Several days later, Sabit stood on the eastern wall of Bahteel. The morning sun bathed the fields of ripening grain in a crimson light. The packed earth line of the great eastern road cut through the blood-red fields like an open wound.
Where the dark brown expanse of road met the wall—gleaming a white-gold light off its ancient bricks—a caravan spilled out of the newly-opened gate. Two dozen mules laden with cargo took to the early morning road, attendants on foot at their side for the long walk to the great city of Urom.
Sabit looked down on three of those attendants: A small woman with a bow across one shoulder, her son moving drowsily at her side, and a man of middling height in a tunic of crimson and white. Allamu had begun his journey—away from Sabit and the doom the clung to her.
The caravan had not gone a dozen steps from the gate when Allamu turned back to look up at the wall. The harsh morning sunlight crown his frizzy hair with red-gold tips, but hid his face in shadow.
Sabit drank in her last look of Allamu and turned away from the sunlight. The scar on her wrist throbbed gently as she walked down the steps into the city, each stair plunging her deeper into the darkness.
—END—
—–
Wayfarings of Sabit: Bazaar of Death is copyright (c) 2017 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 or http://ipressgames.com/fiction/