79. Qesh (i) @Alnasl
The fury of Far-nah-qesh was all around us, the storm’s blast a red hell. Stinging, choking sand was now so thick I saw only a few yards anywhere I looked. Beyond that, all else was indistinct blur. It was as if I was again figure-blind, stumbling through the desert in Quibble’s wake, confused, witless.
The gray mare had slowed. Her flanks heaved with her labored breath. I prayed she wouldn’t collapse beneath me. Then the blurry shapes we were following – Quibble on horseback, Lurah with the camels – stopped moving, and we passed between them. I drew the reins, turned in the saddle. Quibble and Lurah were dismounting. At once, the sah directed us to unload the sandstorm tent Yahn and Yuni had given us.
Relieved of their burdens, the camels lay down of their own accord, seeming at home in the sandstorm. But, unsaddled, the horses still needed Lurah’s coaxing. She worked with reins and riding crop to bring them to their knees, then their bellies. Quibble knelt between the horses, an arm over the neck of each, stroking them, soothing them, as Lurah and I constructed the tent above them, propping it on poles and holding it taut by cords tied to anchors we buried in the sand. Once the tent was erect, we took as much water and food in as we could. Low to the ground and streamlined to let sand blow off, the tent grew cramped, the air inside stuffy. Once it was sealed, we stripped off our bandannas.
“How long,” Quibble huffed, “will this last?”
“Hours or minutes, no telling,” I said as I squatted next to her, rubbing her back. “Deep breaths, deep and even. That’s it, Quibble. You’re fine.”
“The sah-uhn-say had to stop as well,” said Lurah, faintly visible in the dark. “I wonder how many followed us after all.”
“I espied three, all on camels,” said Quibble. “Luht was one of them.”
“Hours or minutes,” Lurah echoed me, musing on something. There was a long silence, and then she announced, “I am going.”
“Going?” Quibble and I said in unison.
“I must do a sah’s work.”
“You mean you’re going to kill them,” Quibble said.
“That’s madness!” I objected. “You’ll just get lost and die out there. And even if you don’t suffocate, even if you find them – one against three?!”
“Listen, both of you!” Lurah said harshly. “If I have not returned by the time the storm passes, do not wait for me. Take the tent – Far-nah-qesh may come again. Go east, quickly. In a day or two, you will see Ahnk-nuh-qah-say on the horizon, a glint of light like a star. When you reach it, set the camels and horses free. Qeht-qahlif will lead them to water, for he is wise in the paths of Ayn-qesh. As I hope you will be. Ef-suhl.”
And then, deaf to our pleas, she left.
“Magenta,” Quibble said, facing me in the dim light of the oil lamp. She shut one eye behind her goggles. “Now I see red.” She opened that eye and shut the other. “Now I see blue.” She opened the eye and stared at me. “Together, they make a different color, just like the light of opposing glasses.”
I thought of Gienah. He might have given us an encyclopedic lecture on how the mind interprets vision, but something else intrigued me: “You can blink with either eye independently? Just as easily with one as the other?”
Quibble opened and shut alternating eyes, repeating the trick three times.
“I’ve never seen that!” I observed. “Extraordinary.”
