The Desert of Souls by Howard Andrew Jones

Author:Howard Andrew Jones
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: St. Martin’s Press

11

The new moon was a slim, shining sickle when we rose later. We bade farewell to Hadban and his family, and Sabirah, who bade us go with God. She embraced us all, then looked fiercely upon Dabir, as though it angered her to pull her eyes from him. He smiled sadly at her and turned away and my heart ached a little for both of them.

The camels objected no more than usual as we mounted. We were up over the first dune in only a few moments. I saw Dabir half turn to look over his shoulder for the campsite at the apex of the next dune. Already the tents were hidden and might almost have been figments of our imaginings.

The stars shone coldly down, and the Milky Way gleamed like a twisting silver ribbon. The wind was light, the night cold. I had not realized the comfort of my threadbare roll until I could not lie within it.

Dabir carefully picked our way forward, slowing at the height of the dunes to trust to his own judgment, or perhaps his camel’s. Next came the poet. I brought up the rear.

The moon sank low as we traveled deeper into that wasteland, and I fell to thinking upon Mahmoud, and my father and brothers, aye, even my wives. I wished that I might only ever consider my first wife, but alas, when I thought of her I naturally thought of the second who had proved so wanting in comparison.

After a time the poet fell back beside me. We exchanged greetings, and then he said: “I think that in the darkness beneath the stars the desert evokes even more loneliness than the sea.”

“That may be so,” I conceded.

Hamil must have been musing on this for a while, for he continued: “Both stretch in every way around you, dwarfing your existence to insignificance. Upon the sea is constant motion and the sense that you are in a place you were not meant to go and do not belong.”

“That is true.” Fish belonged in the sea, not men.

“The desert is entirely different—it moans like a ghost; everywhere about you is the sensation of ineffable antiquity. Beneath the dunes at every hand might lie some ancient palace, vanished from the knowledge of man.”

As if he had bid me to do so, I considered a long dune on our right, wondering if it might conceal the tomb of some storied king, or the treasures of djinn, or other things. The poet was not the only one who fancied wild things; I was simply not as used to giving tongue to them.

Up ahead Dabir was dismounting to examine something along the base of the next dune.

“What do you think that’s about?” Hamil asked.

“Let’s find out,” I said.

We dismounted behind Dabir’s camel so as not to tread across whatever he examined, and I led the way to his side. Even by starlight I saw that Dabir’s expression was grave.

The sand was marred by a set of lion prints.

“It came down here from the west,” Dabir said, “and stood.

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