R. Salvatore: The Companions

Tahnood Dubujeb was the ringleader of the Desai’s child gang, Ruqiah thought, but did not say. He used victims like her to strengthen his standing-and no doubt with the great encouragement of his proud father and overbearing mother.

It crossed Ruqiah’s mind to pay the Dubujeb tent a visit when the tribe had at last settled in for the night. Perhaps she would bring some stinging scorpions along …

She couldn’t contain a little chuckle at that, conjuring images of Tahnood running naked and screaming from his tent, a scorpion stinger firmly embedded in his buttocks.

“That’s better, my little Zibrija,” Niraj said, patting her head and using his pet name for her, which was also the name of a particularly beautiful flower found among the windblown rocks in the shadows of the dunes. He had misconstrued her sudden gaiety, obviously, and Ruqiah wondered-and not for the first time-how Niraj and Kavita might react if they ever discovered what was really going on behind her five-year-old eyes.

“This way!” It was Tahnood’s voice, closing in, and it seemed as if he had figured out Ruqiah’s ruse at last.

“Run! Run!” Niraj said to her playfully, pushing her away. “And if they get you muddy, smile all the while and know that there is plenty of water to wash you clean!”

Ruqiah sighed, but did indeed start away, and she realized that she had run off not a moment too soon when she heard her father laughing as Tahnood and the others came rambling by. She thought of a dozen ways she might avoid them, and perhaps even make them all look foolish in the process, but her father’s laughter made her put those dark thoughts out of her mind.

She would let them catch her, and pelt her, and throw her in the mud.

For the traditions of the Bedine, the playful bonding the Desai tribe demanded of its children.

For Niraj.

Untaris couldn’t contain his gap-toothed smile as he kneeled before the small break in the windblown rocks, a narrow channel leading to a wider area that was protected from the wind and sand by the rock walls. They had passed by this spot several times already without even noticing the break, so completely did the rock shading camouflage the narrow entrance.

“It could be left over from the days of Rasilith,” Alpirs reasoned, speaking of the ancient city which had once dominated this region. “Some perennials are stubborn.”

Untaris shook his head and crawled through, coming into a small secret garden, hidden by the stones. It was too clever, he thought. This area was tended-well tended-and many of the flowers, vibrant and fragrant, seemed to have been recently transplanted.

“You see?” Jhinjab asked. “Like Jhinjab told you, eh?”

“Not enough water here to sustain these plants,” Untaris told his partner. He reached out and touched a large red rose, slowly wrapping his fingers around the plant and rubbing the petals into pieces.

“So someone is bringing water out here,” said Alpirs.

“Not ‘someone,’ ” Jhinjab insisted. “De girl.”

“So you claim,” Alpirs said skeptically. He turned to his partner, who was much more acquainted with gardening than he, and inquired as to how much water would be needed by these particular plants in any given day.

“In the heat of the desert sun?” Untaris shrugged. He looked around at the area, some ten strides across and half that deep, and all of it filled with vibrant plants, flowers, vines, and even a small cypress tree, flat-topped and shading the southern half of the secret garden.

“More than a child could carry,” Untaris decided, and both the Shadovar turned to regard Jhinjab.

“She does not bring out de water!” the Bedine informant insisted. “Never have I seen her. Never has Jhinjab said dat!”

“But you claim it’s her garden,” said Alpirs.

“Yes, yes.”

“Then how does she sustain it without water?”

“M-many is de water near Rasilith,” the Bedine stammered, and he looked around as if expecting to see a river flowing through the garden under the flora.

“The ground is moist,” Untaris reported, rubbing some dirt between his fingers. “But there’s no water source here.”

“Nearby, den,” said Jhinjab.

“Or the girl creates it,” said Alpirs, and he and Untaris shrugged. She was, after all, a mortal Chosen of a god, so they believed.

“However it is done, it is clearly maintained,” Untaris pointed out. “The plants are neatly trimmed, and I see no weeds, and no desert plants at all in here. And they would be in here if there really was a water source nearby.”

“So someone tends it, and well,” Alpirs agreed.

“De girl!” Jhinjab insisted. “It is like Jhinjab told you. All of it.” He eyed the precious igal looped on Alpirs’s belt as he spoke.

“Do we lay in wait for her to return?” Untaris asked.

Alpirs shook his head. son of a son of a son of a captainced,“I have seen enough of Rasilith and smelled enough of these Bedine dogs already.” He turned to Jhinjab. “Her name is Ruqiah?”

“Yes, yes, Ruqiah. Daughter of Niraj and Kavita.”

“She comes out here? Just her?”

“Yes, yes. Just her.”

“Day or night?”

“In de day. Maybe in de night, but Jhinjab only see her in de day.” Alpirs and Untaris looked to each other. “Miles to the Desai camp,” Untaris said. “Long walk for a little girl.”

At that moment, a lion called out in the darkness, its mournful cry echoing off the stones.

“Long walk through dangerous lands,” said Alpirs.

“De lions, dey don’t bother her,” Jhinjab interrupted, seeming a bit frantic once more, and reverting more fully to his thick Bedine accent. “I have seen her walk right past dem as dey sleep in de grass.”

Alpirs motioned for Untaris to follow and started out of the secret garden. He paused to glower at Jhinjab, and told the man, “Wait here.”

“Quite a tale,” Untaris said when the two were back out among the windswept rocks, near to a large dune with an alabaster spire protruding at a strange angle.

“Too much so to be a lie, perhaps.”

Untaris shrugged, seeming unconvinced.

“Someone is tending the garden,” Alpirs reminded him.

“We can make Shade Enclave by midday,” said Untaris. “Let Lord Ulfbinder unravel this mystery.”

Alpirs nodded his agreement, then motioned with his chin back toward the secret garden. While he went to retrieve the horses, Untaris crept back in to offer Jhinjab his reward.

They left the old Bedine face down under the cypress tree, his blood pouring from his opened throat and wetting the ground around the roots and flowers.

The indignity assaulted Ruqiah’s sensibilities. Thrown over Tahnood’s shoulder like a sack of feed for the camels, the poor girl kept reaching back to pull her sarong down over her bare legs. There was no use in resisting. Tahnood’s friends were all around, escorting the pair between the many Desai tents, and out of the village to the wellspring just to the south.

The parade collected many happy elders, chanting and singing-many others, nearly the whole of the tribe, were already down at the growing mud pit. Barefoot women danced without inhibition in the slop, kicking their feet up high and often sliding and slipping down into the mud, to the happy howls of the onlookers.

Several hollow poles were driven down into the ground around the area, the water bubbling up over their hollow tops, catching the fiery reflection of the many fires that burned around the edges of the pit. The Desai would celebrate through the night, as tradition demanded whenever a wellspring was discovered.

Ruqiah tried not to be distracted by the cheering and the singing and the tumult all around her. She focused on her own song now, hoping to heighten the celebration even more. She whispered to the winds, calling upon the clouds to gather.