The Chronicles Of Fone Bone, Oathbreaker

Chapter 8: Bones of Contention

Flowers of all hue, and without Thorn the Rose.

-John Milton, Paradise Lost IV.256

Dietrich on a yellow camel wasn't exactly Sir Galahad on a white charger, but he would do.

Covered as they were in bone-sucker blood, Annie and Dietrich were stuck riding together for the next several days-stuck as in literally stuck. Their sweat made the blood sticky, and sometimes Dietrich had to peel Annie off his chest at the end of the night's ride. The smell was bad, and the black flies were worse, but Annie still enjoyed herself. It was almost like her fanciful dreams of quests and romance.

Almost.

The days were hot. While everyone else made himself more or less comfortable, Dietrich and Annie slept in their clothes without their bedrolls. There were enough red sandstone outcroppings to offer shade, and Annie took turns on watch to ensure against more predators of the deep desert. Annie didn't sleep well. During the night, she usually drowsed against Dietrich's stomach as they traveled. Her sleepiness didn't matter much since Dietrich wasn't the talkative sort. He tried to keep the flies off her while she slept, but it didn't do much good.

In the mornings, as the others prepared camp, Dietrich taught Annie how to shoot. He set up small targets in the clefts of rocks, and she fired a bone-made rifle and often hit them.

Rictus looked up from cleaning his pistol. "We'll have to call you Annie Oakley," he said after she made a bull's-eye.

"Hush, Rictus," Annie answered.

They were almost two weeks into their journey when the mountains loomed on the horizon, black with the sun glinting behind them. Visible rays shot through the dusty air and gave the peaks a wild halo.

A cool morning breeze blew across Annie's skin. "Is that it?" she asked as she leaned against Dietrich's chest.

"Could be," he whispered. "I cannot tell from here, but zis could mean vater, at any rate."

Serge, with Rictus at his back, pulled his camel alongside. "Der Berg dort, how far, Dietrich?" Serge asked.

"Not certain," Dietrich replied. "Anozer day, perhap?"

Serge rubbed his head. "I don't sink so. Zey ver hidden behind zees low hills here, and zey are not really so high. I sink ve travel on und reach zem midday."

"Tired of zuh desert?" Dietrich asked.

"Tired of your stink, Dietrich," Serge answered.

The journey to the mountains did take almost another full day, since they had to navigate the dendritic, incised badlands of Deren Gard. The humans were quiet as they rode through the dragons' domain. They knew nothing of the canyon's venerable inhabitants, but the air hung heavy with potent mystery, and riders and mounts alike sensed a need for silence. Occasional trickles of pebbles rolling into the gorge echoed with loud clatters, and the camels' hoofs against the ground beat with a monotonous, muffled thud.

Annie's aural membranes prickled. Like all bones, she could speak to animals and would switch into the ancient Language of the Birds while doing so. It was the tongue of all nature, one only rare, gifted humans could use, and one the bones could never use consciously or intentionally. To Annie, these canyons held a strange buzz pulsing rhythmically through the air, and it seemed that under the buzz an animal was speaking. At first, she thought it was one of the camels, but their mounts had proven to be taciturn and laconic; the sound she heard was like a continuous monologue, or perhaps a conversation involving thousands of voices. She couldn't quite make out the words...