He opened it and peered inside, finally pouring some into his filthy palm before looking closer. Then he carefully poured it all back into the bag.
“Don’t you want any?”
He nodded. She hadn’t told him to eat it; she’d just thrown the bag in his direction. He had caught it. The interesting thing was that he didn’t eat any despite being hungry. It didn’t belong to him, and she hadn’t expressly told him it was acceptable to eat it. Anna felt she was beginning to understand him a little more.
“Take some. It’s yours,” she ordered, hoping he poured out the exact same nuts and kernels that had rested in his filthy palm before. She was not a prude about eating, but there were limits. She glanced at the mud-caked hands again and decided she might give it all to him.
He carefully poured a tiny amount into his hand and lifted his eyes, silently asking if he’d taken too much. Sighing, she motioned for him to take more. After waiting for him to eat, she accepted the almost full sack back.
She said, “Now I have to make a camp and get some sleep. I want you to go back to yours.”
He stood slack and limp as wet clothing hanging on a line to dry.
“Thief, it is time for you to leave.”
He turned and walked slowly away, looking confused but not angry. Still, she watched him until he disappeared over a small hill to the west. She walked in the opposite direction determined to put as much distance between her and ‘Thief’ as possible before making a campsite. While he appeared harmless, she didn’t want to worry about him staying close or returning.
The ground was more solid with less blowing sand slowing her. She walked and half-ran, always keeping an eye behind. The sun felt warm on her back finally settled below the horizon, and Anna’s spirits lifted. She was on her way.
CHAPTER THREE
As the sun went down behind her, Anna saw the first hints of green appear in the drab landscape. The desert floor now held a few small plants struggling to survive on the limited water. Ahead spread a green ridge where the land rose, and trees grew. Her instinct was to reach it before dark, but training said the distance was too great. In the drylands things often appear closer than reality.
The last water bottle still held enough to splash when she shook it. She came to an area littered with the spines of cacti, most from a sprawling pear cactus that covered an entire hillside. Using the last of the light to step carefully until she was ten paces into the cactus patch, Anna used her blanket as a broom to sweep a space clear of spines to sleep. While the location was not protected from the wind, the spines littering the ground all around would deter animals from getting close to her, and that included most men.
There would be no warm campfire tonight for Thief, or others nearby to locate her. She laid on her back and watched the stars until falling asleep. Nearby coyotes woke her a few times, but their howling was almost welcome. As was her practice in the wild, she woke several times and listened to the sounds of the night, sniffed familiar and unfamiliar scents, and peered into the darkness before drifting off again. In all, the night was refreshing.
She awoke with the first light and immediately headed for the green ridge, the last of her traveling food in hand. When it was gone, hunger still growled in her stomach. Head down and one foot in front of the other brought her to a path covered in footprints, old and fresh alike. It was not a road, but a track that many desert dwellers used. It was close enough to the ridge to indicate the people often moved from the wooded areas ahead to the barren lands behind, and back again. What sort of people would they be?
Supplying an answer to her own question, Farmers, tradesmen, soldiers, and craftsmen could all be eliminated. People belonging to many of the remaining groups were not ones she cared to encounter. Her eyes scanned the area searching for another route. To her left was a shallow, rugged valley. Walking there would be hard and progress slow. On her right were hills rising and falling, some almost as high as small mountains. It would take twice as long to move up and over them.
Anna squared her shoulders and shifted the belt holding her knife, so it moved to her front, into easier reach. To run was always an option, but running into danger was stupid and had happened to more than one person after a clever trap had been strung. Instead, she walked quickly, keeping her eyes and ears alert. She chose to move on the lower ground where possible, so she didn’t skyline herself. She constantly watched both sides of the track for escape routes and memorized them to keep in mind at all times.
Finally, climbing a long hill brought leafy trees at the top of the ridge. Upon reaching them, the track widened to become a small road, and Anna felt safer for a time. But, as a child of the desert, she quickly realized her mind played tricks. Back in the desert, there was little for a foe to hide behind, or in front of. It was possible to spot an enemy a thousand paces away and make preparations. Maybe two or three paces if she kept a good watch. At that distance running was a better option than fighting.
However, walking along a narrow road with trees and thick underbrush growing right up to the sides, made her uneasy. Ahead looked like walking down a tunnel. An attacker could be squatted behind the next bush and leap out before she could react. Anna pulled to a wary stop. The road was ten times more dangerous than the open drylands. Worse, every footprint that she had observed down there in the drylands had come from this road where she now stood.
While she had seen nothing overt to alert her, she felt eyes watching. An opening in the undergrowth to her left told where deer and small animals crossed the road, probably heading for a stream to drink. She sidestepped to the edge of the road and ducked into the dense growth.
After a few steps into the underbrush, it cleared somewhat. The underbrush always grew heavier right beside a road where it received plenty of sunshine. The deer path carried her for some time until it turned the wrong direction. She left the path and settled on the ground behind the trunk of an oak large enough to hide behind. She waited and watched. Her hunger would also wait.
The bow slipped noiselessly out of her pack, and she strung it. With an arrow ready to fly there came more sitting, listening, and watching. When Anna was sure nobody followed her, she still couldn’t shake the feeling of eyes looking at her. In family stories, ignoring instincts like not listening to feelings had gotten more people killed than she knew how to count.
Anna wanted to hurry on but waited and wished a dragon had come with her. She missed sensing the dragons on the tattoo on her back. At home in the hills near the drylands, several reds usually roosted, sometimes joined by a black or tan. Almost every day of her life she had felt the slight tingling and tickles that told her one, or more, was nearby. On the trip with Gray, there had been a continuous presence. However, since leaving her family on this trip there had not been a single touch by a dragon. The lack of the dragon touch made her feel more alone than ever.
Finally, she stood and stalked back the way she had come, ready to fight or flee. If anyone tried sneaking up on her, she’d take the fight to them, or run. But again there was nobody there. She turned and adjusted her pack and sleeping roll, still feeling the tinge of fear. It could be she’d talked herself into being afraid. She moved through the forest using the sun in her face to guide her.
After climbing a series of low hills, she reached the crest of one, and between the trees, she found a wide, almost treeless valley covered in the greenest grass pastures she’d ever seen. A flock of sheep grazed under the watchful eyes of a sheepherder. His black and white dog came alert and peered in her direction, testing the breeze with several sniffs. Smoke rose from a chimney far enough to be whisked away by the same morning breeze. She stayed still.