Ella was pleased to see she still remembered how to ride, swiftly forming a rapport with her horse, a bay gelding named Afiri. Shani had taken to riding with surprising ease. If anything Shani saw her ability to subdue her own horse as a challenge. There was little the athletic Petryan didn't seem capable of.
Looking around her, Ella wondered how Jehral was managing to navigate across the unbroken expanse of the desert. Here in the deep south the formations of rock were a rare occurrence, and one dune appeared the same as the next.
Shani must have been thinking the same thing. "Take care, man of the desert. If anything happens to you out here, we're dead."
Once the decision had been made, their departure from Agira Lahsa had been swift. Ella saw the city only once, on their way through, but what she'd seen had amazed her. When the work of rebuilding was done, the hidden city would rival any of the other houses' capitals, with a population to match. Ella was thankful the Hazarans were on her people's side.
They'd now been travelling for weeks, mostly by night, but also riding by day to make up time. Shani constantly urged them forward, fearful for her people and desperate to be at Torlac for the confrontation to come, while Jehral longed to be once again fighting by his prince's side. Ella had decided she could do more in Petrya than she could back in Sarostar. She'd heard Miro speak on strategy enough to know that if Altura's southern border was secured from Petrya, the allies could start to consider a re-conquest of Halaran in the east.
If Halaran were freed, maybe they could find Amber.
"We're running low on water, desert man," Shani said.
"To be expected," Jehral said. "We can only carry so much, and we're now nearing the half-way mark. Soon, the Oasis of Lyra will be in sight."
"So what's the plan?" Shani asked. "Get in, grab water, and get out?"
Jehral didn't smile at her levity. "Something like that."
"Can you tell us what it looks like?" Ella asked. "This Devil of Lyra?"
Jehral shrugged, his attention on the horizon. "I have never seen it. The creature stays clear of large groups of men. I have never gone to the oasis with fewer than ten score."
"You must have heard rumours," Shani said.
"Some say it is a kind of serpent. Others that it is a worm. I have heard it has many teeth, rows of them, and it is impervious to the stroke of a scimitar."
Shani looked down at the red cuffs she wore at her wrists. "Let's hope it doesn't like fire."
"No, Petryan," Jehral said. "Let us hope we don't see it at all."
The three riders continued in silence for a time. Ella watched the sun move inexorably to the horizon, falling as if made heavy by a hard day's work, finally glowing against the dunes, spilling radiant light on the sand, making the riders' shadows long and tapered.
Ella thought about Miro, fighting constantly to hold against the attempts of the Black Army to penetrate Alturan lands. She wondered about Layla, the Dunfolk healer, hoping the small woman was alive and safe from harm. Amber's face swam in front of her vision; she was so soft and gentle, always laughing or crying; the chances of Ella's tender friend surviving capture by the Black Army were low.
Finally, Ella's thoughts turned to Killian. Her intuition told her he'd been successful; that something he'd done had affected the enemy's supplies of essence. It was the only reason Altura had lasted so long. She knew, though, that there was more to Killian's quest. He burned inside, desperate to know who he was, and about this power he possessed.
Fingering the pendant she wore at her neck, Ella looked over at the red bracelets Shani wore at her wrists, contemplating the myriad of symbols that had been drawn with essence on the cuffs, giving Shani the ability to control the elements. Killian could wear those symbols on his skin. His skin! Like Shani, he would still need the knowledge, but the feats he was capable of, if he only had the knowledge, were staggering.
The sun dropped past the horizon, and stars began to appear in the night sky. The temperature fell away, and Ella felt a great relief; even with the protection of her dress, the heat was uncomfortable. Still, they rode on. After some hours the moon rose, casting a glow over the dunes, shimmering over the sandy ocean. Ella shivered as the night grew cold, feeling her dress adjust to compensate. Looking over at Shani she saw that her friend wasn't coping with the chill as well as Ella was — the elementalist's robe was built to withstand heat, but not cold. The three travellers rode on.
Finally, as Ella was beginning to slump in her saddle and she could feel Afiri tiring underneath her, Jehral called a halt. He had each of them unsaddle and groom their horses with a stiff brush, before watering them a little at a time. They hobbled the horses by twisting the reins around their legs, before sinking to the sand themselves, lying back against a dune while the stars looked down from overhead.