Chapter 4 – Bloody Business

  The outskirts of the Bdain Araan Desert – Drift 3

  Hayam stepped outside to find her already lacing her boots. He'd expected nothing less.

  The suns hadn’t cleared the cliffs yet, and the sand lay in shadow, deep purple and sharp in the early dark. He stopped a few steps from the door and watched his daughter get ready, gripping a hot cup of tea too tightly and struggling to keep his worry from showing.

  He regretted letting her go as soon as he said it. But the look on her face made it impossible to say no. She was old enough—twenty Devon sols, or nineteen Standard.

  She was fastening his knife at her belt and what appeared to be his spare locator on her wrist.

  With one hand on the doorframe, he watched her finish tying the straps. She wore his blue scarf, tied loosely around her neck as if it was just a careless afterthought, though he knew it meant more. The edge was fraying; one thread caught in the wind, dancing like a signal. She hadn’t asked to take it. She never did. But she always reached for it when she was scared.

  Or when she thought he might be.

  Cold light edged her shoulder, making her look older—not by age, but in the way she moved, more precise and determined. Her whole body showed a sense of purpose he felt he lacked. She was nothing like him, but she was everything he hoped she would become. She was much calmer now and just as stubborn as when she was small. He wanted to kick himself for letting her go.

  He hated when she did this: leaving to run before full light, alone, wrapped too tightly in leather and dusted navy linen scraps.

  But he’d taught her how to move, how to read the dunes, how to know the wind.

  Now she moved without hesitation, without waiting. She was ready to do more than just train, run, and follow. He knew it, even if he didn’t want to admit it.

  He could stop her.

  He could try.

  He really wanted to.

  He wanted to say something simple, like wait for the wind to shift, take a runner, don’t go alone, or grow a few more sols—maybe ten.

  But he didn’t.

  Because she wasn’t a child anymore.

  And because part of him, the part that had seen her step between venom-spitters and smile, believed the desert might actually be safer with her out there.

  Still, he cleared his throat. “You’re going far.”

  She nodded once, cinched the last strap. “Ridgeplate Spear. If the roots haven’t dried.”

  He frowned. “That’s four ridges out.”

  “Three,” she corrected. Then, quieter: “I’ll be back before I run out of shadows.”

  She reached for the satchel but paused when he didn’t answer. Her eyes met his, steady and calm, unhurried.

  “Leave a mark if you change course,” he said, nodding toward the ridge where the signal still held.

  She tapped the inside of her wrist. “Already logged.”

  Behind her, a long-legged trumpet-nose skinner sneezed into a clump of dry grass.

  “Is that what you’re riding? Where did you even get that?”

  She grinned and patted the animal’s thick, red-striped fur. “Caught him last night.”

  The creature flinched at her touch, but the leash was tied too short.

  Re ho san! Of course she’d been out during the night. “And how do you plan to feed him? Water him?”

  “I’ve got reserves,” she said, stepping aside to show the bags tied to the mount’s back. “And so does he,” she said, gesturing at the oversized belly of the beast. “I’ll let him go as soon as I can walk back.”

  He exhaled slowly, already regretting letting her go.

  “Well,” he muttered, “if all else fails, at least you’ve got emergency food.”

  “Mor ter sha,” she called behind her, grinning.

  He’d let her go.

  “Emergency food? As if I’d ever eat you, Nosey,” Serendipity said as she swung onto the skinner’s back and stroked the coarse stripes along his shoulder. His fur was hotter than she expected, already warmed by the sun even though it was early.

  The mount shifted beneath her, ears flicking in protest, then stilled. She’d chosen him for his stamina, and his coloring. He wouldn’t starve if she had to stay longer than planned. She might. But he wouldn’t.

  She’d hoped Hayam wouldn’t wake to see her off, but even if he did, it didn’t matter. She’d seen it in his eyes.

  He let her go. As reluctantly as possible, but still, he did.

  Not all children of the desert were lucky enough to have someone like him. He was more than a parent—he was a mentor, a steady hand in a place full of shifting sand.

  She still called him Dad, but not as often now.

  It wasn’t because he had stopped being her dad, but because she wanted to be more than just a daughter. She wanted to be his equal.

  She wanted to be something more than Dip, the desert brat everyone knew as Hayam’s girl. The one they avoided because she was different.

  So she had a plan.

  She knew most plants and desert creatures by heart, and what she didn’t, she had Hayam’s locator for.

  She knew what to watch for, what to avoid, what to follow. The maps — mostly.

  She needed to reach Ridgeplate Spear before the sun climbed too high, before the ultraviolets burned through her ointment and cloak, frying her layer by layer. If the path held and the dunes didn’t shift, she would make it.

  And if the suns allowed, she would catch it today — the silver-dart. Sleek, fast, and nearly invisible in motion. She'd been tracking them since she was twelve, sketching patterns in journal margins, mapping migration trails in her head. They weren't medicinal. Not edible. Not even dangerous. But their fur scattered light like heat shimmer, making them vanish against the sand. She wanted to know what that felt like. To turn almost invisible. To hide in plain sight, away from predators and judging eyes. And she needed to prove she could find something rare, just once, to herself.

  From the mount’s back, the desert seemed quieter, as if the silence was waiting for her to speak first. The sound of Nosey’s hooves on the packed sand was so different from her own running that it made her uneasy.

  Behind her, Hikari had started to rise, dipping her shadow in pale gold and stretching it long across the dark sand. Nero would soon join, casting a second shadow—colder, sharper, making both faint and diffuse.

  If she didn’t reach the canyon walls before her shadows completely disappeared, she’d be in trouble. No cover. No shade.

  The cloak and ointments would protect her for a while, but not through a Blue-sun Zenith. She would cook long before she starved. She leaned forward, lips close to the soft red fur. “Faster, Nosey,” she whispered.

  The trumpet-nose skinner snorted, his long nose twitching, and broke into a loping stride. His legs moved with awkward grace, built for this kind of terrain. Sand kicked up behind them in rhythmic bursts as the desert spread ahead into brittle hills.

  The fork of her shadow stretched wide, getting shorter and shorter.

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  She urged him on.

  The shadows split.

  She locked her breathing mask in place to keep the hot air from her lungs and covered her hair with her father’s headscarf.

  The shadows chased themselves.

  Almost time. She would make it.

  The canyon came into view as a thin cut in the horizon, just a dark seam at first. Then rising, slowly, into split walls shaped by centuries of wind.

  Her thighs hurt, her wraps were loosening, and her fingers were slipping inside her gloves. But they had made it.

  The canyon air shifted as she rode, Nosey’s long legs gliding over sand crust and brittle shale the same color as his fur. The mount snorted now and then, tilting his head, trumpet-nose pulsing as he searched for moisture. Serendipity was already scanning. She didn’t need a trail; she needed a sign—a flick of dust too light for the wind to lift, a glint where nothing should shine, a ripple between the canyon walls almost invisible unless you were looking for it.

  The silver-dart lived in the cracks between stones where the sun barely reached. They nested close to the centipedes, feeding on molted shells and smaller insects drawn to decay. She’d never even heard of someone catching one. But maybe today. Nosey froze. One ear twitched.

  She slid from the saddle in silence, knees bending with the drop. Boots muffled by dust-crust. One hand on his flank. The other reaching, slow and steady, to the pouch at her side, pulling out a piece of sheer cloth, a thin mesh, nearly weightless; her net. She stepped forward, toward the canyon wall.

  The wind seemed to hold its breath. Heat rose from the stone. And there it was—a shimmer, a ripple of motion in the crack, light bending where it should be in shadow. A dart. Small, upright, tail twitching. Its outline was just a flicker of motion blur and heat.

  “Cal na re,” she breathed, her heart climbing into her throat. She took one step closer. The dart turned, glossy black eyes locking on hers. It didn’t run.

  Not yet.

  “Come on,” she whispered. Her foot scuffed a stone. It vanished in a flicker of white and silver, gone like light down a knife’s blade.

  “NO—”

  She didn’t shout. Just breathed out and let the net fall limp at her side.

  “Too loud,” she muttered. “Too slow.”

  Behind her, Nosey sneezed. A soft huff that felt like laughter.

  She turned. “You could’ve warned me.”

  He blinked, turned his head away, and grazed a dried-out bush.

  Still, she’d see one. She hadn’t been entirely unprepared, but not ready either. The creature had been beautiful: white whiskers glittering in the heat, a scaly tail twice as long as its body. Serendipity smiled; it was enough for her first try. “Next time,” she said, folding the net with care. “I’ll catch one. You’ll see.”

  Above them, small stones tumbled from the canyon rim. Her body froze before she even registered why. Nosey’s ears turned forward, taut; something watched them from above.

  The hairs lifted on the back of her neck and along his flanks. He sneezed again—softer this time. She didn’t move. She knew what it was. She’d been warned.

  She hadn't dared to hope she'd see a silver-dart on her first trip, let alone the thing that hunted them: the Felidae. She swallowed dryly and backed toward the canyon wall, pressing herself to it. The rock burned through her cloak. Too hot.

  She had messed up. The mount was too tall to hide. Her boots had been too loud on the shale. Her stalker was too skilled for that to matter. No other predator hunted from the ridges. No other hunter moved with that kind of stillness. By the time you heard it, it was already too late.

  Above, something shifted again—the soft grind of weight against pebbles. Then stillness. Watching. Serendipity eased a breath through clenched teeth. Not today, she thought. Not like this. She could run into the desert; maybe it wouldn’t follow. But the heat would kill her. She could hide in the canyon. Wait. Ambush it? She almost laughed—impossible. She was as good as dead, and so was Nosey. Suns be damned. How had she ended up here?

  Her breath was shallow. Nosey stomped, agitated; she wrapped the leash tight around her forearm. If he ran, she’d be dead. She was dead anyway, she told herself. Still, she held on.

  Her heart pounded. For a moment, she forgot about the knife. Then she remembered Hayam’s blade, small and sharp, barely more than a scrap of metal, and yanked it free, holding it to her chest like a toothpick against a storm. She started whispering—not prayers, but pleas. “A little guidance would be nice,” she muttered up at Nero. The sun burned quietly, heating the air she barely let herself breathe in.

  The canyon sighed, a low groan of stone grinding on stone—like a lament she didn’t want to hear. Then came a thump. Heavy. Muffled paws on hot sand. She didn’t move or breathe. This was it. She stepped in front of Nosey, shaking, knife clenched in both hands. If she ran, he died. If she fought, she died. But she wouldn’t run. She would stand here, facing the beast she’d stolen from the wild, the one she’d led to its death. Because it was her fault he would die. She knew it. And so would she—desert garb and bravado stripped away, her body turning to white bone beneath the merciless sun.

  Yet here she was.

  The suns dimmed. Something large blocked the light. Then came the scream, sharp and bone-deep, but not hers. A blur of white slammed into red. Nosey fell, legs folding like paper. The leash ripped painfully from her arm. His body hit the sand with a sound she would never forget. The Felidae was on him, jaws around his throat, pinning him, watching her. Jaws locked tight.

  “No…” she whimpered. Her knees buckled. The knife trembled in her hands. The creature growled low, nostrils flaring. Waiting. Nosey’s fight slowed. The jugular had been torn. He was bleeding fast.

  The massive feline drew in a breath, exhaling spit and blood down the sides of its snout, the long whiskers twitching. Then she lowered the limp neck to the ground and began to feast, tugging at muscle and sinew. She was going to eat him. Right there. In front of her.

  “Please…” Her voice cracked. Her limbs turned to ice. Nausea threatened to unravel her. She felt useless, like she was five sols old again and drowning.

  Dark blood soaked into the rust sand.

  Nosey twitched once more, then stilled. Final. Dead.

  The Felidae kept tearing at him, mouthful after mouthful of warm flesh. Each bite made his body jerk like he was still alive. Then suddenly, she stopped. Lifted her head. Sniffed the wind. Blood dripped from her long jaw.

  She looked straight at Serendipity and huffed. Her red tongue slid over her muzzle, slow, deliberate, tasting the air. Thin, long canines glinted in the heat, sharper than her knife.

  Her limbs shifted against the bloody sand, claws stabbing into the wet spot. She rose in one fluid motion, nearly eye level with Serendipity and twice her weight. Her short fur was striped with pale, ghostlike markings from spine to belly, making it look like she had ribs on the outside. She looked like she was made of stone, but she moved softly and silently. Her bright eyes, pale and almost violet, blinked up at Serendipity. She could see her own reflection in them.

  “Are you… grateful?” Serendipity whispered, stunned.

  The predator blinked once, then tore off another chunk, chewed, swallowed, and waited for Serendipity to move again. The way it looked at her wasn’t hunger as she expected. It was almost an invitation. One she ignored.

  A long, breathless moment later, the Felidae stepped back, turned, and vanished into the canyon's shadow.

  Serendipity stood there, knife still raised, hands still shaking.

  She wondered if she deserved that. She didn't think so. She wondered if she could have avoided it. Probably.

  Yet here she was.

  The suns scorched above, and Serendipity only then realized her skin was burning. She dropped to the sand, crawling toward what was left. Nosey’s red fur was smeared with blood and grit. He hadn’t even had a chance.

  She crouched in the canyon’s thin shade, arms around her knees, watching the blood pool and the trail fade. The Felidae hadn’t eaten him—not fully. Why? Was it too hot? Was she already full? Or maybe it was just one of those things that happened, and you never knew why. You were just happy to have survived.

  She sat there until the second sun set. Then sat longer still.

  A cold wind had crept in behind it, turning the desert stillness into something tighter. Watching. Waiting.

  Hayam hadn’t lit the lamp.

  He sat just inside the doorway, boots on the stone step, arms draped over his knees, a metal cup of cold tea hanging from his fingers. He watched the edge of shadow creep across the deep purple sand. His tablet blinked quietly beside him: three missed pings, two unanswered pulses, one location log that hadn’t moved since midday.

  He told himself not to check it again. Told himself she’d be back before the sun set. And then before the second one did. And then he told himself he’d wait a while longer.

  Behind him, the small house crackled, the stones cooling in the night. Her mug sat untouched on the table, tea long gone cold.

  He remembered her small hands gripping the cup as if it were a treasure, her tongue between her teeth as she carved each letter with the tip of a rusty knife. She looked up at him after every stroke, waiting, needing to know she’d done it right. He never stopped her. He never would.

  The lacquer had long since worn away. The metal was dull now, dented at the rim, but the name still held—stubborn and proud, just like her. He could smell faint ash from the herbal burner she had left uncleaned beneath the table. The silence tasted bitter.

  When the sound came, it wasn’t really a sound. It was like a prayer answered—soft and dragging. He stood up too fast, his vision spinning before his feet caught up. His bad knee flared with pain, and he cursed.

  She was there, standing in the shadow of the outer arch, dust streaking her legs, one glove gone, the other clenched in a fist slick with dried blood. Her cloak was half torn, her lips cracked. Her braid had come loose, curling wild around her face like storm clouds. She didn’t speak, and neither did he.

  She stepped forward, limping, and handed him the knife. His knife. Clean. She was gritting her teeth so hard he thought she’d shatter them. He didn’t ask. He took it, and the hand that offered it, and pulled her inside. Closed the door behind her. Wordless. Careful.

  She stood there, deflated. Gone was the laughter from that morning. Gone was her new mount, apparently. He wasn’t gonna ask. He wasn’t gonna ask, he told himself again. He poured water into a basin and nodded toward it. She let her backpack slide from her shoulder. Untied her cloak. She set down the bloodied glove, then plunged her fingers into the cold water. She winced once.

  “So… that didn’t work out as planned, did it?” Damn it. He asked.

  She turned and flicked water at him. “Apparently not,” she said through clenched teeth. “Don’t ask.”

  “I wasn’t gonna.”

  “Yeah, you were,” she sighed, rubbing her face with both hands. When she was done, she wiped them on his shirt and leaned into him for a moment, trembling just slightly. A child once again. Like the time she’d stumbled into a pack of youlsnouts and come home running, shrieking louder than they did.

  “Dip,” he started.

  She tensed. Released him.

  “I’m fine,” she said. “I just need sun cream and a good night’s sleep. Tomorrow I’ll go again.”

  He wrapped her fingers in linen, squeezed her hands in his. “You came back.”

  She nodded once, swallowed hard, blinking until her eyes cleared. “Yeah,” she whispered. “I came back.”