Sabit found walking through the night in the vast, open badlands to her liking. The air was cold, but the walking kept her warm. She slept the next day in the shade of a knot of large boulders.
Sabit hoped to catch up to the caravan before dawn the next night, but she had only walked a few hours when she caught whiff of fire ahead. Two of the wagons had burned down to charred scraps. The third lay on its side, broken in pieces. Fragments of charred carpet were scattered about, among many merchant corpses. Whatever had killed them had taken their long knives, their valuables, and their heads. Sabit found no trace of her necklace.
Finding a surprisingly unbroken water jar in the unburnt wagon, Sabit drank her fill and waited. When the eastern sky took on a rosy glow, a trail of blood and tracks could be seen leading south.
Wrapping herself in a robe and hood taken from one of the dead men, Sabit set out after the tracks. She could not say what assaulted her with more heat: the rising sun or the hard-packed earth. The glare off the bleached rocks dazzled her eyes and made the trail nearly impossible to follow.
Sabit found walking through the badlands during the day very much not to her liking.
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Wayfarings of Sabit: Blossom of Ruin is copyright (c) 2016 by Michael S. Miller. All rights reserved. New chapters post every weekday. You can support this and other stories on Patreon: https://patreon.com/michaelsmiller