The Unearthing (Book I of the Tebel Chronicles)

Chapter 6

The routine in the new camp remained much the same as it had been with the Mursites, except that Cyan now had company. Over the following days she got to know the men in her tent and found that three of them had been caught trying to mine in the desert. Their names were Aila, Sela and Creanre. Cyan discovered from the men that there was a rare metal called donomia that is only found in Furnia. The metal was considered very valuable in the rest of Tebel, but the Lifthan tribes refused to allow other Tebelian nations to come and damage their land. Kael mentioned that his sword was made from it and so he'd left it in Noring, knowing how it would be received in Furnia. Having seen the destruction of the land at the quarry, Cyan couldn't blame the tribes though. The fourth prisoner pretty much kept to himself. He was the only one from a desert tribe so Cyan assumed he was a member of one of the rival tribes. Later they found out from him that he was Abdin from the Eythites tribe, which Cyan remembered her Mursite keeper saying were the rogue tribe that preyed on others. She made a mental note to avoid him.

Outside, the sounds of festivities and celebrations filled the night. When Cyan was taken to the ablution tent she sometimes saw a great fire with large crowds of people gathered around it. Other than these glimpses, she never saw what happened at the Meet.

Over the dreary days of waiting, Kael entertained the tent with stories of his escapades with his twin sister, Asha, their older brother, Roban and their cousin, Braeden. Cyan had laughed along with the rest of the tent but secretly pitied his mother with her handful of children. Kael also told her about the city of Bayit. Although he seemed reluctant to go into a lot of detail about his family, he had obviously come from a fair amount of wealth. Many of the stories centered on tricks played on various governesses and tutors. Cyan especially appreciated the one where a certain tutor, who enjoyed making grand appearances, had forced Kael and his brother to attend a high tea with an important visitor. He was considered high up in the tutor's order and had wanted to meet the brothers. While the visitor was giving thanks for the meal, Kael had slid under the table and tied their tutor's robe tassels to the table leg. When he stood up later the whole table lifted, dumping the contents of the tea onto the visiting tutor's lap. Laughing along with the rest of the tent, Cyan resolved to try some of the many pranks that Kael had spoken of, if by some twist of fate, she ever landed back in a foster home. Cyan would only have another year though, she realized suddenly. Her seventeenth birthday was a month or so away. As soon as she was eighteen she would be free from Joanna and Joel's control. Maybe landing up here wasn't the worst thing that could have happened. Then she remembered that she was going to be sold as a slave and her thoughts quickly darkened.

It was a fortnight before the prisoners were packed up to leave the tribes of Furnia to travel to Iebelia, where the slave market was. Kael explained that this was the land that was situated north of the Furnian Desert on the other side of the Kimba Canyon. Cyan resigned herself to not knowing where she was going, but was content that she would be with Kael. Everything about him made her feel safer about her predicament. She even found herself forgetting that she was a foreigner in the very definition of the word. The slave manager and the prisoners traveled with one of the tribe's caravans for three days before they were to be handed over to the tribe that would take them to Micrild.

While they traveled towards the canyon where the slavers would retrieve them, Cyan was chained with the rogue tribesman prisoner, Abdin, away from Kael. The desert man still looked sullen and withdrawn.

After a couple of hours, out of sheer boredom, Cyan tried to speak to him. 'I was captured by the Mursites. They didn't speak kindly of your tribe. I would like to know more though.'

Abdin looked at her with some surprise, before sighing. 'No, they wouldn't,' he said, 'the tribes have been enemies for centuries.'

'Why?'

Abdin shook his head. 'The tribes broke away from each other after aligning with politics of other countries. We wanted to remain independent and true to past alliances, but the tribes were bought out by an evil king. My tribe pulled away to remain true to the past. Anyone in the desert seen as allied with others, we regard as enemies. As a result, anything we do seems to be interpreted as criminal because we are alone.'

'The Mursite woman didn't make it sound like they were aligned with anyone. Quite the opposite actually. They sent me with the only tribe that barters with the Mainland.'

'And yet they sold you to that tribe,' said Abdin dryly. 'Don't be fooled. They are still accepting money from other countries. They may hide behind their principles, but note that they have still sold you. They still got their money. They don't arrest people like your three thieves over there because they want to protect the land. That is a lie. They took them because the donomia has been purchased by Skotonia already. My tribe stands against that in the strongest way possible and so we are labeled criminals and murderers.'

'I see,' said Cyan and she thought she could. It was sad that so much strife had happened to a once unified tribe.

Abdin shrugged. 'It's our way of life now. I don't always see the point. The old ways are ancient now. My tribe lives in the past.'

'Don't say that,' said Cyan quickly. The desert man looked at her. 'I think your old ways sound more noble. Why give up on that? Why succumb to what's easy when it's not what's best?'

'Because it's hard,' the Abdin. 'Because what we are fighting for is so far from our minds.'

'Then identify it again and fight for it,' said Cyan. 'Where I come from, the past was better than the present. I can't understand why anyone would settle for less than they had before unless it was for something better, ultimately. It seems to me that every tribe has lost something from the rifts. What your tribe stands for is bigger than what's easy.'

'You sound like a seer,' said Abdin.

Cyan laughed. 'Not even close. Do you ever accept outsiders?'

'There was once a woman of this desert but not of our tribes. She was accepted by the whole of the Lhifthan Tribe and welcomed as one of them. But she was the last one. It was her family that betrayed the tribes and caused the rift. Since then, no outsiders have been allowed to walk the desert by any tribe.'

Cyan nodded. How would they ever go back with so much hate and distrust? At least that isn't my problem.

The next day, Cyan and the other prisoners were handed over to the slavers, who would take them the final way to Micrild. Their route took them along a large canyon which Abdin told her was called the Kimba Canyon. It gaped to the north of them, as far as her eyes could see. As they traveled closer, Cyan could see glimpses of the majesty of the rocky void. When their path finally crossed close enough to look down into the great chasm, Cyan was awestruck. She remembered the manmade quarry and its violation of the earth. The canyon, in contrast, was a magnificent piece of natural architecture, stretching for miles across and down. The bottom ran in red rocky channels and serrated passes. Towers of terracotta rocks rose up all over the gorge. A scattering of trees and shrubs had managed to grow, springing up haphazardly in defiance of the hostile surroundings. On the ground, rivulets of water had left dried up riverbeds. It was a raw beauty that captivated the eye. Since the tribesmen had left them with the slavers, they were all traveling together again. It hadn't escaped Cyan that every step was now taking her closer to Micrild where she would be sold. Her anxiety was growing with every hour they walked but Kael would change the topic when she said anything and Abdin became so surly that she decided to keep her apprehension to herself. Instead she focused on the landscape.

'Breathtaking, isn't it?' said Kael, seeing Cyan's wonder.

'I never knew such a thing existed.'

'Kind of puts our predicament in perspective.'

'What do you mean?' Cyan turned to him.

'Well, in the greater scheme of things, with creation so detailed and taken care of, I can't help but think that things are going to work out for the best,' Kael said.

'Hmm,' Cyan murmured, unconvinced. She looked back at the canyon. It wasn't her experience that things ever "worked out for the best".