Chronicles of Akhani - 3 - The Day After
The sun rose, desert birds sang, and the calls of the antelope looking for mates rang out in those early morning hours. Nothing seemed to have changed. Nothing appeared to be out of the ordinary. But, in Akhani’s heart, the entire world was strange and unfamiliar.
He looked over at his guest, and felt a pang in his chest. How was he supposed to lead her, if he himself did not know where he was heading? He thought back on all his recent failures, misgivings, and lost relationships.
Zhorovna started to stir, so Akhani quickly got up, and started doing something. He didn’t know what to do, but knew that he needed to look busy, and not like he had just spent any time watching her sleep. What did he do? He poked at the burning logs on his fire.
“How long did I sleep?” asked Zhorovna yawning.
“Long enough, but I think we should take it easy today. Given what happened yesterday, I’m a bit wary of taking you out into the dunes. And, forgive me of this, I don’t know you well enough to leave you with what little I have.”
“The gods forgive, and so do I,” she replied without a pause. At this, Akhani found himself staring at her blankly once more.
Breaking the silence, Zhorovna asked, “What would you have me do? The gods do not look favorably upon idle hands.” Realizing that she was speaking in platitudes, a bit of color had come to her cheeks.
Seeing her embarrassment, Akhani quickly thought of tasks to keep both of them busy. They set to work grooming his oasis. Ripe fruit was gathered, wood was stacked and split, tools were sharped, and an inventory of what supplies that they possessed was taken. It filled the majority of the morning, but they soon ran out of tasks by noon.
Skipping breakfast came naturally to Akhani, but he soon found that Zhorovna was losing strength. Her body was not made for the desert, as they had both become aware. Water, salt, and food is what she needed, and Akhani scrambled to find the resources.
Between the two of them, they only possessed enough food to last them two days. Akhani realized that he either had to take her with him to hunt, or trust her alone.
“If I were to leave you here, what will you do?” Akhani asked, looking for any assurance that she could be trusted.
“Whatever you will have me do, as my only order was to follow and serve,” she said in a way that she thought would show trustworthiness, but actually came off as a child promising to be good while the parents are away.
Skepticism swept over Akhani’s mind, but he knew that taking her with him would mean her death. He scanned the area for tasks that needed to be done.
“I have been spending every evening gathering and cutting wood for as long as I can remember. If you could gather and organize firewood, that would suffice. In the meantime, stay close to the water. If you feel hot, dip in it. It is quite cool, and is never hot.” He did his best not to take a patronizing tone, but it still came off that way. He cringed at the thought of leading another person, but until he could get her safely to civilization, her life rested on his shoulders.
As Akhani was climbing the first dune, he looked back. He had never felt the desire to see someone one last time upon departure before. An involuntary sigh escaped his lips, and catching himself, he shook it off. No time to be sentimental, he thought to himself. The antelope’s migration path is an hour’s trek from here. They will most likely be in the dried riverbed digging for the wet soil below.
Akhani’s hunt was a successful one. Using his trusty short bow, he was able to fell a sizeable buck. He quickly drained the blood by hanging the animal from a tree and slitting its throat. He caught the first drops of blood with his hand, and drank it from his palm. “As this blood sustained your life, it now sustains mine,” he recited as his lineage had for centuries.
Once the blood was drained, he carried the animal on his back. He scuttled on all fours to save energy, despite the drag that the legs would provide. The kill had given him new vigor and he had forgotten all about the oddities of the day before.
As he crested the final dune back to camp, he was overtaken once more by confusion. It was as though his temporary respite from his circumstances had created a backlog which came flooding in all at once.
Zhorovna had made herself quite at home while Akhani was gone. She had done as he asked and gathered and organized the wood, and so much so that there was fuel for at least a week that had been set aside. But that was not all that she had done. She had erected a shrine on the eastern end of the camp. Before it stood a stone altar.
Akhani, baffled, approached the shrine, but it was the altar that confused him the most. It was hewn granite as wide as he was tall. He slid his hand over it and inspected all sides of it. He was so caught up in it that he didn’t even see Zhorovna approach him.
“Are you going to wear the small deer all day, or are we going to butcher it?” she asked laughing.
He looked at her with a look of utter terror as he shrugged the antelope off his back. “Where did you find this stone?”
“The gods sent a word, and the stone was found,” was all she replied.
“I’m serious. I need to know where you found this stone.”
She tilted her head and squinted in confusion. It was apparent something was wrong, but the gods would not betray her. Did she mistake something for a Word that was not sent by the gods?
“Where did you find this stone?” Akhani pressed once more. Now he was almost before her, and his anger was growing.
“It was below the surface of the water. I followed the Word and dragged it out.”
“These stones are rare in these parts, and are said to be magical. It is said that creatures, larger than you, lived in these deserts before they were deserts. They had ancient structures, all of hewn stone just like this. For as far back as our history goes, we have not disturbed a single stone out of fear of reprisal. Reprisal from what, we have never been certain. These stones are not to be moved under any circumstance.”
“I know of these giants of whom you speak. We Syverenians descend from them as much as we descend from the first humans. They are called the Ovorganti. We serve the same gods,” she reflexively replied. A Word was moving within her as she spoke.
“So, is it safe to have this stone here then?”
“We are to burn the choice fat of our kill here upon the stone. It is the will of the gods,” she replied, still only speaking from the stirrings of the Word within her and not hearing his question.
Akhani felt the cloud pass over his heart. He did not wish to waste edible portion of the kill that he had made. It was his kill after all. He was the one that had journeyed to the riverbed. He was the one who had shot the arrow through the antelope’s heart. It was his, and was only a mercy that he would share it with Zhorovna.
“You follow me, right?” Akhani pried.
“As the gods will.”
“Then I am the one who decides what actions are to be taken. Correct?”
Zhorovna became pale upon hearing these words. Something was wrong, but she could not tell what. She nodded in obedience.
“Good. Then we are not wasting any food. We are not burning the fat,” Akhani declared in a haughty tone.
“But… the Word...” Zhorovna sheepishly replied.
“No. You heard wrong. If these so-called gods cared about us, they would know that we need this food. Food such as this is hard to come by out here.”
“If we trust in the gods, they will provide.” Zhorovna’s whole demeanor was now as one defeated.
“We do not even know if you really hear the gods or if it’s all just in your mind. That asp, I am sure there is some other explanation for it. This is ridiculous. I am not wasting any food. I am not willing to bet my life on such foolishness. That’s final. No discussion. If you follow me, you will not waste our food.”
Zhorovna was crushed. She had never heard someone doubt her ability to hear Words. She had never been around someone who did not know the gods were real. Since she was a small child, she had been in the monastery. She had been surrounded by women whose only thought was to serve. She found Akhani disgusting in that moment, but still believed that she was to serve him. She felt as though her spirit had left her, and she was all alone.
Akhani proceeded to process the antelope, portioning some for immediate consumption, and the rest for preservation. Once the meat had been prepared, he began cooking. He did not say another word to Zhorovna that evening.
Zhorovna fasted, wept, and prayed until she fell asleep.
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