☼ Tenth Sun ☼

Wardee tossed her head back and gave a trilling cry, the sound echoing past the dunes, off the mountains, and down in the valley. Hyenas replied to the baleful ululation with cackling cries of their own, and something far in the distance yowled at all the noise.

The once-still camp was now bursting with activity, and Aisha watched it all unfold with fear. Stallions barreled out of tents to defend their families, who followed soon after to see what the danger was—and then all of them froze.

Wardee stood tall and towered over Aisha, the moonlight catching every thread of her robe. Her eyes pierced through the darkness as she addressed the herd in her far-carrying and firm voice.

"My sisters and brothers of Al-Seglawi, my duty as your sheikha is one of which I am normally proud."

Everything within Aisha was trembling, from her hooves to her teeth. She saw, among the crowd of confusion, her mother's eyes were widened with worry.

"However, tonight is a sorrowful burden I must bear." Wardee's shoulders rolled as strode forward to stand between Aisha and the others. "Aisha bint Sahar is no longer welcome within our herd."

Basma lunged forward, pushing past the horses standing in her way, and skittered out into the open. "What?! Why?!"

Wardee stopped a few paces away from Basma and peered down her muzzle. "Your sister is harmful to the herd. She is a poison that is killing the roots of everything we stand for."

"That's not true!" Aisha blurted out, but a part of her knew it was a futile effort. All eyes were on the sheikha to seek her guidance and wisdom.

"I'm—" Basma's chest heaved with a sobbing, shuddering gasp. "She's—"

With a snort, Wardee looked past her at Sahar. "How do you raise your daughters for one to become venom and the other to follow her?"

Sahar ran forward to stand protectively in front of Basma, her expression open with desperation. "Basma cannot be faulted for loving her sister!"

"Please," Aisha whimpered as dread filled her chest that suddenly felt too tight to breathe.

"No, she cannot." Wardee's voice was colder than the air around them. "But you are at fault for encouraging your daughter to ignore our tradition, to pursue the path of a stallion, to bring such shame on your family."

Sahar's eyes widened even further and she looked past Wardee to search Aisha's face. Whatever it was she sought couldn't be found, because Aisha had nothing to give.

"Sahar, I see now where the problem lies." Wardee walked past her without glancing back. "Take your family and go, before your daughters can do more damage to the herd. Your kin are exiled from Al-Seglawi's embrace."

The air was full of whispers that seemed to attack from all angles. For a moment, all Aisha could see was the despair on her mother's face, the tears running down her sister's cheeks, and the retreating forms of the herd that was once hers.

"Aisha," Sahar said, taking a step toward her, "what have you done?"

Aisha's gaze darted to the side to where Al-Seglawi had been, but there was nothing. Panic prickled the frozen blood in her veins and she started to stammer sounds with no direction of what she was trying to say.

Sahar slammed her hooves against the sand. "Aisha! What have you done?!"

"Take only your belongings," Wardee called from where she stood outside her own luxurious tent. "Then, before the sun rises, I expect to see nothing of the family of Sahar."

Then, after the herd retreated back to their beds, they were alone—save for the lingering presence of Qadira and Ma'mun. Neither said anything, but they watched with concern etched on their faces.

Nawar poked her head out from around a nearby tent. "Ummi?"

"What's going on?" Zahra appeared beside her.

Sahar's anger faded to fear at their voices, and she turned to rush over to them. "Shh, my sweet blossoms. Don't worry." She nosed their foreheads. "We are taking a little trip."

Without a word, Adil led the way back to their tent, Sahar and the twins following him. His expression betrayed nothing, but Aisha knew.

"You have to understand," Aisha started to say as she trailed after them.

"Understand what?" Sahar snarled as she whirled around and marched toward Aisha, stopping her in her tracks. "Understand that we should congratulate you?"

Aisha shrunk back. "I—"

Sahar stared her down with fire in her eyes. "Because it does seem that congratulations are in order. You have fulfilled your dream of serving yourself and only yourself—always in that order, and never any other."

With a strangled sound somewhere between a snort and a growl, Sahar turned away to aid Adil in taking down their tent. Aisha could only stand there, her chest tight with a suffocating pain when she looked over to see Basma hadn't moved.

Tears fell one after the other down Basma's cheeks and she heaved a shuddering breath. Her whole frame trembled with the emotions that showed plain on her face: despair, anger, and fear.

When Aisha opened her mouth to speak, Basma turned away to tend to the confused twins while Sahar and Adil worked together to pack up their belongings. She knew she should help them, but her legs refused to work.

Aisha watched it all as if it were a dream: the last rope secured to Adil's back, the tearful goodbye between Qadira and Sahar, and the reluctant departure of her family from the life they had always known.

Just before she slipped out of sight, Sahar snapped, "Are you coming, Aisha?"

Qadira remained outside her tent to stare at Aisha with an expression of contempt. Aisha ducked her head and hurried after her family, trying to shake off the feeling of Qadira's hateful gaze.

"Where are we going?" Zahra asked, her ears drooping low as she looked between Sahar and Adil.

Sahar opened her mouth to reply, but no sound came out beyond a strangled whimper.

"To the city of Al-Jawhar," Adil said without looking away from the desert ahead of them. "It will take several days to cross the desert, however."

Nawar scuffed her hooves against the sand as she walked between her parents. "But we never go to Al-Jawhar. Aisha always says—"

"It doesn't matter what Aisha said," Sahar interrupted with renewed anger burning through her voice. "That's where we're going. It's not up for discussion."

Aisha trailed behind, dropping her head low to focus on their prints in the sand rather than their actual forms. It was easier that way. "I'm sorry," she whispered.

There was a pause before Basma came into view beside her. "We'll get through this," she said in a low voice between them, but there was no conviction to her words. "The twins need us all to be strong. They don't understand."

"Right," Aisha managed to say, her gaze flicking up to land on her little sisters. They stayed so close to Sahar that her legs brushed against them with each step. "Right."

It gave her a purpose, however fleeting: she would do what she could to keep her mistakes from further hurting her family. With renewed vigor in her step, she trotted forward to walk beside her parents, who stalwartly ignored her presence.

"Hey, Zahra," she said with the most casual tone she could muster, like nothing had happened.

The little filly's ears perked before her eyes raised to meet Aisha's. "What?"

Nawar leaned forward to peer around Sahar with interest as Aisha stuck her nose in the air and cantered ahead of them all. "I heard that at night, you can sometimes see Al-Seglawi and Al-Abeyan shaping the dunes for the new day."

"What?" Zahra squeaked and sprinted ahead, darting between Aisha's legs. "Can you really? Really, really?"

When Aisha glanced back, she felt a brief burst of relief at the gentle smile on Basma's lips as she came up beside her again. "Oh, yes," Basma said. "But only if you're quiet and well-behaved."

Sahar gave a weak, tired chuckle. "Otherwise, you might startle them, my little flowers."

Nawar and Zahra drew close to one another, their ears and eyes alert as they searched the dim surroundings for signs of the Djinn. The starry expanse above kept the path well-lit, but shadows cast by the dunes still reached for them with potential dangers lurking within.

"We follow the star of the north to guide us to Al-Jawhar," Adil said in his low voice that rumbled over the quiet sands. "How do we find the star of the north, however?"

After a careful pause of consideration, Basma perked up. "We seek the Qafzat, the galloping leaps whose tracks guide us toward the star of the north."

Adil flashed a smile at her. "Very good. So long as we know the stars, we can always find our way."

Zahra stopped to look up at the sky, her head tilted all the way back until it seemed she might lose her balance. "There are hoofprints in the sky?"

"The heavens are home to beings far beyond our understanding," Adil explained, and Aisha smiled from the memory of when she had asked that very same question. "Only with careful practice and a vigilant eye will you be able to see the canvas above us."

For a long while, the twins were silent, both taking in the nigh endless expanse of constellations whose names were a mystery to them. Eventually, however, one broke into a yawn and the other followed suit.

"Come on," Aisha said, stopping and lowering herself to their level. "I'll carry you."

Nawar looked at her with a moment of suspicion, but another yawn convinced her to take the offer. She scrambled onto Aisha's back and buried her face into Aisha's exposed mane.

This prompted a brief smile from Basma, who helped Zahra onto her own and said, "We will set up the tent soon, don't worry."

Nawar yawned loudly. "But what about the herd?"

A tense quiet fell before Sahar snapped it with a terse reply. "We do not talk about the herd now."

The twins looked at one another with mirrored confusion, but gave in to their exhaustion before they could raise more questions. Once they were asleep, Aisha watched Basma's expression grow cold and distant.

Though she walked with her family, Aisha felt a suffocating loneliness. Hooves scuffing the sand and wind whispering in her ears were the only sounds that filled the air as they walked, Adil guiding the way.

For a while, Aisha could endure the pain that clenched her chest with every moment that passed and no one spoke. She reminded herself that this was her punishment, and to suffer in silence was the least she could do for them.

But a thought wriggled its way into her mind. Would they forgive her if they understood? She ran her tongue along dry, cracked lips and tried to mull over her words before she opened her mouth.

The elders were selling khatar for water. That went against their tradition. It imbalanced the herds!

'As if that is worse,' the imagined scorn of her mother's voice replied, 'than what you have wrought with your own selfishness. At least the water benefits the herd.'

Aisha's ears flicked back and she shook her head. No, the important part was that the sheikha was lying to them. Everything they knew about her, their herd, their history was founded on a lie.

But still she could hear her mother snort and say, 'Then you should have approached us first, instead of rushing headlong into danger on your own. Your pride has brought our family to ruin.'

There just had to be a way to explain it that would make them understand. She couldn't make it all the way to Al-Jawhar with the weight of their disappointment bearing down on her every single step.

That was, of course, assuming they traversed the desert safely without running out of water or food. That thought sent a chill down her spine, and her gaze fell to the sand in front of them. A few paces ahead, she saw the shape of a familiar bush of rigid, spindly leaves jutting out of the sand.

She paused to lean down and chomp at it, then jerked her head back up to tug it out by the roots. Nawar stirred and gave a sleepy whine of unintelligible confusion.

After inclining her head to offer the bush and having it cautiously accepted, Aisha explained, "It'll fill your stomach and soothe it at the same time." She looked over at Basma with a hopeful smile and received a guarded expression in return. "Keep an eye out for any more."

Nawar's lips curled back as she chewed with distinct displeasure on her face. "'S'gross," she mumbled.

Adil regarded Aisha with a ghost of a smile in the pale moonlight. "And where did you learn this?"

With a flush of pride that dropped into sheepish uncertainty, Aisha returned her attention to the sandy expanse ahead. "From my time feeding myself, before Raqeeb Hadi allowed me back."

Sahar snorted. "If you hadn't rejected that stallion at your Khetbah, you wouldn't have had to eat like a wild animal."

"I remember the shame in his family's eyes," Basma added in a soft but terse voice.

Anger and frustration flared within her chest and before she could stop herself, she yelled, "What would you have had me do?! I would have been miserable as a wife!"

Sahar rounded on her with renewed fire in her eyes. "More miserable than you are now?"

Aisha bit back a sudden sob that tore from her throat as tears sprung forth. She dropped her head in submission, waiting for her family to start walking again before she followed behind them. The guilt renewed its weight on her, so heavy that she struggled to breathe.

A shadow passed over them through the moonlight, followed by a series of shrill warning cries—kak, kak, kak, kak! Aisha's body tensed and they all came to a halt, looking around instead of up for whatever danger had been spotted by a shaheen falcon overhead.

The air whistled as the falcon plummeted toward the sand off to their right and whipped back up with a cobra clutched in its talons. It all happened so fast that it hardly seemed like it had happened at all; the desert was quiet and still once again.

"That was close," Sahar mumbled as she moved closer to Adil. "Do you think there are others?"

Adil shook his head and resumed walking forward. "We must keep moving. If we keep this pace, we can reach Al-Abeyan's oasis before tomorrow is gone and nightfall returns. We'll rest, resupply, and leave before the hospitality wears out and the questions begin."

Sahar looked up at him and said in a low, mournful voice, "Ya hayati, we can't make it that far. We haven't even slept since traversing that distance to get here."

"We can't set up the tents in the open desert, either." Adil shook his head, his words punctuated with a soft but strained huff. "It's too dangerous."

Aisha bit her lip before blurting out, "So is over-exhaustion." She winced when their eyes turned on her as if she were the danger. Perhaps she was. "I'll stay awake and guard the tent. You need sleep."

There was a long silence before Adil slowed to a halt. He looked between the members of his family, then relented with a long sigh. "I accept your offer. Come, then. Let's set up the tent."

It was a somber affair as they unloaded their rolled-up tent and baskets of belongings from Adil's strong back. None of them spoke beyond simple commands to take this or remove that, setting everything down into a pile before beginning to raise the tent.

Nawar and Zahra sat off to the side, leaning against one another and yawning back and forth. Aisha caught glimpses of irritation flickering across one's face that was returned with a light glare until Zahra nipped at Nawar's neck.

"Hey!" Nawar cried, jumping to her hooves.

Sahar heaved a sigh and tugged on the rope between her teeth to tighten it before she chided, "Please don't fight, my darling blooms."

Zahra butted her forehead against Nawar's. "She won't stop yawning, and it's making me yawn!"

"You bit me!" Nawar's nostrils flared as she snorted.

Basma trotted over to them with her best attempt at a smile, but it didn't reach her eyes. "Come, now, the tent is ready. Why don't we go to sleep?"

Zahra glared up at her. "No! Why are we here? We shouldn't be here!"

Nawar gasped. "Ummi said we're not supposed to talk about it!"

The anger in Zahra's expression melted to desperation as she started to cry. "But I want to go back to the herd!"

"Ummi said we're not supposed to talk about that, either!"

Aisha whistled to get their attention and inclined her head toward the tent. "Little weeds, go with Basma and sleep."

To her surprise, Basma glared over her shoulder. "Stop calling them that."

"I'm not a weed. Nawar's a weed!"

Nawar's lips curled back in a sneer and she reared back to drive her forehooves down into the sand, then kicked it up at her twin. "Am not!"

"Nawar!" Basma put down a hoof to try to separate them. "Don't—"

"Are, too!" Zahra lurched forward to butt her forehead against Nawar's.

Something snapped within Basma the moment the twins' heads collided with a resounding thwack. "Enough!" she yelled, and both foals cowered against the sand.

Aisha recoiled when she became the sole focus of Basma's ire, eyes narrowed and teeth bared in a sneer. "Do you see what you've done, Aisha?! If you could have been less stubborn—less you!—then none of this would have happened to us!"

Her words echoed throughout the desert around them, silencing any further argument between Nawar and Zahra. Their family watched in silence as Basma heaved a shuddering sob.

"I'm sorry," Aisha whispered and cringed at how hollow she sounded.

Basma huffed an empty laugh. "You weren't sorry when you shamed our family at both of your Khetbahs. Did you ever realize what happened while you were out there running? Ummi had to endure watching all of the other mares' daughters with their new husbands, proud and content. They told Ummi how sad it was, how unfortunate she was."

All Aisha could do was bite back another useless apology, bowing her head to avoid the pain in Basma's gaze.

"You weren't sorry," Basma continued, "when you got what you wanted and spent every day like a stallion, away at the mining site while Ummi sat at camp. Every day she had to listen to the same comments about how you were a disgrace to our family. But you were never sorry!"

Aisha glanced up to see their mother standing with Nawar and Zahra and doing everything she could not to look over at them, but the sorrow on her face was hard to miss. Mumbling something to the twins, Sahar guided them into the tent with Adil following behind her.

They had left her to deal with the worst consequence of her actions: the loss of her cherished sister's love. Aisha swallowed and, returning her gaze to Basma's, she managed to say, "I didn't know."

With a roll of her eyes, Basma turned and walked away. "No. You knew. You just didn't care." She gave Aisha one last look of unrestrained contempt over her shoulder before disappearing through the flaps.

It was difficult to breathe with not just guilt crashing down on her, but regret. She had never known there was a distinction between the two feelings until that moment, and they boiled together in a dark self-loathing.

While the rest of her family settled in for a long and uncomfortable night, Aisha remained outside and gazed up at the sky. The stars twinkled far above without a care for the plight she'd put her loved ones in.

How much food did they have? How long would it last? Would they make it to Al-Jawhar before it ran out? Would they be ambushed by the dangers that lurked in the desert? Could they defend themselves?

Suddenly, Aisha became aware of every sound near and far. The twins had already started snoring. Basma was crying quietly, trying not to be heard. Sand skittered as it was pushed around by the wind.

Or was that the sound of a cobra hissing before it prepared to strike?

And was it the wind howling, or something that was on its way to prey upon them?

She looked over at the tent where her family slumbered and her heart finally shattered when she realized that there was nothing she could do to fix the situation. Because of her stubbornness, her family was condemned to death.

There was only one thing she could do for them now: lighten the burden.

Though she wanted to be strong, tears started to well up and fall down her cheeks as she steeled herself for the decision she had to make. It would be easier while they were asleep—for them, at least.

Once it seemed that she had run out of tears, Aisha relaxed into focusing on the surroundings. She would fulfill her promise of guarding them while they slept. The desert was, mercifully, quiet and still throughout the night; the worries and fears circling her thoughts kept her painfully awake.

Would they make it to al-Jawhar safely? What sort of life awaited them in a city they had never seen and never known? How would it change the twins, leaving the freedom of the desert?

Would any of them ever forgive her?

The night sky started to lighten as the sun prepared to rise, and soon Adil would follow suit. Aisha quietly snuck inside the tent and looked at the slumbering forms of her family. In sleep, they seemed at peace. She could almost pretend that nothing had happened, that if she went outside, they would be back at camp.

With as much resolution as she could force herself to have, she dressed to the best of her abilities while unaided. She was unable to properly secure the headdress in place, but so long as she didn't encounter any strong winds, it would suffice.

Her gaze travelled over her family again, and an ache she couldn't fully describe seized her to start the tears anew.

It was, she imagined, a little like dying.

Basma seemed restless in her sleep, twitches running along the muscles of her sides. Aisha approached her carefully and almost fearfully so that her hooves moved without sound. Once she was close enough, she leaned down to place the softest kiss she could manage on the back of Basma's head.

"I know it's not enough," she whispered in a hoarse voice, "but I'm so sorry for everything." She pulled away before her tears could fall and risk waking her. "I love you, Basma."

Aisha went over to where the few baskets of their supplies were stored and chewed on her lower lip as she considered her options. She tested each canvas bag to see which had the least amount of water and, finding it, slipped its strap over her head to rest against her shoulder.

Food was a different matter entirely. There wasn't nearly enough of it for the rest of her family, and she had no way to store it on her own. Reluctantly, she ate two of the dried dates and bade her family a silent farewell with one last mournful look.

The desert greeted her without any fanfare, just a gust of wind rustling through dry bushes and the sight of sand dunes swallowed up by darkness. Her robe fluttered around her trembling legs that threatened to buckle underneath her, but her mind was made up.

"If you're listening, Al-Seglawi," she mumbled as she started forward into the night, "please take care of my family so that they may walk your path."

Author's Note

This story is a part of the Quill & Blade universe.