KISMET

Chapter 1: AUSPICIOUS BEGINNINGS

The boy squinted up at the horizon, shimmering in the desert heat.   Packs shifted audibly on the camels' backs. The hunting party walked slowly among them,  in the soft red sand.

Peter hated Africa with every fiber of his being.

***

The Whelan party trekked onward through the desert. The difficult terrain was a shortcut to prime hunting territory. Coleman Whelan had been coming to the Northern coast to trek through the Spanish Sahara every other year since his business took off,  seeking new and exotic game.

That year, he brought along his only son Peter, despite his wife's firm protests. At nine years old, she feared the stifling temperatures, illnesses, and dangerous wilds of Africa would be too much for her frail boy.

"He is too young my love, and you see how small he is. He is quite fragile for his age." she said, shaking her head.

"Which is exactly why he must go. To build up his strength; his fortitude, rather."

"He's only nine years old, darling. He has plenty of time to grow."

"Yes, and next year he will be sent away to the finest school in Victoria. Strangers taking over our parental role. While I still have influence, I shall use it to his best advantage."

She crossed her arms and pursed her lips, knowing his mind was set. She could do no more.

Peter was small for his age. A pale, skinny, curly-headed strawberry blond, like his mother was, when she was a girl. Her hair had since faded to a rich golden auburn.

He also had the wide curious eyes of his mother, a striking shade of hazel. His face was dotted with freckles, all the more prominent from the hot African sun.

His father, Coleman kept him close, as their guides took them through a rocky slice of the Sahara down into lesser explored depths of the Congo.

Coleman was a tall hard-looking man with stern lines etched into his face by emotion and the sun. His dark brown hair was close-cropped and his abundant facial hair was kept neatly trimmed, even in this harsh desolate place.

Peter absently dragged a large bleached-white branch he had found in the desert behind him, creating a long winding line in the sand. He was dressed in a mini-version of his father's own hunting gear. An incentive, his father thought, for him to start hunting like a man.

Coleman had taken him on other such trips hunting fox with the hounds back home in the wide countryside. The boy had cried when he witnessed the dogs tearing apart that tiny red ball of fur.

"-Look! -Boy!" he said wrenching Peter's hands away from his face.

"Father, I don't want to...  It's cruel."

"In maintaining the natural order, cruelty is a necessity." his father said evenly.

"It may seem unpleasant right now, but as you grow you will learn to fire a gun, kill for your own, and carry yourself as a man would."

They trekked along early and late in the day, when the hot sun had a lesser chance of taking one's life from stroke. Still, some members of the party did succumb to the elements.

One died.

A tall amiable elderly Berber man named Assyr had been a friend of his father's from his first hunting trip to Africa, but he still showed little emotion at his passing. Peter, who had been close to the man and looked up to him as a mentor, cried silent tears and wiped his eyes away from his father's view. He did not want to disappoint him with his weakness.