It turned out that Bel and James were the last ones up, even though dawn was only timidly painting colors in the sky. Daran explained that her group walked during the morning, stopped in the middle of the day, and then walked again once the sun began its retreat from the sky. Taking so many breaks didn’t sound very efficient to Bel, but she was sore enough that she wasn’t going to complain.
“So, how far away is the Great Swap?” she asked.
“It is taking about half of the month,” Daran smiled back.
“A month as in 100 days?” James confirmed.
“Of course. A month is not having 100 days where you are coming from?”
“Yes,” Bel replied, at the same times James said, “no.” The siblings looked at one another with exasperation.
James rushed to explain. “I mean, yes, Satrap uses 100 days a month. But I’ve heard of places that do it differently.”
Daran’s antennae waved around as she thought. “Differently is strange. The sky completes a cycle in 502 days, a month of 100 days is good fit, and it is leaving two special days for shortest and longest day celebrations.”
“Ah, sure. I didn’t mean that it doesn’t work, just that some people do things differently.”
Bel was used to James weird otherworldisms, but she thought he would just embarrass himself if he starting spouting nonsense. Who would want to live with 24 hour days and have the same length for every day of the week? Bel decided to speak up before said something silly.
“So Daran, is there any way to get there faster? Half a month is a long time – or is the Golden Plains really that big?”
“Hm. Well, we must go around the place of the Ravager of Darkness, which takes some time. Also, I am being the only person who can be providing cover. Oh!” She clapped her hands together. “Unless one of you has power to move the sand?” she asked hopefully.
Bel and James shook their heads.
Daran looked disappointed, but simply shrugged, as if she hadn’t expected anything different. “Well, perhaps we will be finding more friends as we are moving. If we are having a little luck they will have an ability that will be helping. I will be doing the cover until then.”
James tossed his recently combed hair, attracting the ant-girl’s attention. “That sounds important, Daran. Cover from what, exactly?”
Daran’s antennae beat the air, clearly excited by his praise. Bel tried to avoid gagging. “Yes, it is being very important, both to protect from the hot of the sun and from the eyes of the sky predators.”
Bel perked up at that. “Birds? You know, I really want to advance my Path and improve my abilities. Think I’ll have a chance to fight them? Maybe when we’re taking breaks?”
Daran laughed. “Yes, there will be many of chances. Every day will be fight. The desert is full of animals that are sucking anyone dry that they are catching.” Daran mimed little biting monsters with her hands. “Hm, but the sky, uh, the birds are being too dangerous.”
Beth leaned into their conversation, lured in by the talk of fighting. “The birds? Too dangerous?”
Daran nodded and pursed her lips. “Yes. Big eagles a little dangerous, but also not flying. Flying to dangerous with spearheads in the sky.”
Bel and James gave her blank expressions, so Daran explained. “Spearheads travel from Atmos.” Daran spread her hands wide. “Very big, very dangerous.”
“But What is a spearhead?” Bel asked. “A bird with a big beak?”
Daran tilted her head and considered the question.
“Spearhead is like bird, but does not have feathers. It has head like a spear and a body as long as James is tall. But spearhead cannot see through cover.”
Saying that, Daran lifted her hands to her sides, closed her eyes and then twitched her hands upwards. The ground in front of them burst up in a spray of small particles. The sand rose to form a cloud above them, providing a diffuse cover that blocked some of the light and reduced visibility, just like the ant-girl had described.
Daran opened her eyes, and smiled. Her face was pinched with effort though, so Bel decided to stop pestering her with questions.
James had no such reservation and immediately started talking to the poor girl, even though she wasn’t capable of responding.
Bel shook her head. A month of that? I don’t think she’ll be quite as excited about him by the time we actually get to this Great Swap.
Bel looked at Beth and hesitated to talk to her. Her sister was still trying to warm Daran’s group up to the idea of forming an army for… well, Bel didn’t really listen to what Beth was saying. Something about overthrowing the Dark Ravager and then taking back what Technis had stolen from them behind the Barrier. Losing a limb had only made Beth’s desire for vengeance even stronger.
Staring at her in silence won’t improve anything though. C’mon, Bel, talk about something, she thought, trying to psych herself up.
“Do you think you could hide us like that, Beth? With your powers of darkness and revenge?”
Beth tapped her teeth as she considered it. “No, not all of us. And not for very long.”
Bel sighed. “Are you still planning to convince people here that they need to start a war, Beth? Or has Durak given you another message?”
Beth quirked an eyebrow. “This place seems rough, so I bet that the people here are pretty tough. Technis took all the good land away from them, which doesn’t sound very fair to me. It also sounds like they would be excited to find a way into Satrap and get at all those compatible humans too, doesn’t it?” She spun her finger in the air like she was winding an invisible string. “Seems like leverage to me, and if they have to fight Technis’ priests to meet the humans then that works fine for me.”
Bel chewed on her lip. “Isn’t there already one war in Satrap, Beth? Does it really need another?”
“Sure does, kiddo,” Beth replied with satisfaction. “There’s no way the Points-delver alliance will win.”
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Beth pointed accusingly at Bel’s face. “And I’m sure that they’d see it the same way I do. If you started thinking for a moment you’d realize that there won’t be any sunshine and rainbows for them if they lose. Revolutions are do or die.”
Bel gestured at the people around them. “And you think these people could make a difference? How many people can even be out here in this desert?”
Beth lifted the stump of her arm. “Being serious about something means going to any length to achieve it, Bel. It means pushing for every advantage you can get, no matter what you could lose.”
Bel couldn’t think of anything to say to that. Her snakes slumped against her skull in defeat. The worst thing about it was that she could understand Beth’s point of view – Bel hated Technis too, and a part of her wanted to burn everything down, even if it meant hurting other people too. After all, Technis was guilty and had to be punished.
But then she thought about Ventas, and how he had used his abilities to save people. Even when he’d been forced to fight, he had still been fighting to save her. Everyone in the village had followed Lempo rather than following the orders from Technis’ enforcers. If they could have all escaped rather from Satrap rather than staying to fight and die wouldn’t that have been better?
And wasn’t Ventas’ approach going to create more lasting change? The priest had been replacing Technis with an alternative – Beth just wanted to burn it all down and didn’t have a plan for the day after.
Bel knew years of old world history from James. She’d learned that revolutions were driven by ideas, not by destruction. Well, that’s what James says at least.
Bel walked behind her sister in silence as Daran began to lead the way through the desert. She gradually drifted away from Beth as her sister began talking with the kangaroo about how much easier life was on the other side of the Barrier. She was soon lost in her own thoughts, swirling around in her head like the sand swirling above them.
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Once they left the rocky area near the mountains the air became hot and the sand began to swallow her feet with every step. As if the ground were fighting them, the sands rose in great waves that they would have to struggle up and down to make any progress. Her boots didn’t help – in fact, they kept filling with sand, so she quickly tied them to hang at her belt and proceeded barefoot. Her toughened integument protected her feet well enough, but James wasn’t so lucky. He had to stop every so often to run his hands over his swollen and blistering feet, activating some mix of abilities to reduce the size of his blisters and promote faster callous formation.
Surprisingly, they weren’t the only ones who were having trouble. The small snake person made so little progress with each step that he had to be carried by the big-tailed kangaroo guy. Bel hadn’t thought much of his hopping when they were moving slowly, but he was by far the fastest of their group on the sand, although Daran could also skitter with surprising speed. They all crowded together beneath Daran’s cover though, despite their differences in speed.
When they reached their midday stop Bel was desperate for any reprieve from the heat and the ache in her calves. When she saw a freestanding wall that stretched for a hundred strides, Bel realized that their resting place had been planned in advance. The wall must have been part of a larger structure before it became a temporary shelter, but Bel couldn’t tell much from looking at it. It was old, its stones ground down by the wind, but it was still tall enough to cast a soothing shadow over a large stretch of ground.
There were also a few more people already there: a pair of bird-like people with long necks and legs, with bushy clusters of black feathers around their torsos that made them look like they were in terribly impractical dresses. There were also three people who looked mostly human, at least from Bel’s distance. An upright scorpion with a human face also lurked at the edge of the wall, but Bel couldn’t tell if that was another person or the local wildlife.
“Ho, Daran!” called out one of the humanoids.
Daran called something back and skittered over, letting her cover of sand drop to the ground once they reached the wall’s shadow.
Bel trailed after the group, waiting for James to slowly make his way down the last dune.
“Still having fun hanging out with the ant-girl?” she teased.
James smiled like a kid. “Yeah! She’s full of interesting stories. You know, this place is way better than Satrap.”
Bel rolled her eyes.
“Even if all the people aren’t fully people?”
“Wow, racist much? You have snakes on your head, should I start treating you worse?”
Bel leaned her head closer so a few of her snakes could hiss at her brother. “I just meant that it may be hard to fit in with them. We can’t even speak their languages.”
James shook his head. “No, Daran says that they usually group up by similar traits so I don’t think that would be an issue, She also said that they’re in too dire a situation to push people away. Are you feeling lonely, Bel? Those anteater people look pretty human; maybe they talk Mycenaean.”
He ran his hand through his red hair and grinned. “You could learn some of the local language too. Daran’s been teaching me a few words – it isn’t hard.”
Bel was about to tease her brother, but they soon came face to face with the newcomers. The ones that James identified as anteaters looked fairly human, but they had abnormally long, almost snout-like faces. From time to time their incredibly long tongues would pop out of their mouths. Bel wondered if they actually ate ants, and, if they did, how Daran felt about it.
Just like with Ken, Bel had once again confused their furry bodies for clothes. The anteaters were covered with a coarse, brown hair and had dark markings around their necks and arms and white along their chests. The patterns had fooled Bel into thinking that they were wearing vests over darker shirts.
“Greetings,” one of them called out with the reedy voice of an old man, “I am Samya, elder of my tribe. I’m escorting my niece and nephew to the Great Swap as their chaperone.”
“Wow,” James reacted, “you speak our language really well!”
The old man chortled. “Of course. The Bargainer’s tongue was more widely spoken before the Untrusting Ones locked themselves behind the Blue Wall. But I hear that you know more about that than I would.” He flicked his tongue in Daran’s direction. “This child tells me that you have travelled from there. Does this mean that the great divide between our peoples is opening?”
Beth swooped into the conversation like a hawk onto a field mouse. “Would that it were so, elder,” she lamented. “But the land inside the Blue Wall is filled with disagreement. Many would be willing to heal our ancient differences, but dissent is not tolerated.”
She lifted the stump of her arm. “We payed a heavy price to leave our homeland, but we will be forever grateful that the people of the Golden Plains have welcomed us with such warmth.”
The old man seemed quite flustered by the flattery, but Daran stepped in before he could respond. “James is telling… has told me much, no, many thing about Satrap. My mother would be, ah, would want war if it is possible to reach the Untrusting Ones. But the Ravager is the one whose hand is on top, and the alliance has little hunger for more fighting.”
Bel was impressed by how much Daran’s speech was improving, although her idioms could use some work. Then again, James had just spent all morning nattering at her nonstop. She would be bound to pick some things up.
Old Samya nodded at Daran’s words. “It is hard to stomach more fighting when time will remove the Ravager’s followers for us.”
“And how would time do that?” Beth asked.
Samya gestured at the scorpion, skill skulking at the edges of the group. “The human traits do not always breed true. In time, some regress so far that we cannot bring them back into the collective, even with the best work of our matchmakers. With a limited selection of people, it is only a matter of time until the Ravager’s folk all revert to simpler creatures.”
Beth clicked her fingers. “But they’re kidnapping people from Satrap. Pure humans. Perhaps you didn’t know?”
Samya’s eyes widened in surprise.
Daran nodded. “Yes, it is changing some things to learn this. We will talk with the elders when we reach Outpost 3.”
Samya nodded rapidly and ran his hands through his fur in agitation. “I agree. This news is rather unsettling.”
Daran and Samya began talking in their own language, and soon Bel felt excluded by the group as they fell into an animated discussion.
Bel looked at the scorpion-person. He was short, the top of his head only coming up to Bel’s neck, and most of his body was covered with a black chitin that gave him an ominous appearance. His tail waved nervously behind him whenever he got too close to the group, but he also hurried closer whenever he got too far away. Bel couldn’t help but feel sympathy as she watched him. Like her, the scorpion seemed uncomfortable being an outsider, but wasn’t brave enough to actually join the group.
Bel caught the stranger’s multifaceted eyes and attempted a friendly wave, but this just sent him scampering further away.
Bel stifled a sigh. If only I could be as friendly as James. Or as bold as Beth, she lamented.