The plains outside of imperial Ma'in, bordering the Rub al-Khali
Mari jostled awake with a sudden lunge forward and reminiscent of the many weeks she traveled on a cart over muddy Roman trails, bolted upright with a hand at her chest. Lo'gan had been fully alert at her side, but was still caught off guard by the quickness in her movement. He let go of the dagger in his hands and quickly turned Mari by the shoulders to face him.
"Mari?"
Mari squeezed her eyes shut and fought to quell the instinct that told her to push him away. It was Lo'gan and Lo'gan would never hurt her. But the goose bumps on her skin were still telling of her fear and the setting was all too familiar. With a mild shrug of her shoulders to free herself of the large hands cupping her, she gingerly eased into the burlap sack that was behind her. The sacks were a hard surface to sleep on, but at least they were malleable under weight. She shifted a little to make a dent in the sack that fit her snugly and feeling Lo'gan's eyes still on her, reviewed her vocabulary to retrieve the words that she needed.
"Mari, tired……okay."
Lo'gan nodded in understanding, but still felt uneasy with Mari's actions. She was scared. He could tell by the way she was still clutching her cloak between her breasts and it more than angered him to feel that familiar tinge of curiosity about her past spark up again. It was something that in all the chaos of the past day he tried to forget, but in moments like this, he couldn't help but think back to the Sultan's depraved indifference and wonder. Swallowing dryly, Lo'gan eased up next to Mari and offered her a smile he really didn't feel. Mari appreciated the gesture though, and letting her head rest again by his side, slowly eased her grip on her cloak. She hadn't been aware she was doing it, but it didn't surprise her.
Most nights crossing the Carpathian Mountains, Mari woke up to frost frozen on her face and a numbing cold deep in her bones. On occasion it would be at the insistent hands of a guard she detested. It was against the rules for anyone to touch the merchandise that was still considered intact, and Valeria made sure everyone understood that, but there was something different about this particular guard. In his dark, flat eyes, Mari saw that he did not care. He got off on causing pain and always left bruises where he mauled her.
She still remembered the first time she woke up to a knife pressed to her throat with him grunting and straining over her. Mari opened her mouth to scream, but he quickly shushed her with his words. Mari really didn't understand them, but she did know what he was pointing at. It was her mute cagemate and unlike her, she was not intact. He could do with the poor girl what he wanted and Mari was not prepared to live with that kind of guilt. She understood what he was threatening and quietly nodded in compliance.
He relieved himself over her a few minutes later and with more hateful words spit into her face, left before the camp woke up. Mari had stood in place crying silently for an eternity, wishing she was back home and hating what her life had become. It would happen on occasion after that, fast, silent, and always in the predawn dark. She hadn't remembered in a while, but something about the way the rain fell on the tarp above her had brought it all back. Only she wasn't in the mountains anymore and her hands were not linked by chains. She was free and safe and next to someone who touched her like no one else had.
Slowly moving a hand to join Lo'gan's where it rested on his stomach, Mari closed her eyes again and let the anxiety she felt slowly dissipate. She wanted to tell Lo'gan so much, but couldn't. Touch would have to do. It would have to serve as their link when words failed them. Sinking into her hood so that her tears would not be visible, Mari smiled sadly as the rain kept pouring outside. Her head felt heavy and hazy and all she wanted to do was sleep her tiredness away. It had been months since she had slept without worry and Lo'gan was there to keep all the wrong far away. He would never fail her. Of this she was sure.
Lo'gan delicately took the small hand over his and working circles he knew helped soothe her still hurting fingers, reiterated his own wordless assurances. She needed some space and he understood that perfectly well. In less than a minute, Mari was fast asleep again. After traveling for almost a half day in the cart, they were all tired of being cramped among the sacks of coffee, but there was little else to do other than wait.
He figured there was at least another few hours until they would pass the last marker that announced the end of Ma'in's departing main road. Until then, caravans coming and going to the city still heavily traveled the thoroughfare and they could not stop. It was still dark and rainy outside which would make the traveling over the gravel road difficult, but Lo'gan was confident the Shammar people could cross the plains easily enough. Already they had had significant good fortune. To everyone's surprise, they had crossed the city gates completely uneventfully.
Lo'gan had been on special alert when the Shammar caravan ground to a halt that morning, ready to fight at a second's notice if they were discovered. He even woke Harabi up and together they lay ready in the cart's entrance, but it never came to pass. Through the fluttering tarp covering the cart, they saw the blue turbaned guards hastily walk past the convoy and give the signal back to the gatekeeper that all was well. Lo'gan figured their lack of interest had something to do with the pouring rain, but too relieved to care, Lo'gan thanked the gods and eased back to check on a sleeping Mari when the caravan was given the order to pass through.
The heavy wrought iron gates that served as Ma'in's primary defense creaked open slowly. Lo'gan smoothed over Mari's hair without breathing while they crept forward through it. When they were finally on the outside and the gates slammed closed behind the convoy, he exchanged relieved grins with Harabi and moved to position Mari back over his chest. Harabi mumbled on about his ingenious plan and snuggling back into his sleeping cubby, brought his ghutra headpiece back over his face and promptly fell asleep with a smirk on his face.
Lying peacefully with Mari just a few hours later, Lo'gan went through the various possibilities for their next move in his head. Once they left the plains surrounding the city, they could either follow the Shammar up into the Rub-al Khali or go on alone. One provided disguise in numbers in case the palace guards were patrolling the nearby areas for them and the other guaranteed quickness as they could move faster with only four animals. Either way, the goal was to rendezvous in Gazir with the waiting Dawasir and the Jabir clans before the new moon. After that both clans had to go north to make their scheduled meets with northern traders. Unfortunately, the new moon was only three weeks away and with the added pressure of the royal guard looking for them and the possibility of really bad weather in the dunes, Lo'gan knew that it would be hard to make it in that time.
Looking over at Harabi's increasingly louder snoring and then at Mari's delicate hand in his, Logan breathed out heavily. His mission had been a failure, but his two companions were dependent on him and he had to get them both home safely. The fact that he didn't really want to see neither go, made it even more ironic. For a person that never liked to be around people for the simple fact that he disliked most, he was really going to miss them. Feeling something in his chest pinch at that revelation, Lo'gan picked up the marvelously soft hand in his grasp and kissed it delicately, trying to forget all thoughts of having to say goodbyes.
The movement caused a jangle in the many bracelets that Mari wore. Sighing in the memory of the nipple ring he had miraculously not thought of in the last hour, Lo'gan ordered his libido to take a rest. Except the hand in his was too soft to ignore. Turning it, Lo'gan looked over the hennaed designs on Mari's pale skin that he hadn't really had time to examine before. As luck would have it, time was all he had now. Squinting his eyes in the faint dark, Lo'gan carefully ran his coal black eyes over the intricate designs.
Starting on her index finger, there was a growing swirl of paisleys and pansy flowers winding all around her finger. The brown tinted wave of designs curved around her wrist where it thickened to include little suns, crescent moons and stars. Each shape was about the size of a fingernail, but together they created a beautiful river of designs that continued to thicken and curve up into the wide sleeves of her garment.
Lo'gan looked down at Mari's deep breathing with a smirk. As nice as it would be to explore the designs that spun up into her arms, Mari needed to rest as much as possible. It would have to wait. Turning her hand over, Lo'gan continued to explore with a sly smirk on his face. What he found made his face go lax again. Unlike the trail of designs that curved on the other side, Mari's palm was covered with a solid and tangible depiction. There was a wide thick circle that covered most of her palm and a drawing inside it. Tilting the hand slightly to get a better look with the light that filtered through the fluttering flap of the cart, Lo'gan creased his brow and brought his face closer to the brown markings.
The circle was composed of little elephants, all dressed with tall head feathers and ornamented blankets draped over their backs. Their tails and trunks were linked, making the circle complete. Lo'gan smiled slightly at that, having seen plenty of hennas before but never this intricate. The Jabir women used any excuse from weddings to the birth of a camel to have henna parties, but this was altogether different. He looked at Mari's sleeping face again before looking back to the circle. Inside the perimeter of elephants was the true measure of the talent the artist possessed. It was a sketch of a peacock bird, stylistic instead of realistic, but as beautiful as anything he had ever seen before.
Slowly, Lo'gan's smile faded. He wasn't sure why, but something was oddly different about this particular peacock. It was a popular omen animal, who routinely found its way onto rugs and urns and jewelry, except……
Lo'gan thought over the familiarity of the drawing. Forgetting that it was attached to someone that was still sleeping, he brought the drawing even closer to his face in the muted light. A few moments later, the Jabir warrior raised his eyebrows. Peacocks were indeed routine in Arabian wares, except none were positioned quite like this one. The magnificent bird was always drawn with its tail feathers gloriously open behind him. This particular drawing had the animal turned to show its long tail feathers curved under him. What made it even more curious was that it looked familiar. He had seen it before.
Lo'gan stared at it for a good three minutes before letting the hand fall back down to his stomach. With a half smile, he wondered why on earth he was thinking so much about a bird anyway. Looking back at Mari, he traced a finger lightly down her face and eased back down again to rest. The rain had not slowed down and boosting his head up with his free hand, Lo'gan settled in for the long wait. Still massaging Mari's hand where the flow of henna shapes curved over her wrist, Lo'gan closed his eyes to the soft drum of the rain. Eventually his breathing evened out to unconsciously match Mari's and just a few moments later he was almost asleep. Only something clicked deep in his recollection first.
Opening his eyes suddenly, Lo'gan lifted the hand that he was cradling. The curled peacock was actually one he had seen for years. His mother Joza had one identical to Mari's as a charm on a bracelet. When he was young, it was something that he played with out of boredom while he lounged in his mother's lap. When he was sixteen, his mother had lost it and unwilling to see her cry, Lo'gan walked four days back into the desert to retrieve her lost satchel. Just three years ago, he had taken it to a jewelry specialist in a Gutiab trading post for resmithing. Joza always wore it and trusted only him with it. Lo'gan never asked why that was, it was simply not in his nature to ask, but thumbing the design over Mari's palm, he felt selfish. It mattered to his mother and because it did he should have asked. Shaking his head free of a familiar guilt, Lo'gan instead focused on the design again.
The resemblance was remarkable. Even though one was carved in gold and the other drawn in ink, the unique pose made them the same. It was beautiful and Mari had even said so when she pointed to it when they had crossed the beach. Furrowing his brow a little, Lo'gan ran his index finger across the graceful arc from the head of the celebrated bird down to the tip of its tail. Mari mumbled and shifted at the inadvertent tickle and Lo'gan quickly removed his finger from her palm. The mumbling ceased and Mari let out a soft snort before resuming her even breathing. Lo'gan smiled and bent down to place a soft kiss over her cloak covered head. Just as he did, the cart stalled and ground to a halt.
Immediately at alert, Lo'gan reached for his Khanjar while moving Mari's hand from his stomach back over to her. Tucking it into her side, he pulled at her hood to hide her features a little more, just like she liked and then moved to the head of the cart with minimal movement of the sacks under him. Peeking through the flapping tarp to the drenched world beyond it, Lo'gan saw that the convoy had stopped. Nayif was hoofing madly behind his escort and Lo'gan knew that something was wrong.
Completely forgetting the mystery of the peculiar peacock drawn onto Mari's palm and the connection it might have to his mother, Lo'gan pulled at the sandaled feet that peeked out between two nearby sacks and parting the tarp that covered them from the rain, jumped outside.
Immediately, Lo'gan felt his robes flatten against his body and blinking against the odd feel of rain brushing his eyelashes, stomped over to where Nayif was making life harder for his keeper. With a low bow of respect, Lo'gan took the reins from the old woman on the dulah camel that was leading Nayif and quickly patted down his horse into submission. He then untied Nayif from his pack camel and led him out of the procession to help calm him down a little more.
The temperamental stallion was no stranger to rain, having weathered a few storms on their coastal journeys before, but it didn't mean he liked it. The slippery mud was unfamiliar and the chill the rain brought with it was not to his liking neither. Lo'gan understood the dislike very well and wanted to stay with him a little longer, but seeing Harabi finally fall out of the cart groggily, quickly looked around to see what was causing the delay.
"What's going on?"
Lo'gan pointed near the head of the fifty or so camel procession that had ground to a halt over an apparently overturned cart. Lo'gan could make out Shammar and his horsemen trying to lift it back on its two wheels, but since it wasn't budging, he figured they could use a hand.
"Cart trouble. They need a hand."
Harabi nodded and fell into step alongside Lo'gan, already completely drenched down to his skin in the pouring rain. Every step they took sunk them deeper into the muddy plains soil and threatened to take the very sandals off their feet. Harabi grimaced in distaste as he plodded through the mess.
Wet soil was not something a desert dweller liked and even though it only rained that much a few times a year, it was not an event anyone outside of orchard owners looked forward to. Once started, it would rain for days and when finally over, the plains that separated the desert and the coast would come alive with life. Dry shrubbery would bloom brightly, wells would fill to capacity for another few months and animals would hurry to reproduce. Unfortunately the boon would spell nothing but trouble on the dunes if it was strong enough. The resulting winds would seize everything and even oases have been known to be swallowed up during those sandstorms.
Lo'gan and Harabi thought back to their families waiting for them in the Gazir Oasis. Gazir was in the range of the sandstorms, but if things got bad, both Khalaf and Salih knew enough to leave without them. It was not something they needed to deal with at that point on top of everything else, but like every nomad learned early in life, there was no dictating the winds. They did what they wanted and people simply had to work around it. Hoping with everything in them that the storms would avoid their loved ones, Lo'gan and Harabi approached Shammar's purple trimmed warriors.
The young Shammar sheik quickly spun around and faced them with an exasperated look. The men he was directing had managed to lift the cart a few feet off the ground, but it slipped and they were splattered in mud with nothing to show for all their combined strength.
"What are you doing out? Someone can see you."
Lo'gan shrugged past the sheik and lined himself alongside three men that were now burying a tent pole under the overturned cart to use as leverage. Nayif watched closely from the side and having no further need for orders other than to see Lo'gan doing it, Harabi quietly did the same. Shammar watched them both in frustration, before finally joining them. It was obvious his question was not going to be answered by either one.
On his order the men pushed and strained and after a few tries, succeeded in righting the pull cart. Sharing in the brief victory, Lo'gan and Harabi shook off the clumps of mud clinging onto their lower halves and then helped in getting the camels hitched up again and the caravan moving.
It was better for everyone if they stopped for a rest, but they were still in the open road and until they passed the last markers that signaled the end of the Ma'in province, they couldn't stop. Fortunately it was only a half hour away and moving with renewed vigor under their protective suede cloaks, the Shammar people kept up their march through the now indistinguishable mud trail.
Deciding that it was best if they rode alongside their smugglers, since they were already wet and the road was dangerously slippery for most of the animals, Lo'gan and Harabi added two more to the Shammar's twelve horsemen. They did so without asking and intrigued over the stranger's apparent disregard to all clan convention, Shammar soon pulled up alongside Lo'gan to get a better look at what everyone extolled as Arabia's new hero.
"It is safer if you hide for now."
Lo'gan gave the sheik a sidewards glance and kept up Nayif's medium trot alongside the cart Mari was sleeping in. When she did wake up, she would need to see him nearby and he was going to keep her in clear view meanwhile.
"I'm tired of hiding. Besides, you can't see past an arm's length ahead of you. No one will spot us."
Shammar thought that over and surprised that he hadn't thought of it first, looked over at the man that apparently didn't think much of him. He was used to other clans disapproving of his age. Some even refused to trade with him, but the Jabir was different. It wasn't personal. He was utterly irreverent with authority, period. And the Dawasir was not too far behind. Rumor had it Harabi was a thief and a scoundrel. Looking over with a frown at how Harabi rode closest to the camels with his young female cousins, Shammar made a mental note to watch him a little closer. All together, he believed every word of rumor he had heard concerning the two. It would take a pair that brazen to pull off something of that magnitude in the Sultan's presence.
Only there was something else that was bothering him. It did not escape him that Lo'gan barely left the girl's side. A girl that was scared, displaced and until recently - part of a harem. It was really none of his business, but well, he had to know. Wrinkling his brow to find the right way to breach the subject, Shammar hemmed and hawed atop his white horse until Lo'gan finally spoke.
"She's mine."
Shammar whipped his head around, the speed sending fat drops of rainwater from his Ghutra spraying in an arc. He looked at Lo'gan with a mortified expression, but Lo'gan didn't see it, since he hadn't wavered his gaze from the furthermost camel at the head of the convoy.
"Ahh, what I……"
"She's safe with me and I'm taking her back north. She's mine……for now at least."
He finally looked over and the young sheik almost swallowed his tongue at the mixture of anger, determination and sadness on Lo'gan's face. The rain ran down in rivulets over his hardened features and Shammar took all of five seconds to determine he was telling the truth. Lo'gan might not care very much for his authority but he looked as honest as they came. His own father was not an easy man to impress and yet he never had nothing but exalting things to say about Khalaf Jabir. He often wished he had met the man his father so admired, but his son Lo'gan, seemed a character from a clan poet's tale himself. And the saying said; the figs never fall far from their tree. He would keep an eye on the pair, just for safe keeping and leave it at that.
When Lo'gan turned back to face forward again, Shammar finally found his voice and feeling ashamed that he had insulted the son of a man his father had admired so much, pulled slightly ahead in his white stallion to enter Lo'gan's field of view.
"I apologize, Lo'gan al Jabir. I have no rights to judge you. I do not doubt that you will do just that. I……I am sorry."
Lo'gan stared at the sheik, surprised that the kid actually was apologizing to him. He was called a savage often enough. It was not something he cared about. If people feared him all the better he thought, but he could not recall someone actually saying they misjudged him. Perhaps there was some credit to the kid after all. Not sure how to respond, Lo'gan nodded sternly and slowed Nayif a little more so that he stood level with Mari. Perhaps going with the Shammar as far as possible would be a good idea after all.
Shammar knew that was all the response he was going to get out of the seasoned warrior and taking his cue, pulled forward to check on his other horsemen. Spotting Harabi flashing a toothy smile at one of his cousins, he quickly decided that that was a good place to start.
Lo'gan watched him go and quietly rode by the cart while he thought over Shammar's sentiment that his involvement with Mari was somehow less than honorable. Of course, it wasn't ideal. If it was, they'd be alone in his tent right now, but well, he was being truthful. He would do nothing to harm her. It would only go as far as she wanted.
Still rolling that thought in his head, Lo'gan startled when a particularly bright flash of lightening tore the sky above them. Bracing Nayif for the inevitable rumble that followed, Lo'gan rubbed the stallion's neck soothingly. When the crash did come, it rattled everything and many of the clan's animals stalled, including the camel pulling the coffee. Only a second later, Mari's wide-eyed face peered out of the cart's flapping tarp.
Lo'gan saw the immediate relief on her face when she saw him and tried to say something to her when in an unexpected move, she adjusted her hood and leaped out of the moving cart and onto the muddy ground. It was now Lo'gan's eyes that widened as he made an attempt to dismount to tell her to get back in. But Mari had other plans. She stretched out her arms and with a definitive voice, declared.
"Lo'gan, up."
The Jabir warrior answered with a grin and seeing her intent, stretched out his free arm to her. Barely stalling his horse to avoid falling out of rhythm with the rest of the procession, Lo'gan bent over and scooped Mari up to the saddle. Unlike their first try, the move was smooth and seamless. Mari landed in front of Lo'gan squarely and smiling back at him offered her explanation with a sour expression.
"Coffee."
Lo'gan chuckled heartily at that. The smell of coffee beans was intoxicating, but after a few hours of being immersed in it, it got tiring. Assuming his now typical hand across her waist, Lo'gan brought Mari back a little to fit flush against his body. The move caused the water that soaked them both to squish between them. Lo'gan really didn't want to have her out in the rain for fear that she could get sick from the unnatural cold that accompanied it. What he didn't know was that Mari had a bigger immunity to the cold than anyone else for over three thousand miles.
The last thing he expected a minute beforehand was to be riding with Mari in the rain, but well, at least she was in his arms. Ignoring the fact that Mari's clothes were now plastered onto her frame, Lo'gan placed a warm kiss on her hood-covered cheek. Mari smiled at the embrace and also assumed her now characteristic position with one hand on the brunt of the saddle and another clutching the forearm that crossed her waist. Together they rode north alongside the Shammar people, cuddled tightly for body heat while the skies that had been quiet for months thundered and shook in increasing fury.
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