she knew that Saleem and Miri were now enjoying each other in the middle of the night.

The carriage was too small for her not to be awoken by Miri's movements and when she returned to see Sanaa awake; she apologised, but couldn't keep the grin from her face. At Sanaa's request, Miri told her of the things they'd done, and the two women giggled like small children. Sanaa delighted in the new relationship she had with Miri, but she couldn't deny the jealousy at the woman's seemingly carefree life. What she wouldn't give to call Amir into the carriage and simply lay with him, receiving tender kisses on her mouth and jaw as he had once done. There wouldn't be space for the acrobatics that Miri spoke of, but to be so close to him, to wake up beside him, in his arms, was a dream she knew would never come true.

Their fifth day in the desert brought them closer to the mountains that lay to the west. Gargantuan structures that jutted into the clear blue sky, taller than anything Sanaa had witnessed since leaving Agmantia. Her home country was to the west, past those mountains by boat she knew, but she did not know what she would find if she ever returned. Were her family still there? Would they still be in her village if they were or had they moved on, searching for her across the Known World? She had tried many times to have visions of her family but she had yet to witness proof that they were alive. Her visions that came unbidden were just as unhelpful and so she remained in the dark about the fate of her family. She'd never known, whether her mother knew that she'd been taken by Ghassan's army. If she had, then it was save to assume, that she knew Sanaa was in the palace. The fact her family had never attempted to find her and bring her home remained a sore spot for her. There was no evidence that they had or hadn't, or even had the means to but it hurt all the same.

Their group continued toward the mountains, finally coming upon a trail that led directly into them as night fell. At the base of the mountains stood a large expanse of barren trees, more like a thicket of harsh branches and cacti. Beside it though, sat a pool of water that while opened out into the desert seemed to go into the mountains as well. There, Amir and the other men led the horses to drink and refill their water skins. Sanaa's carriage and the rest of the horses had been left some feet away from it. Miri dismounted her own horse before rummaging through the saddlebags and approached the carriage with food and water for Sanaa.