Ani

Do not think for a moment I had forgotten the carnage. The deaths of my friend's family. But I was still intent on finding Ani. I prayed to the Sky she was still alive. Lar Torvis could be a killer out here even if she was not injured.
As I worked my way out I found the bodies of two men. They were as the three that rushed my hollow. Men ... though not scarred. They appeared perhaps from the Tahari or even Turia. I could not tell and I did not waste my time long over their bodies.
It was good that Juu did not die alone.

I began to call her name. Ani ... Ani ... over and over though I kept my tone low and soft. Perhaps it was more of a prayer for I did not expect her to answer me. My chest ached with concern. I felt like my breath was captured in a web and there was dread every time I looked over a clump of grass or a small rise in the sod. Would the men have taken her with them? Such a small child? I did not think so... that left death and I refused to think such. She had to be here .. she had to be here.
My heart jumped into my throat then .... I saw the marks ... I saw where she had crawled through the grass ... I stayed low and made my way as quickly as I could along the indistinct trail. More insistent I called .... Ani ... Ani .... Ani
I almost ran over her in my haste. She just sat there .. as usual only she didn't have her doll. I swept her up into my arms and I held her to my bloody sweaty chest and I wept. I knelt and I wept there upon the plains like I was no more than an unscarred unnamed boy. I whispered her name over and over again into her wispy hair with its scant little yellow beads. I must have crushed her small little body but she never made a sound ... though I felt her tiny fingers curl into the muscle of my chest and I just held her and dampened her hair with my tears.

Ani ... my Ani. How possessive of her I had become in such a short time. When my emotion was exhausted I wiped my tears from her forehead and I held her from me so that I could inspect her. Had she been hurt? She scrambled up my arms against my chest clawing my flesh with her tiny nails. It was the most I had ever seen out of her. But I did not refuse her. She did not appear to be hurt. I swung the bota around and I loosed the cork and I set it to her lips and she snuggled back against my chest and placed both chubby little palms on that bota and drank. I simply pressed my lips to her head and thanked the Sky she was alive.

I felt such a relief. But it was not over. I took her in my arm and keeping low to the ground I returned to the half burnt wagon. I set her down and though she protested I insisted. I did not go far from her sight though ... but this I had to do. I used the remains of the wagon, carefully positioning the heated coals and pieces of wood until I had a make shift pyre. I then gathered Juu and his family and I relit that wagon and I made sure they were sent to the next life as they should be. It was a risk ... I had no idea if the rest of the men were still in the area but I had no choice in my mind. I would expect him to do the same for me ... and mine.

I took Ani up then and I made my way back to Kree. He was a good kaiila. I stripped my gear from him and I set my saddle on one shoulder and I set Ani on the other and I set out for that stream. I could not stay here longer for I had lit a beacon to the plains that someone here was still alive. It was going to be a long walk. But oddly enough I did not feel the weight of my saddle, I did not feel the heat through my boots as I strode, I no longer felt the suffocating of Lar Torvis.

You see .... I had an angel on my shoulder.

Death

Lar Torvis was high in the Sky when I crested the ridge and my gaze took in the scene below me.

It was like nothing I had ever seen before. Like nothing I had seen before outside my Father's wagon.

The stripped white body of Oni lay on the ground in Lar Torvis. Juu was no where to be seen yet. But two of the boys were tied to a couple of the wagon wheels. The wagon had been tipped over and was now burnt to a crisp. The boys' charred bodies still upon the wheels. How did I know it was the boys? I knew no one would do such to girls. It just wasn't done. I began working my way low around the area. Someone had made a fire break around the wagon. Now as far as I knew only a Tuchuk would do that. Only a Tuchuk would value the grass even in such a situation. It was something to store away in my thoughts for later. I found where the others had left their kaiila. There had been eight kaiila here at one point. Now there were none. Had the three kaiila run? I did not have time to think about it now as I continued to scout around the wagon. It was then I found Juu. He had put up quite a fight. His body showed the ahns of fighting. Wounds tied off with scraps of cloth. The end had been harsh and swift. I bent to lift his lids to open them to the Sky before I moved passed him. In the grass I found another boy. An arrow deep through the back of his neck. Further on I found Juu's first son. Here I paused for the boy was staked out and ants covered his small body. A deep hole was opened in his belly, someone had run him through. I came closer and then I felt the bile rise in my throat for his eyes opened and he looked at me.

His lips were cracked and bleeding. He couldn't talk. I slid closer and placed my knee beneath his head as I cut through his bindings and the bota I had slung over my shoulder was opened and cool water trickled over his lips into his mouth. The look he gave me I will carry to my dying day. I don't know if you have ever seen someone with their guts torn open. You live sometimes a long time. A long agonizing time. There was no help for him here. He was almost gone as it was. He knew it ... I knew it. I spoke then and I prayed to the Sky he heard me. "I name you Juu,after your Father." I cradled him in my arm and he seemed so much smaller than the hunter's first son that had set out on this trek to earn his name ... I would not break a bone, I would not damage his heart or his brain ... he would need these things in the afterlife ... instead I cupped my hand over his mouth and nose and he opened his eyes wide to the Sky. He barely jerked at all in my arms as he passed. Another ahn in the Lar Torvis, with the ants and the loss of blood and he would have been gone. I have never had a look of gratitude for killing someone. It will haunt me.

I worked my way in towards the still smoldering wagon now. Oni. She had put up quite a fight herself. It was obvious she had refused to submit, choosing death over slavery. Her baby son was clutched in her arms and he did not breathe. I found the girls' clothes. the beads taken from their hair. They would be on their way to be sold as slaves. Naked and chained. It was the way of the land in which I lived. But what of Ani? I steeled myself to look at the wagon, breaking pieces apart with my boot so that I could attempt to see within. I saw nothing that appeared to be her body though it was hard to tell with all the ash.

I took several more drinks of water. Resting for a moment and listening. There was only the wind in the grass and a bird here or there. It would not be long though before the smell of death began to attract scavengers. I started then at the wagon, and I worked my way outward in slow spiraling circles. Intent now on finding Ani.

She had to be here, dead or alive.

Three for Kree

I am not sure when I realized they were coming. They knew just as well as I did that soon the light would be in their eyes and they were not willing to wait. They did not know how old I was, or how experienced but they were right for rushing me now. I half expected it. It is what I would have done in their place.

I expected five. There were only three and I lifted up under the first one over the crest of my hollow and I shoved my lance deep through his body. Perhaps they judged my experience by the kaiila I rode. I broke the second one's quiva thrust with an uplifted arm as the third jumped my back and wrapped an arm around my neck. I grabbed him and threw him onto the ground breaking his hold. I may not be big but everything I have is rock hard muscle. I work with the bosk all day. I spend long hours roping, branding, and wrestling young stock. That man got a taste of it when I threw him over my shoulder. My quiva caught the light as I swung wide at the second man and I felt it rake across his chest and biceps. I took a left fist to my jaw and felt my teeth rattle in my head and my eyes went funny but I never stopped. They fought like larls and it was life and death there for a few ehn but when it was all said and done and I crouched taking ragged gasps of breath into my starved lungs the first was laying there with my lance still through him, the second was staring at me from the ground with a broken spine and the third had my quiva through his throat spilling blood onto the baked ground and the scent rose acid in my nostrils. My arm stung and I realized one of them had gotten in a blade cut. It was messy but not enough to cut through the muscle and I tore off part of my shirt and tied it around the cut.

I wiped my hand over my face and let my dazed mind catch up. Points for reflex. Everything was foggy right now. Too much movement and not enough hydration.
Water .... I needed water. I stumbled over to Kree and grabbed a full bota and I drank, small sips. I knew better than to dump water on my system at this point. I was torture, but I kept to small gulps as I wiped my brow and began to look around. I stayed low ... I did not know where the others were and I was not willing to risk myself again so easily. Slinging the bota over my shoulder I slid back into the hollow. I retrieved my quiva and my lance and I wiped them off on the chest of the man that was still alive. He never said a word and I didn't ask him any questions. It was just settled between us. I left him to die in the heat as I began to work my way to the ridge, the smoke was almost gone now. I dreaded what I would find but it was there for me to do and I would do it.

My Enemy

Sweat had left tracks down my face in the dust. My shirt was dark with the stains of it.

I didn't hate those men out there. The men intent on killing me. Men intent on killing me with no reason I could see. No one knew I would be here. No one knew I would follow Juu's wagon. I just happened to show up at the wrong time. And I had come barreling across the plain like an unnamed youngster. I just panicked when I saw that fire. All I was thinking about were those kids. I was being a lot more careful now.

No I didn't hate those men. But I intended to kill every singe one of them. They had set themselves up against me. They were strangers... they were my enemy. And they killed my kaiila.

I carefully reached beside me and found a small pebble. I shoved it into my mouth and attempted to inspire some saliva ... Anything to moisten the dry cracked interior of my mouth. I kept my mind busy. I mapped out in my thoughts where I was and how far it was to water. I was now afoot on the plains and that can be risky business. If my calculations were right I was about twenty pasangs from a stream. That was a long ... long way in this kind of heat. Though I did have my botas. Even as I thought that the song of an arrow went strait over my head and I wondered for it was too high. What were they up to? I rolled, my clothes scratching in the dust. They were shooting at Kree. What in the name of the Sky for? And then ... again ... with a sickening thump an arrow sank deep into one of my bota and the dark stain as it bled out spread over Kree's shoulder and into the thirsty ground.

Bloody bastards!

Kree

You might look at me and think I was insane for thinking over things while men waited for a chance to finish me off. But aside from watching and squinting against the light there wasn't much for me to do at the moment and my mind just never stopped. I had a few hours to wait until Lar Torvis was in their eyes. If they didn't rush me before that ... and I wasn't moving until then.

I suppose a more experienced warrior would not have rushed headlong into something he didn't understand fully. I suppose I wasn't thinking of ... well I just wasn't thinking.

I had been riding all morning. Pushing Kree but not too much for I did not intend to run him to death. It was easy now to follow the wagon tracks through the grass and over the gentle rolling hills. I was jumpy ... but jumpy about things I didn't have set in stone yet. Jumpy about dreams, visions and words of the Spex but they weren't real. They were like mists and they caused me to worry but I didn't know exactly what to expect ... if anything.

It wasn't long after dawn that I saw the smoke. Fire is a thing most feared by Tuchuk. Not only can it over take and kill people and animals but it destroys the grass. Where there is grass ... there is life. Now perhaps it was that I was keyed up anyway or that I just lost the brains the Sky blessed me with but I kicked Kree into a run and we made strait for that smoke. Somewhere in the back of my mind there was the realization that there was dark black smoke in there ... the kind of smoke you get when you torch a wagon ... with grease. All I know is that my stomach was up in my throat and we were at a full run when up out of the grass there rose at least five men and they were shooting arrows as fast as they could draw and aim. I felt Kree stumble, lose the rhythm of his stride and I knew he was hit but I didn't know how bad. I grabbed weapons and I kicked free of the saddle and hit the ground running and I dove into this hollow I was trapped in.

Now... if it had been Kai or Rocca they would have dropped like a rock. But Kree wasn't trained fully yet and he just stood there. I closed my eyes and groaned and he went down kicking and screaming looking like a pin cushion. There was just no need for that. Killing a kaiila. Except for one. They were set on making sure I never left this hollow.

Damn

There have been times in my life when I relished the fact that I was right. That I had been correct in an assumption or prediction.

This wasn't one of those times.

I would have liked nothing more than to ride into camp and see those kids playing and share a cup of paga with Juu and laugh about dreams and specters that live in the night.

Instead I was laying here in a hollow keeping my head down and baking nicely in the heat of Lar Torvis. I figure this was a dusting spot for bosk at some point. Rolling in the dust to relieve themselves of parasites and such. Right now I was just thankful it was deep enough to hide the outline of my body.

It was hot though. My mouth was dry and my tongue was nothing more than a stick in my mouth. My stomach felt like a rock ... a dried out old empty rock. It felt like a million grains of sand scraped across my eyes every time I tried to blink. Dust coated the insides of my nose and all I could smell was dirt, grass and blood. My botas and almost everything else was still with my saddle. And my saddle was still with Kree, and Kree was laying dead as a bent wagon axle some twenty feet from me. But it might as well have been twenty pasangs for all the good it was doing.

I did have my bow and quiver and my lance. My bola had been hooked to my belt and I had one quiva as well. These things I fell with .... ran with. It wasn't much to have in the position I was in, but right now they were my best friends and no man ever felt stronger about his weapons than I did about mine right then. They were all that stood between me and those intent on making sure I never saw tomorrow's dawn. Right now though it was hotter than I ever thought it could be and dawn was a long .... long way off.

Tracking

I think that was one of the longest rides I have ever taken. It was going to take me hands to find everyone I needed to apologize to after nearly running them down with Kai. The lanes between the wagons stretched out before me like fiendish ribbons of uncountable time.

I hit our wagon group at a dead run and jumped from Kai even as he dug his claws in to a sliding stop.

But they were gone.

I spun on a heel and began to strip Kai of my gear. I could not take him he was worn out from a day of riding. I switched everything to Kree. He was young, untried but he was fresh and I needed speed now more than anything. I would regret that choice in the hours to come, but at the time I thought it was best.

I took time to roll my bed and tie it onto the saddle. I took time to grab my weapons. I was in a hurry but I did not have a death wish.

Kree was fresh and eager to go. I swept a gaze over my wagon ... the kaiila and Yaz. And then I swung into the saddle, closing my eyes as the sickness rose. Only a moment I allowed it to slow me and then I was digging heels into Kree and he spooked and took off like a shot from a cross bow.

The only problem was I didn't know where I was going.

I hit the edge of the herd and began tracking Juu's wagon by outriders and those in the nearest wagons. It was daunting to hear they had left so early in the day, but I was one man on a kaiila. I could travel much faster if I could just get their direction. But tracking at night meant finding people and asking questions and that takes time. My nerves were shot full of holes by the time I got to the end of the wagons and ahead of me was the trail we had moved over in the last hand or so and here is where I lost them.

I swore for hundreds of bosk had walked over where their wagon tracks cut into the sod. I threw a leg over the pommel, chewing on the jerky pariah had brought me in the little pouch tied to my saddle ... and I waited for the moons to rise enough that I could see a little. And then began the pain staking process of tracking them through the hoof marks.

It was now that I began to realize bits and pieces of the Spex's words that I had forgotten. So much of it was like a dream. She had spoken Ani's name. How could I have forgotten that? There was more. I tried to go over it in my mind as I searched for the indentations of the wagon wheels.

Omen

The first wagons. It is a phrase I use more than I care to when I am there. So many things remind me that it is a different world than mine. It is not that the people there are not polite. They are so much so that I find myself reminding THEM, not vice versa. But I am not ashamed of who I am. My pride is woven through me like the Sky and the grass and the bosk are all woven together.

Pariah remained at my thigh, my fingers in her teasing short hair as I called the Spex to me. She is called pile now, I try to remember it but I do not always.
I gave her a piece of cloth. It was gray with tiny pink dinas embroidered into it. It was just a small piece, a couple of horts in length and breadth. I asked her to tell me the omen for the hunt the next day. If I was embarrassed to produce such an item for a hunt I did not show it, though the concern in my gaze was much more intense than any hunt should cause.

She went to one of the wagons and brought out a small black pouch. She threw a few herbs and things into the fire and called forth the spirits.

Without realizing it I had begun to lean forward in the saddle. Energy charged through me and Kai began to shift his weight, his fur jumping as his skin twitched.
I was no stranger to the oddly colored fire, nor the voices or specters that danced in the flames. But this time there was more riding on this reading than I cared to admit. I believe I cared more about this reading than I cared for much else in my whole life. The questions this raised in my mind were set aside, they would be pondered later. For now there was only this ... here.

She asked for the gift, for the knowledge for the warrior with no clan yet. It was not what she said but how she said it, and my gaze began to narrow on her. She threw up her arm to ward off what she saw and I felt my stomach tighten. The muscles across my chest began to tense. A silver blue flame shot up out of the center of the fire then and knew it was more than tricks now ... I knew that flame. She began to speak then.

"They will not stop you know. Nothing will make them go away, you cannot push away the dream walkers. We are stronger then you She wore a white cloak, your dreams are haunted by her. Almost so real yet you cant touch her.
Perhaps you desire that taste of stains left with on you....You remember a touch, a smell... Your hunt.... much of this hunt is shadowed...darkness lingers to try to reach out and snap you in half from the reality... The hunt... yet you seek more to know then the hunt alone... Why only ask of it? Ah perhaps memories seem to bring forth ... No.... It is not time yet.... The hunt... You would do well not to ride in the valley. You will be the hunted if you do. So much wonderfully smelling blood.... Its not a larl that hunts you but you know this. Do you not? Such a sweet smell wishes to touch you in the dreams."

There was a growl deep in my chest. My fingers tightened on the reins which caused Kai to jerk his head against the touch. Anger snapped through my veins and every muscle stood out in sharp relief under my skin. My beast began to claw at the grass arching his thick neck and it was all I could do to keep him from bolting.

"I know who you are. I recognize you... I see you ...I hear you breathe when you cannot hear your self in the night. Umm tell me how it feels to drain life with your own hands? Do you remember? Yes... yes the hunt.. The omen is countered. Do not ride to the valley."

There was pure rage in my features, twisted in the fire light as I gazed at the Spex as if I would kill her for her words but restraint lay in a heavy shroud to be fought but not overcome.

As the Spex went down on her knees I was hit by so many thoughts in quick succession. I spoke Pariah's name ... to care for mahalah even as Kai took three half jumps backwards almost upending himself before I jerked the reins and spun him on a tarsk bit and kicked him into a run down the lane between the wagons and I prayed to the Sky I was in time.

To Get the Omen

And so the evening found me riding towards the first wagons. Not something I had done for a long time. Life had just seemed to converge around me. It was an odd jumpy feeling it gave me, to return to this place. How much it was mine and how at the same time it was like stepping into another world.

The Spex ... the woman Mahalah now the slave of Trajen had mentioned before she knew who I was. I didn't believe her completely ... but she was a Spex and so there was enough doubt there that it was dangerous for me to even be around the first wagons. And yet as much as I was drawn there for myself at times, this time I was drawn there for another reason.

Night had brought coolness. Shadows that eased my aching head. There was no one around the fires when I first got there but the slave Pariah and a free woman I had never met before. The woman was jumpy and nervous. Her fingers trembled around the cup of blackwine she drank. I found that curious, almost curious enough to distract me from why I was there. Was she afraid of me? There was no reason for fear, she was within the first wagons. So then there must be another reason and before I could ponder it further pariah was sent over to me and she brought a plump cool bota, and I can say it was Sky sent for it tasted very good as it washed the dust from my mouth and throat.

I remained in the saddle. Mostly out of the lack of desire to move, I still ached from top to bottom and then there was the fact that every time I moved the horizon did an unbroken kaiila dance on me.

People began to arrive, some I knew some I did not. They gathered around the fires and spoke among themselves. Lone arrived. I heard that he and Laquetta were mated. The first woman at the fire must be the woman Laquetta. I also met a woman called Tacita. She was beautiful. But I do not look much at the women here. They are not for me. They are of the first wagons.

Raven and isis came in and isis brought Kai a bucket of water for him to play with. She then approached my stirrup and lifted her crossed wrists to me. I was puzzled for a moment andI paused in the hydration of my body. She begged me to buy her. That shocked me. I asked her why. Why she would ask me to buy her, she did not know me.
What I wanted to say was...

how would I buy you? I am only an outrider and you belong to the Ubar of my people. You are a valued kajira kept at the first wagons. How could I ever buy such a slave? All my property together might not even be enough.

But that is not what I said. I am a proud man.

The Best Intentions

Today an odd thing happened while I was riding drag. How it happened was not so odd. I can only say I was not paying attention. It was hot and dusty. I adjusted my wind scarf attempting to ward off breathing so much dust. But it still got into my eyes and my hair, in my ears and covered every bit of my skin. Kai had his head ducked and I can say he was paying better attention than I was for he tried to dodge the incoming blow but I was too out of it to even notice until the bosk hit us broadside. Knocked me clear out of the saddle. I don't know how long I was out.

When I came to I was staring at the sky and the hot ground was against my back and my head hurt. I just laid there for a while and the trickle of memory began to return to me. Not just the few minutes before the bosk hit me but the vision or dream or whatever you wish to call it that I experienced while I was unconscious.
There was a woman. And she was covered in blood and she danced. There was white everywhere. She sang a song, though I can't really remember the words. She knelt and then threw her arms open wide and arched her back until she broke and split open and from her crawled Ani, covered in blood.

It was just at that point that the first stabbing of light registered through my brain as I began to realize I was staring at Lar Torvis. I thought for sure my brains were leaking all over the plain for how much it hurt. I attempted to move, rolled to my knees and I wretched as the horizon upended and spun on me.
I touched my head and found a gash on the back of my skull. A bloody rock is obviously the culprit. Like most scalp wounds it bled like a stuck tarsk. I was going to be a grumpy bastard for a while.

When the world stopped spinning for me I got to my feet stiffly. Kai was standing a few paces away with the reins trailing. The bosk and other outriders were no where in sight. The herd having moved on. I stepped to him and grasped the pommel shoving a boot into the stirrup and pulling myself up ... though as I did my stomach caught up with me and just kept rising so I paused half in the saddle until it settled back to where it belonged.

It was only then that I began to feel the first tightened strings of concern for Ani. What meaning was held in the things I had seen? Was it only due to getting hit on the head and laying in the hot Lar Torvis?

The Hunt

Dreams. That is all they are. Ghosts and specters of the darkness. They vanish come the morning light. It is then that despite the angst of the night you must pick up your saddle. You must ride. The bosk are always there.

This morning I rode the last of my fresh meat over to my Aunt. She is not actually my aunt, she is the sister of Dubois. She is very old and blind. I don't think I have ever heard her name spoken. She has always been Aunt to me. She hates me. I think she hates everyone so I don't take it too personally. But I don't tell her who the meat is from either. I just leave it for her. I am not the only one that looks in on her, or leaves her food. Many of the woman around these wagons do as well, though I know how hard it must be to provide for an entire family and there is only me so I share. I can provide some of the meat and they can fix it for her. I have to chuckle thinking of the fit she would throw if she even knew I was within ten yards of her brightly painted wagon.

I am done curing the meat from the last hunt. Juu is planning on taking his eldest son out on his first hunt. Perhaps even to earn his name. I think they are going to take a wagon and bring everyone. I would go but I believe it is a family kind of thing. And though I am sure they will invite me I do not feel it would be right to intrude. I will hunt, but I will go myself. A couple more tabuk would be a big step towards filling up the stores for this winter. Not to mention the extra meet for my Aunt and Juu's family. Though soon his sons will be old enough to hunt and they will be well off.

I am going to leave Yaz with my wagon. Unless he is the one hunting he is less than desirable on a hunt. I will take my brown kaiila, Kree. I will leave my two best ... Kai and the big black Rocca here with my mares. They can use the rest. I have been riding them hard in the heat. Kree is young but needs the time beneath the saddle. It will be a good chance to train as well as hunt.

Perhaps if my luck holds I will come across a larl. I could use the fur as well as a larl is one of the best meats there is. At least in my opinion.
I will ride drag today. I will work so hard that I will be too tired to dream tonight.

Hush

Wasted effort
from your fingertip
you can not remedy
a silence brought by coal to lip
the crusted scab
a dark cocoon
you can not pierce the numbness
of this self inflicted tomb
do not ply me with your song
do not tempt me with your story
do not disturb the pins
I have waited for so long
do not stimulate my senses
I am passed
your feeble cure
I am anchored to the darkness
by a silence strong and pure
let my senses drown
in the blackened waves of ink
let them die somewhere below
let them rot there till they stink
they will rise again
bleached white
in sharpened contrast
perhaps then
I'll tolerate
their innervating light.

©2005

Silence

Tonight I believe the silence will kill me. It waits for me to move with a million tiny needles capturing me in a steel web sarcophagus.

I stare at the covering of my wagon above me.

I dreamt last night that I fell off a cliff but I did not rush towards the ground below me. I was left suspended. Hanging between the sky and the grass, weightless. If I could I would capture that feeling over and over again.

But tonight I am heavy. And if I move I know the pins will sink deep into my flesh and so I lay here anchored to the floor of my wagon, my mind empty and numb, only a vestige of the desire to be inspired left behind on the edges of my subconscious.
Is it because I am alone? Is it because there is no sound of breathing next to me to ease the emptiness? If there were only a sound to break the spell.

A whispered sound. Something quiet and wraith like that eased through the pins without disturbing them. A mist of something to drift over my fevered skin like a cool rain upon the dry heated plains.

Instead ... there is only left to me the treason of the darkness.

The Flute

The hunt went well. We took three tabuk, a larl, and I brought down a tumit with my bola. The meat is being jerked and salted. I saved the feathers in a cloth sack and one of the bones spoke to me and I have cleaned it and I have begun to carve a flute from it. The bone is light and it is taking the carving well. It would not be the first flute I have made. I used to do it often as a boy. This one though I am taking my time with. I want it to sound perfect. I want it to speak, as the bone spoke to me. I do not play often, perhaps this will inspire me to do so more.

I have caught Ani watching me. She is always alone. She is always quiet. I have never heard her make a sound, I have never seen her smile. There is only the big dark eyes. I think she likes the sounds I have been making with this flute. The boys like it as well. I have been teaching them as I go how to do it. I seem to be better at teaching some things than doing them myself. They are quick to pick it up. Juu is honored by his sons. I have thought on asking him about Ani. Why she is so different. But I do not wish to insult him somehow. Oni, she is a good mother, but she does not seem to care for Ani. It is not that anyone of the family seems to dislike her. It is more like they do not even realize she is there. Perhaps it is because she is so quiet. I find her eyes beautiful. I think I would be a proud father. I think I would hunt and hunt and work until my daughter had everything she ever wanted. I believe I would spoil her, protect her, and kill anyone that looked sideways at her.

Ani scares me, she is so different, and yet I feel a strange kinship with her for I too feel different from everyone else. Yaz seems to notice it also. For he allows Ani to sit with him sometimes near my wagon, or even the step. At first I was caught up in the fear of the big sleen and the tiny girl, but now, after catching her there with him so many times I have relaxed. I see it in Kai too. Sometimes when you watch a mother kaiila with her young you notice she is careful where she steps. Movement of paws almost exaggerated with extra care. He does just that when Ani is near. I am amazed. Whatever happened to Ani, whatever makes her the way she is ... Yaz and Kai seem to know. How is it that a small bit of female could wrap a warrior and a sleen and a daemon kaiila so easily around her little finger?

Time .. Time ... and Half a Time

It has been some time since I have returned to the first wagons. My days have been filled with work and all the preparations for winter. I have much meat preserved now. But still not enough. It is a lot of work for one man to do, and yet I only need enough for one. I have plans to lay extra stores away though.

In one way it has made the nights easier. The work. The sounds of people around my wagon. I am not so alone. And in another it has made me realize just how alone I really am. The size of Juu's family is a bit overwhelming. And yet it is a close example of all I have dreamed of creating and building.

The drive to reclaim all that was mine is a little less loud. The urge to ride to the first wagons. Perhaps it is only that I am working so hard and tired. Sometimes I just sit and watch the children play. Oni doing her work. Juu teasing his sons about their names. I can almost imagine I am a part of their family. In a way I suppose I am. Juu has turned out to be a good friend.

But late at night I still feel the itch. The need to build and claim. to lift my mark high into the plain's sky. To climb up the mountain and to yell, this is mine. I have made this. I have built this with my own sweat and my own blood.

New Residence

Today my time with the herd seemed to go by like a dream. It was uneventful, quiet. I am not tired. The bosk were content to graze and appeared half asleep themselves.
I decided to move my wagon. With Yaz there I have noticed no more intrusions into my wagon. And yet still I feel unnerved. I rearranged the two chests within. I moved my sleeping blankets to the other side of the fire.

I became acquainted with another outrider. His name is Juu. He said he was named for a Tuchuk Warrior who lived many years ago and was lost upon the plains. He is a Hunter. We have made plans to go hunting tomorrow. He invited me to pull my wagon over with his. He has a small family of his own, two wagons. The rest are friends of his father. He doesn't remember his father though. And I don't care to remember mine, we have something in common.

There are many children here at this group of wagons. It was odd at first but now I do not mind their noise. They stay away from my wagon, Yaz is nothing to argue with. I do not fear for them, Tuchuk children are not stupid, at least the ones that live are not.

Juu has four sons, two daughters, a little girl and a baby boy. He had not wasted his time with his mate, Oni. Oni is a good Tuchuk woman. She works hard for her children. But I noticed the little girl, Ani, is left much alone. She is so tiny and so brave.

My stomach nearly fell through my boots when I came back to my wagon and found her sitting next to Yaz. No one had even noticed she was not at her own wagons. At first I did not know what to do. Should I kill Yaz? I was reaching for my lance even as my brain continued to catch up with my eyes. But she was fine. Yaz was half asleep, though I had seen him leap to his feet and attack from just that position. Instead of using my weapon I approached slowly and spoke quietly to Yaz. Even I do not approach my own wagon without alerting him. I picked her up and hauled her back to the cooking fire before I realized I was holding my breath. I set her down near the other children and then I just crouched as the muscles of my legs turned to jelly and I broke out in a cold sweat. Ani simply looked at me with those big serious eyes of hers and continued to play with her doll.

I have never seen Ani smile.

Overcast

Today the sky was overcast with clouds. The plains blanketed in a shroud.. a blanket that appears to have tucked everything in. The bosk are quiet. Dawn was mellow. No shooting shards of gold across the sky. It eased over the hills and ravines. It is still. It feels damp but there is no rain.

I left Yaz, the big black sleen guarding my wagon. Someone went in it when I was not there. That does not please me. Is it not enough that they attempt to waylay me for a purpose I do not even know yet? It is not that there is much in there. I own very little. But when a man owns less he values what he owns even more. I finally own a space that is mine. It is not the biggest or the newest wagon but it is mine. It was perhaps only a slave meaning no harm, however ... I own no slaves. No slave has permission to enter my wagon and touch my things. No slave has begged me to be allowed to offer me food, or water, or bring anything else that does not belong to me to my wagon. In any case, whomever or whatever it was about I have left the sleen there. It will not happen again. No one will get within fifteen feet of my wagon. I am not sure who is crazy enough to believe I will eat food that is not mine, that I did not request. There is someone within my people that wishes me harm, I will not be such an easy mark.

Either my space will be respected or Yaz will eat well.

The Piece she Carried from the Cave

When I was done speaking to her I rested my forearms on my knees and I asked her if she understood all I had said. She said yes. I told her to repeat it back to me then. Prove that she understood it. That seemed to take her back some. She should expect such from me.

she spoke it. She knew it. She understood it. And if the in the days to come it grew misty again I was sure there would be a master around to clear it up for her. Over time it would become more and more ingrained. The habits of fear would grow dim and the Sky and the bosk and the kaiila and the grass would once more flow freely through her veins. The very essence of being a Tuchuk that was honesty and pride in who we are.

I told her to keep dreaming. That the collar was not what hindered it but the mists of her mind. I told her if she felt fear, then she was believing a lie. It was that simple. And if in those days to come she was afraid and could not find the lie than to seek me out and I would help her.

I released her wrists from the binding. I told her to run like the wind back to her tasks. To remember everything she had said to me, and I would know if she was remembering it by the glow of pure womanhood that she would not be able to hide. I smacked her squarely on the ass and sent her off.

I watched her run across the grass and I knew that if she were thrown to a man again. By will of her master, a man that was perhaps not even a Tuchuk... I knew that she would make that dweller a believer in Tuchuk slaves. That the man would cry for the beauty and pride that flowed in her veins and he would wish to the Sky he had been born a Tuchuk Warrior.

Reflections

It was painful to see her as lost as she was. Lost to herself. I could only blame the years she had spent with dwellers. Confined beneath the ceilings and within the high walls. I can only wonder that there is any of her left at all. How deep the webbing of the lies she believed and spun around herself for protection. I can only think it is being back here on the plains with her people, under the Sky, no hiding from the wind and the rain that has begun to make her honest with herself. But that honesty is painful in its beginnings.

I reined in the beast and I threw a leg over the saddle and dropped to the ground. I gave her a full ten beats of the drum to kneel and when she did not I kicked her legs out from under her. No more was she given a hort. I told her she was not worth owning until she was honest with who she was. I told her she could not be owned nor mated, free woman nor slave until she knew who she was in the core of her being. I told her she was worthless without that knowledge, that she was a danger to herself and those around her.

I asked her who she was. She replied she was a slave. I told her I didn't ask what she was I asked who she was. She replied she was just a woman.

Just a woman.

Just a woman?

I wanted to backhand her. I wanted to see the blood spray from her lips across my boots. Instead I had a painful clamp of my fingers on her jaw and I spoke, though I probably spoke through my teeth.

"Just a woman? Where is your pride Tuchuk? Where is your arrogance? Where is the trust and faith in your breeding? Are you not a woman of the plains? Do you not feel the bosk in your veins? the Sky? the soil? the grass? Do you not remember the feel of kaiila muscle between your thighs? and the fury of a plains storm?"

Ah the poison of the dwellers. That she would have to give up everything to be a slave? Bosk shit. It would not change who she was, it would enhance what she was in her core. No more hiding. No more lies. She was pure Tuchuk woman. Free to feel desire when a strong man took her by the hair. Free to kneel at the feet of men and receive the gift of mastery. That thing we do to women, we show them pieces of themselves. Each man would show her a different piece. Some she would come to love more than others, some would show a clearer picture to her ... but she was not burdened with the choice any longer. She was free to kneel and receive. Her fear was based on the lie that she would be less of a woman in a collar.

When the truth was that it was the only way she would be a whole woman.

Enter the Cave of Mirrors

As the wagons were left behind the beast was allowed to lengthen his stride. I ran the woman for a long time. Until her breaths were ragged and I saw the sweat began to glisten on her body. And then I reined in Kai and we slowed to a walk. That is when I started questioning her. I would allow nothing sexual to enter between us. There would be no desire to cloud her answers. Physical exertion only. Always now the rhythm of the steps and the sound of the kaiila paws upon the plain. Her conscious mind would have to keep that rhythm or fall and be drug by the leather leash binding her wrists. Her subconscious mind would have to step up and aid the answering of my questions.

It was then I started her talking. I asked her where her fears were that clouded her mind. She asked me if I thought a woman could love two at one time. I would never allow her to see how that question effected me. But I told her my opinion. I believed a slave could love two men at one time. I did not believe a free woman could. She told me she was once confused between two men. She told me several other things. Things that led me to believe that in her heart, in her core, she was a slave. I did not lead her answers, nor her questions. I let her plot the way at first until I knew. It was only then I began to guide her through the mists of her own denial.

Spex Once Known as Mahalah

Declan came riding in. Man looked like death ... like death that had been sitting in a hot bag for a few days. A lot like an urt I knew of....

It was a little later that the Spex once known as Mahalah came to the fires. She was the reason I had come this morning though I had not spoken of the reason out loud. I wanted to ask her of the rains and when they would come. I was going to be working all day in a stream bed and there is nothing that will kill a man faster than to be caught on the plains in a dry stream bed when there is rain somewhere else and all of the sudden you get hit by a wall of water. It is not healthy to go lounging around in a stream bed on the plains. It may not be raining here, but it may be miles away and you will not know it until it is too late. But ... I was not going to be lounging today, I was going to be working ... and any help in the area was going to be welcomed.

I actually never did end up asking her. Now a couple of days ago I had told her if she got tired of the darkness clouding her mind to come and talk to me. Today she asked to speak to me. I know she has been troubled lately. I know the collar has been weighing on her neck like a mill stone. I told her she could speak to me while I rode towards the stream. Leashing her wrists I mounted and rode out from the first wagons towards the stream with her jogging at my stirrup.

I was not unaware of the looks we got. As we continued to travel away from the first wagons I know there were several gazes of satisfaction for I was an outrider and at my stirrup ran a woman of the first wagons. She was a good girl though and kept her head up, proud. Just like a Tuchuk woman always should. They would begrudgingly come to accept her as she was. After they rubbed her status in I was sure, but that was the way. When they saw she wore her collar well they would be proud of her.

There is a fierce protective pride in our people, and I savored it.

The Kaiila Known as Kai

I stopped at the first wagons before going out to the stream. The few moments respite from the work was welcome and I had been drawn to a few there that lightened the monotony of the day to day.

Today the aroma of blackwine was a torture. I am not wealthy enough to drink the stuff. The few occasions it has come my way though have given me an addiction for it. Mai was there at the fires drinking some. If I stared at her I hope she did not take it as an offense. Damn the stuff smelled good. The new slave isis was there beating furs and raven was around and brought water for me and offered to for my new kaiila.

Speaking of my new kaiila, he is a blood red beast. His left fang has been broken and it is jagged and gives him a malevolent sneer. The scar that runs down across his left eye does not help. The eye was not damaged fortunately. He is big. The biggest kaiila I have seen in a while. All raw power and we sometimes get into arguments about who is in control but I usually win. Usually.

I have named him Kaiila. There really wasn't anything else I could call him. He is just the epitome of ... kaiila. He ... is. I will probably shorten it to Kai though, less syllables to yell. He is intelligent for a beast. With him and Ahamay I do not feel quite as alone.

The Stream

The woman Noya and I raced at the kaiila track. She was a worthy opponent. It felt good to push my beast to the limits without it being work. I look forward to the next race with her. I finally met Trajen, his mate is Nava. A few free women around the fire though they seem withdrawn and quiet. There are several new slave girls around the first wagons. And some of the ones I met are no longer there. The Spex seems to be wearing her collar well. I begin to wonder if she does not belong in it. I can not see a man freeing a woman from a collar when she proves to be pleasing in one.

Some time during the winter the stream changed course and the large watering hole dried up. The bank caved in and rocks and soil slid into the path of the stream. For the last three days I have been working at dragging the stream and hauling boulders from the low hills to the west with teams of bosk. My muscles are so tight I sometimes wonder if they will ever relax. I never dreamed I would grow any more together with my saddle but the last three days have challenged that theory. Every night I have fallen into my blankets without a fire or food. I eat what meat I have dried and can shove into my belt before I drag myself back out into the saddle. I haven't even had time to gather dung.

I believe today we will actually change the course of the stream back. The old stream bed is drug out and prepared and the other boulders are in place for a small retaining wall so that it doesn't happen again. It was good in a way. We have been able to clean out the watering hole and make it more useful with better drainage that makes the water fresher and less brackish. Easier to do it when there is no water there. But a lot of work no one was planning for.

I've been too busy to think about the other events of this hand. When I start to think I just work harder. It is easier that way.

The Beginning of the End

What was it all about? It wasn't robbery. I have nothing to take. It wasn't mistaken identity. She was a targeted bolt sent by the unknown marksman. She found her mark .... though I know the result was unexpected.

I don't remember the moment I left her. I wish I could. I remember a lane of wagons. I remember a cool stream. I remember drinking and drinking the cool water and I would swear to you I must have leaked like a sieve because I never got enough. I remember stripping and bathing in that stream. Washing the stain of her from me. Her lingering scent.

I think I must have passed out on the bank of that stream. I was probably invisible in the grass. Perhaps it saved my life, I don't know. It was getting light when I remember walking over a grassy bank and seeing the many Tuchuk wagons ahead of me. Missing pieces .... I remember the smooth steps of my wagon. I remember the darkness inside.

And now there is only the numbness and the fractured pain as bolts of light rip through the mist. I know my head hurts. I know the feel of this leather between my fingers. I know the rhythm of the braid.

But I do not know why. I knew it was a bad idea to start going around the first wagons. I knew someone would recognize me. I knew it was better to remain anonymous. I knew it was a bad idea to start reaching for those things taken from me. But what is done is done. Enough hiding. Fuck it. Their first shot failed....

I think.

The End of the Beginning

The wine was expensive. The girl was exquisite. The sex was rough. I think she was alive when I left her. I wish I could remember that part.

I wish I could separate the sensations. Why I wanted to keep her eyes. Why I hated the tiny freckles across her breasts. How she could please me and make me want to destroy her all tied up and contained in one violent act.

Did I take aggression out on her? Or was she the cause of it? Did I humiliate her because of all my frustrations? Or because she inspired it?

I played her like an instrument. I reduced her to the basic female instincts she harbored in her core. I pieced out her emotions and I ate them. I fucked her until she was nothing more than a stain on my cock.

Was it because I was angry? Or was I angry because of it? Where did the surge of energy come from? I hated her pale flesh. I think I tried to rip it off. I liked the way she crawled on her belly in the dirt and begged me to hurt her again. I hated the word please and I know I slapped it from her lips.

She got more than she had bargained for. I hated the set up of it all, even through the fog I knew it for what it was. I know that when I was done with her she was a more honest female.

I also know she was not the driving force behind it. I don't know how I know it. I just know it.

What did they take me for? Yesterday they took me for a thirsty dusty rider. And I was. Yesterday they took me for a drunk. And I was. Yesterday they took me for an easy mark. And I wasn't.

I remember I liked the feel of her throat exposed in my fingers. I think she was alive when I left her. I wish I could remember that part.

The Beginning .. In Retrospect

In retrospect I still wonder if it wasn't another dream of mine. So real and yet so distant from my fragile hold on reality.

She was so beautiful. When I first saw her I only saw the soft white cloak she was covered in. Not the kind of cloak you wear to escape the cold. But the kind you wear to escape the burning rays of Lar Torvis. It was when she turned over her shoulder and shot a look at me from those eyes that I was enthralled. When she caught my gaze she turned fully to lift a bota of water to me. I could not speak. It was as if there was a rift cut between my lungs and my tongue. But the water was welcomed. I was so hot and tired and dusty. Sweat rolled down my forehead and temples as I lifted the cool water over my arm and let the stream hit my mouth.

In retrospect I knew it was too sweet. But I could not stop drinking. I was so dry and thirsty and it was so cool and wet.

I think I must have drained the bota. She offered me the shade behind the wagon. I threw a leg over and dropped to the ground stirring the dust beneath my boots. There was more to drink there. A sweet wine.

That is where I begin to lose the ordered filing of my memory. The rest is in pieces. Flashes of pictures, sensations ... all this intertwined within the pleasant fog that eases the throbbing of my head.

After the End .. or the Next Day

I think I must have been drunk last night. Intoxication still drifts in mists through my thoughts and Lar Torvis only reaches me in sharp spears that lance through the fog. I watch my fingers braiding the leather strips and I know they are my hands but my vision fluctuates from being so far away to very close. So close I have to lean back to focus. Today I do not try to brush the hair from my gaze. It is a welcome shade.

I do not drink much. I do not have time. I am still trying to piece together the events of yesterday. I remember a comfortable numb though. It lingers with the mists.

The repetitive movements are easy on my conscious. The back and forth as the new leather slides against my fingers.

My memory comes in flashes. I remember yesterday up to a point. A point where I was done riding and I had decided to make my way towards the first wagons. Perhaps spend some time with the spunky little jir. I like the person she brings out in me.
But I never got there.

Of Wisdom and Acquiescence

I should be a very wise man. Perhaps I am. I know I am driven to understand more and there is no limit to that drive. Sensation overwhelms me and I could weep for the exquisite beauty of it all. Even as it kills me. At one and the same time to see it and want to place it on a pedestal where it can be safe from all the dirt that life has to throw ... and also to cut it apart further and feel the warm wet slickness up to my elbows.
Something so simple as a beautiful woman, a Tuchuk slave. Her inhibitions slaughtered and peeled away. She is the epitome of female beauty and desire. Arrogance come to acquiescence at your feet.
And yet as much as I may dream and conspire against Life, Life still delivers its cutting blows that leave the scars that mark me as a warrior. I am better, I am stronger, I am wiser. I am the bones beneath the flesh that rots .... and I may not be the man who has seen the light, I may not be the man who announces himself with the sound of trumpets and horns, but I am real. And I don't look for perfection. I don't look for the light. I simply want someone to live beneath my hand, thrive beneath my wisdom, grow beneath my guidance .... and think of me when I am not around.

To Be Wise

I think it is every man's drive to know better. To be wise beyond his years and yet we all forget what makes a man wise. Experience. Those life lessons that open up his understanding like a rotten fruit in the summer heat. The skin splits and the swollen flesh extends outward to burst its confines. The sweet stench rising on the ardent air to assail the nostrils.

We all want to be wise. And we all complain when our skin hurts.

To Understand a Wink

Sometimes I wonder where it comes from. The emotion. The chuckle or the smile. Even perhaps a wink for a favored one. Sometimes it all seems so far away from me. Like I am watching at a distance this man... this man who is myself. Sometimes I want to break through to him. To communicate. To feel him. Somehow to bring the emotion and thought together for the first time like long lost lovers. To let them caress and feel once again the familiar contours and crevices, the way the muscle moves beneath the skin. Would I survive it? Would I live beyond the crashing of the sky?
The slave known as matou is gone. Run away they say. I am not sure how that is, how she would survive the sleens. But I witnessed her hiding from me. Something I did not ever expect to see. I was wrong to want to show her those things. I was wrong. I want to know better. I want to remember this. I want to not make mistakes. I will not make that mistake again.

Spex and the Tuchuk Slaves

Today I rode to the first wagons again. This time to collect Ahamay.

I had spent since the early morning hours riding. I hate days. I would much rather work the nights. The nights are cool and the bosk are quiet ... usually. The day shift is hot and dusty. The bosk on the move constantly. Grass grass grass ...always the eternal search for grass. Water also. Always moving. If we stayed too long in one place we would destroy the grass and the entire plains would become a wasteland, a desert. And so always we move forward. I ate enough dust today to make another rider as big as myself. But I was so thirsty he would have been a very dry man. Dust coats everything. My eyes grate with sand when I blink. I look hundreds of years old for dust cakes every sweat trail and makes my hair look gray. Most times I use a wind scarf. It is old and threadbare but it is mine, and it is all I have
.
Several things happened this visit to the first wagons. I found the Spex. But she was collared and chained to a wagon. Now isn't that some shit. I do not know what black cloud is going to come of that but any time a Spex is humiliated bad things happen. Do not mistake me, I do not believe that a Spex should get away with anything any other woman doesn't. But a man really takes the Fates by the balls when he messes with a Spex.

My beast just stood there with his head hung and drool running down one of his fangs. I was too dry to drool and I sat upon my kaiila surrounded by slaves and not one of them offered to serve me. It is not how I was accustomed to being greeted at the first wagons. I know I am only an outrider. To some I am nothing. But I am a scarred warrior. I am a master. And above all these things I am a man. I did not become angry over this. I even joked with a slave named ori about Ahamay being a bastard of a bird. I think I must have offended her, if it is possible for a man to offend a slave, for her attitude towards me and her expressions. Again, these things would not make me angry. A man learns early on which things to give importance to and which things are not worth the energy. Not that I can say it always works for me. But for whatever reason I did not get angry. I brought water for my kaiila and he drank like he would never get the chance again. Now the Spex, she noticed no one had served me and apologized to me for them. To some it was news that I had not been served. Which was no excuse, but it did offer a small reason. Two slaves came to me then, neka and dusty. They bellied and begged to serve me. I asked them, if I had been mistaken in believing that the first wagons were like any other place where kajirae were proud to serve men. The question was of course redundant. I told them the honor of serving me was not going to be given, for it took the Spex's words to bring them to my feet. I may be an outrider but I am a fiercely proud Tuchuk. They begged me to allow them to serve, because it was their duty. This was true, but it was not the words I had been looking for. Their duty to me was fulfilled and they were told so. The slave ori came to me then and begged my forgiveness. I gave them all a short lecture on the pride of Tuchuk slaves. I think they heard me. Tuchuk kajirae are vibrant and beautiful, but no more so than when they are in tune with their slavery. Bringing obeisance and arrogance together. I like to believe that only Tuchuk slaves can do so.

I left them with the command to always give water to a rider. To always offer to serve. And I cupped my hands into the water barrel and I drank from my own fingers.

Is it slavery that inspires such bitter hatred in me? No of course not. Do not be so narrow minded and simple.

I do not hate her. I hate the dreams I built around her that were not based on her reality. Spun with some kind of mist inspired by my own desires and needs. I placed her on a pedestal that was not for her ... and she fell without any beauty or grace.

Her wings ripped from her flesh leaving ragged holes in my memory of her. It is not she .. herself ... that brings the bile to rise in my throat. It is my own broken and shattered visions stitched so closely to my heart that when they were rent from me they caused a bleeding that still leaves my soul ichor drenched and cold.

So far from hating slavery, it is more in fact that I am more comfortable with it than with free women. At least a slave is honest with herself and with the men in her life. She does not live behind a veil of the unknown. There is no guessing who and what she is. She hides nothing, owns nothing. She is simply what she is.

A free woman can be one of two things. A slave in disguise. Or the pristine sanctum of womanhood that every man desires for his companion. It is the guesswork involved that I have had done with.

No I do not hate her. I hate the mockery made of what I built for her. I despise my vision quartered and pieced out to every hungry voracious pit. Pulled asunder and devoured by the uninspired ... the masses ... the normal deaf, dumb and mute scavengers of life.

My Daemon

Was it just sex that effected me like this? No, of course not. I was no stranger to the act.

It was her.

From the time I had loosed her virgin stitches she infected my veins like a slow acting poison. Kanda for the mind. Drugged conscience ... and I don't mean conscious.

I had built such dreams around her. They were not exactly normal. I don't think I've had a normal dream in my entire existence. But they were as close to normal as I had ever come. She was to be mine someday. To stand beside me, bear children.
Who was she? She was my sister.

No, not my blood sister. To my knowledge there are none that share my blood. She was the daughter of Dubois. Dark haired Tuchuk Wench with intoxicating blue eyes .... so much like the Sky I prayed to them.

The summer we spent together was hot and wet and like none other I can remember. Was it the naivety of youth? Was it the inevitable treacherous soul of women? When they caught her with one of the commanders she was begging to be his slave. A slut with her thighs splayed for every scarred warrior of the Tribe. Is it that in every woman's heart there is a whore?

She is still a slave of the Tribe. I can not but feel the drug every time I see her. Though I no longer partake of her community pussy. Sloppy stench. She makes me ill.

Yet still sometimes I wake from the dream of fucking her drenched in the same heat of that summer and my stomach wretches with the strength of her intoxication and the sick memory of her.

Dying Dream

I lay sweating and my breath was ragged ... seeming torn in and out of my lungs. The act of dreamed sex having flexed every muscle of my body until they screamed for more oxygen. I was staring at the covering of my wagon for a long time before I saw it. I was drenched in sweat. The dream had been intense and it left me sick with the strength of it. I rolled over and got my knees under me and I just stayed there for several moments with my forehead pressed against the cool planks of the flooring.

Reality.

I called it forth like a Spex demanding vision from mist. I finally straitened enough to allow my lungs to fill more with air and raked fingers back through my soaked hair. I slowly leaned my head back and clenched my fists and yelled. The sound of my own voice seemed to dispel the last of the reverie mists.

Slowly my heart's beat returned to normal.

Slowly the sweat cooled and dried upon my body. Slowly the darkness of my gaze found the ability to focus.

Slowly ... my synapses left off the vision of her.

Dry and Weathered

Yesterday I rode to the first wagons. I asked the Spex of Ahamay. She said he was doing well. That the slave matou had a gift with him. I asked her patience with him. That I would be riding towards the settlements looking for a slave. And I did not wish to leave him alone yet at my wagon. She agreed. She told me that I should choose a slave well since she and the woman called Nava went through slaves like water. That they were hard on them. I told her I had no worries for if the slave survived me she would have no trouble surviving elsewhere. I spoke more truth than was obvious on the surface. I am not an easy master. I am not an easy man for that matter. I try hard to be normal. To show the expressions and emotions that they all do at the right times and for the right reasons. It is not that I do not have emotions, not at all. I have so many. They just never seem to fit where everyone else feels they belong. I will probably get old at some point and not care, but right now I am still caught up in that age old drive to belong to something ... somewhere. If I had the inclination I could lament my lack of identity with it all.

Perhaps tomorrow.

I am just now back from riding all night. The Spex was right when she said it was going to rain. It did. And that mud pit we have had so much trouble with was nothing but more trouble. I worked all night. The day today was hot and everything dried and is dusty. I rode again to the central wagons as I promised the Spex I would do. I don't even remember getting there. My mind was caught in this ebb of mire so like the bosk I had worked all night to free. Something was going on with the slaves there. Some kind of trouble. I was pleased at least one came to bring me water, I needed it so badly. Even my kaiila was too tired to drool. She itched to leave and so I let her. I just drank and drank until I thought I would drown and still I felt the cracks of dryness all through me. Will I know anything but thirst? Of course, but at the moment it does not seem like it.

I am going to sleep some and then head for the settlements.

Sleep. My body so tired and yet my mind races with so many thoughts. Too many thoughts to control. To rein in. Why is it when I stumble through the door of my wagon I can't even think, all I want is a chance to stop forcing my muscles to respond. And then, when I can finally do so .... I can't. My eyes wide open staring at the covering above, or the walls. I hate walls. I've decided. I hate grass. I hate the horizon. I hate bosk. I hate stupid bosk that get stuck in mud. I hate kaiila. I hate women. I hate the silence without them. I hate ...

Somewhere in there I slept.

Girl in a Message

I dreamt of her again last night. I woke with her upon my fingertips and flavoring the edge of my conscious.

She was there. She was so real. She sang a song for me. It was in another language and it soothed my soul. She touched my arm and her fingers were so cool. They eased the burning of my veins. Behind her perched three black birds. She wore white ... I believe ... or nothing at all. Her skin was like porcelain. Her eyes were so dark. Like mine ... pools of ink with no reflection. It started to rain. The kind of rain that drenches the plains and sends flash floods down the ravines. I reached for her but her skin turned to parchment, printed with words but they were like puzzle pieces and did not fit together ... her skin pulled away from her into my hands. She started to fade from me then. She did not scream at me for taking her skin. She seemed to understand.

And I woke with the feel of her still upon my fingers and the words upon my lips.

Sound of Silence

Ahamay, the big black bird that Dubois left for me has not eaten in days. I was concerned and so today I rode to the first wagons. I searched for a Spex. One that would help me with the bird. I did not wish to see him die.

I was met at the central fires by two slaves. I called them kajira one and kajira two. They were beautiful spirited Tuchuk slaves. They did not see me ... not me. But they saw a master, a scarred warrior and that is enough for me. In that moment I felt pride for my Tribe. It is not always so. There have been times I have hated my people. Hated myself for being one of them.

The Spex was there and she said she would help my bird if I would give my word to come to the fires more often. I am disturbed by this. Why would she ask this of me? Did she remember my family? Does she know they were of the first wagons? Does she know my father was a black mask?

It is dangerous for me to go there. And yet I will for I gave my word.

She had a slave called matou. A strange girl. A barbarian though so I suppose that explains much. Ahamay took to her instantly. I have never seen him like that. Not with Dubois even. I wish Dubois was here so I could ask her what it all means. I miss her.

I miss Ahamay for now my wagon is indeed empty save for the sound of my own breathing. Tonight I wish for a pillow of breasts. For the comfort of soft skin. For a voice to sing to me to still the silence that crashes in with a deafening roar.

Today I thought of a slave for the first time. I mean in fact, a slave for me for the first time. To own one. It is possible now. I will begin to work towards this. I do not think I can stand the silence of this wagon much more or I shall go sane.

Hallelujah

I think I am more alone in my wagon than I ever was sleeping where I fell. Where I found a shelter. Every sound seems to echo in here. I think too much.

Today I painted on the sides. Great sweeping visions of color. Probably only understood by me. Sometimes I wish there were someone that could share it with me. To see it as I did. To understand. Is that not what we all wish for? For a moment when you realize that you are not alone. That someone out there in the mass of thought connects with you. It is enough to swell in your veins and burst upon your skin and suddenly you feel everything and you see everything and you .... well you know ... everything. At least I believe that to be true. And even if it is not I dream of it. I envision it. I see it out there in the stars when I ride at night.
I am full of so much. So much I have never shared with anyone. The dreams and visions all wrapped around the idea that the person exists that will understand. That will see what I pull from the things around me as I build what is mine. Who will find shelter in it. Who will see the mark I leave upon this existence and marvel at it and be lost in it and ...and will see it ... and know that it is my signature.

I would yell at the top of my lungs unto the Sky if I could just express myself. I look around me and it seems to come so easy for some. They do, they build and it is recognized for what it is. I struggle to lift my alter to the heavens and it comes out crooked and writhing. Misunderstood and they are afraid. Afraid of what I see. I can not help I see the world without its skin. I see the tendon and sinew. I see the rush of blood through veins and how it is all tied together and how it works from the inside out. And it is beautiful and it is ugly and it is sick and it is wrong and yet ... it is. And I can not deny what I see.

One day I will find my artist. I will gorge myself upon her. I will cleave her open and I will glut myself on every atom of creativity she is and I will bathe in her and I will dance in her and I will paint with her until there is nothing of her left but my signature.

Perhaps then ... they will understand.

Courage

It was odd to sleep in a wagon tonight. I can't remember when I last slept under anything except the stars. It is not much of a wagon. But it is mine. I have never owned anything this big before. It makes me feel opulent.

My scars itch. They seem to be healing well.

I am just done with three days of hard riding. Some of the small stuff got mired down in mud by the water hole. I feel like my shoulders and back are packed full of rocks. I barely had enough energy to gather some dung for the fire. I don't remember if I ate. I just fell into my blankets.

How can I be so tired and yet my mind be so awake? The last few days have been a change for me. Respect. It is not something I have ever gotten. I can't say I had a lot of it the last couple of days but there was a difference. I caught a girl watching me today. She did not turn up her nose in disgust. She even blushed a little. It made me ride taller in the saddle.

I have meat. I was allowed to go on a hunt and I brought back a tabuk. A whole tabuk to myself. I think I will eat until I throw up. Eat until I have to pack it down my throat with a stick. I will make a new shirt with the skin. I have never had a new shirt before.

I need to sleep and still my brain is charged with energy. Pictures flashing so fast through my conscious. I wish I could capture them and paint them on the sides of my wagon. Tomorrow if I have time I will hunt and trade meat and hide for some paint.