Moving as sinuously as a rock serpent, the sand-spirit danced just out of K’ret’s reach. Hidden behind a garishly painted, oversized mask, the desert being seemed to mock K’ret as its bare feet whispered over the dark sand. It held a vicious-looking club in one clawed, scaled hand while gesturing to K’ret with the other, seeming to beckon him onward, taunting and teasing.

Enough! K’ret of Mestanor province cried within his mind. Enough!

Swallowing the scream that threatened to burst from his lips, K’ret drew his sword and charged. He knew the sand-spirit was baiting him, had been since the ex-mercenary and thief had wandered into this arid part of the fabled Hinterlands of Fai known as the Ebon Desert. The sand-spirit, garbed only in loincloth, ankle and arm bracelets and the feathered and painted mask, had been following him for the last... how long had it been since K’ret had crossed the border into the Hinterlands of Fai? How long since both his stolen mounts had perished—one from the heat and the other from a panthor attack, the wild desert cats dragging the poor beast off screaming to eat at their leisure?

Tall and muscular despite his middle years, K’ret struggled against the heat of the daystar. It beat down on him like a physical blow even though the wide-sleeved, belted tunic, loose trousers and white head-wrap he had thieved were designed to reflect the harsh starlight and cool his body.

Still, despite his failing strength and the heat-sickness threatening to overcome him, K’ret attacked, hungering to kill, to lash out, to vent his anger and frustration on this desert creature for his own failures and mistakes.

But the sand-spirit was gone, vanishing like a mirage. Only its hissing cry whispered in the hot, dry wind, twisting and curling among the ash-colored dunes like a living thing.

K’ret stopped and stared, mouth open in surprise. What lay a few arms’ length beyond him, what the sand-spirit had doubtlessly been leading him to, caused the bile to rise in his throat. A bone yard sprawled in front of him. Here the skeletal remains of those who had died in the Ebon Desert’s unforgiving landscape lay discarded and forgotten like so much offal.

Mounds of bleached and sandblasted bones were heaped and scattered in a large circular area bounded by rocks and scrub grass as if designed that way by some trickster god. Among and around the piles of bones, wooden poles stood planted at varying heights. A skull was affixed to the top of each pole, the death heads’ mouths gaping, their empty eye sockets staring into oblivion.

As if waiting for K’ret, the wind suddenly kicked up...

K’ret took a step backwards and put his hands over his ears. He grimaced in pain. As the wind blew through the planted death-heads’ mouths and eyes, the skulls turned those hot breezes into sound, each one a different note, producing a different resonance, transformed into dark melodies—demon music that K’ret felt more than heard. Sharp and ethereal, the mysterious melodies ... attacked him ... like a raptor dropping down on its prey.

Strange, exotic harmonies intertwined and pulsed through his head and body. Mysterious sounds coalesced into colors and images he could only glimpse out of the corners of his eyes. Movements of sharp contrast and interwoven chordings enraptured him, swirled around him, rose and fell and broke like waves upon some long-forgotten shore.

And then, like a ravaging dust storm rising in the distance, the music rolled over him, enveloping him darkly like a shroud.

It was then that the sand-spirit struck.

The creature appeared as if from out of the dunes themselves, rushing by K’ret and striking him in the shoulder as it passed. K’ret cried out and spun around, falling forward.

K’ret rolled away from the creature as the sand-spirit brought its club down on the empty sand he had just been lying on. Resorting to old skills he hadn’t utilized in a long time, K’ret brought up his sword and just barely blocked another downswing of the sand-spirit’s own weapon. He slashed at the creature as he scrambled to his knees, driving the sand-spirit backwards. But only for a moment—rushing forward, the sand-spirit once again swung its club in an overhead arc.

Trying in vain to get to his booted feet, K’ret parried the blow but the jarring contact of his sword against the rock-hard club sent shivers of pain throughout his body. He cried out as the sand-spirit kicked him in the chest. K’ret fell to his back, his breath coming in ragged gasps. Another swat from the desert-being’s weapon sent K’ret’s sword flying from his hand.

All the while, the music emanating from the skulls overhead filled the space like some hellish swarm of insects boring into his mind, sinking into his skin, weakening him further and turning his blood to ice. K’ret put his hands up in front of his face, cursing his fortune. It wasn’t supposed to happen this way! He wasn’t supposed to have made his escape from the slave dens of Geth only to end up in this gods-forsaken desert! If only he had listened to M’lena!

M’lena. The image of the female slave he had been bound to, the lover who had taken him in despite his violent past, the one he had so brutally killed burst uninvited into his mind. I should have listened to you, M’lena. I should have...

The sand-spirit stood over K’ret now, the scales on its rangy body glinting in the sun, its serpent eyes flashing behind the mask. With a hissing laugh, it swung the club one last time...

~*~

Jerking in surprise, K’ret propped himself up on one elbow and looked toward the sound of that soft, crooning voice.

Another desert being stood in front of him, a female, unmasked as the legends of sand-spirits had always described. Growing up in the slums of Mestanor City, K’ret and the other homeless street-brats he had run with had been told tales time and again of unruly children being spirited away to the Hinterlands of Fai if they didn’t behave and do as they were told. He had been frightened into obedience then and now he found his childhood fear reasserting itself like an ugly ghost.

He stared, unable to turn away. It was said only male sand-spirits hid their faces because of some order of caste or power. But what a face he gazed upon now! A woman’s, yes, but covered in small, blue scales, lizard eyes glittering, and tiny fangs visible behind a smirking, lipless smile. A cloud of feathery blue hair was swept back tumbling to the middle of her back.

Naked from the waist up and garbed in only a loosely flowing, knee-length wrap sashed around her waist, the thin female also carried a club, this one smaller than the ones carried by the males but more stylized and intricately carved. She wore a necklace of bones around her neck.

This is a woman of power, K’ret thought, a sudden chill running up his back.

"We needs talk to the man," the female hissed, her lips barely moving. "He has come into the land of the Etache uninvited."

The Etache? Is that what they called themselves?

Fear clutched at K’ret’s heart. What in the name of the gods had he gotten himself into? He looked around wildly—in front of him stretched the unwelcoming sands of the Ebon Desert but to his sides and behind him stood an open structure of some kind. Tenting supported by wooden poles and pinnacles of rock flapped in the wind over his head. On the low-lying ridge where he lay were the various markings of a primitive home—a fire pit, its flames licking at a haunch of meat roasting on a spit. Another smaller shelter nestled in the back wall of the tent constructed from animal skins with painted glyphs and images adorning its rectangular surface. Several collections of bones strung together with animal gut hung from the tent ceiling, moving in the hot breezes and making a soft clinking sound—the "wind-bells" he had heard.

K'ret tried to rise to his feet, his heart pounding, his throat dry from more than thirst, but sudden movement on all sides of him stopped him. Two more of the sand-spirits rose up behind the female, male and masked and armed with their ubiquitous clubs. A noise behind him alerted him to a third male, the one who had attacked him, kneeling closely behind him; the eyes behind the now uncomfortably familiar mask laughing.

K’ret turned back to the woman, his body trembling despite the heat. "Who ... who are you?" he croaked, his mouth dry, a slow twitch beginning under one eye. "What do you want?"

"We wonder," the female crooned. "How the man came into the Hinterlands. Yes? Why the man would make such a journey knowing he would surely die."

K’ret started to protest, his mouth opening to deny his death, to prove he could survive against any odds. But that old fear took hold again, compelling him to obey, to only say, "I ... I had no choice. The masters of the slave-dens sent their paladins after me. But instead of running me down and taking me back, they drove me into the desert. I had escaped the dens and ... and..."

The words stuck in his throat then as he remembered M’lena begging him not to go; his lover too afraid to accompany him on his reckless mission yet threatening to tell the slave-masters in order to keep him with her. He had to silence her! He had to...

The female Etache made a sound like laughter. The wind-bells chimed louder, suddenly swelling around K’ret like the music he had felt earlier, tickling at his brain like scrambling water-spiders. "Tell us," the female continued. She fondled the bone necklace with the long fingers of her free hand. "Why was the man sent to the slave dens? Hmmmm?"

Again, as if urged on now by the unworldly sounds of the wind-bells, he spoke. His voice sounded like a distant echo. "I am a thief, was once a soldier-for-hire. I waged war and stole from those who ... who were helpless, unprotected. And I ... I ..."

"Killed," the female finished for him. "Murdered, as you say, for payment." She nodded, her eyes closed, as if listening to some inner voice. "It seems the man is callous and unfeeling," the voice intoned. "And dangerous. To escape from the slave dens is no small matter. Yet it seems to happen from time to time." She paused, momentarily looking away. "For many cycles, the Etache have had to adapt, to change, to make do with what has been handed to us."

She turned that reptilian gaze on him again, her fangs bared. "We have, how would you say, an arrangement with the slave-masters of Geth, yes? Those who escape the dens’ dank confines—those who cannot conform—are sent to us in the end. The Etache are able to appease our gods with sacrifice and the slave-masters rid themselves of those who will never abide by their ways."

K’ret shook himself out of the musical stupor that had bound him once again. Notes of piercing intensity cut through his head like knives, making him wince in pain. The wind-bells rattled softly overhead. Sacrifice? "What are you saying?" he cried, struggling to his feet. "I did what I had to do. I never loved M’lena! She was just there, another slave, lost, uncaring. She’s better off dead! Her life was nothing! She was..."

The female speared him with a look—a gaze of anger and ... pity? Was this monstrous countenance even capable of such emotions? And yet K’ret stopped in mid-speech, unable to continue, feeling like a child being punished. "And what will the man do if he attains his freedom?" the female continued. "Will he atone for his crimes? Will he make amends for all the wrong he has done?"

K’ret looked away, sudden anger flaring within him. "I had to kill her," he whispered. "She would have told the guards. She would have betrayed me."

He leaped to his feet and lunged for the female. If he had to die, he would take this filthy creature with him.

Two of the male Etache were suddenly ... just there. They held K’ret with strong, icy grips, pinning his arms to his sides. This close, he could smell the sand-spirits, their bodies emanating an oily, sharp odor.

The female approached him, cradling her club like a child. Her eyes shone with a fanatical light, her mouth twisted in a parody of a smile. "We will see," she hissed. "Oh, yes. We will see."

K’ret struggled as he was lifted by the two Etache who held him above their heads as if he were a child’s leaf doll. Following the female and the third male, they began running through the sand away from the escarpment, loping like animals, unmindful of their struggling burden.

The heat of the daystar bore down upon K’ret’s writhing body. The Etaches’ grips were like unbreakable chains as K’ret fought against them in vain. He tried to scream but only a strangled garbling escaped his cracked lips.

Who would hear him in this wasteland anyway? Who would come to his aid even if they could? He was a thief and a murderer. That revelation hit him as if for the first time. It was true—no one would care about his fate!

The sky spun sickeningly above him, the yellow orb of the daystar dipped and rose in his sight over and over as he was jostled unmercifully. After what seemed like forever, he was thrown to the ground. He fell backwards, coughing and gasping. He tried to stand but was shoved roughly back down into the sand, his sword dumped by his side, his head-wrap torn from his head by one of the males. K’ret pulled himself to his knees; his eyes grew wide at what he beheld...

The bone yard rose up around him. Twisted skeletal remains loomed overhead; shards of pointed white fingers and sandblasted ribs seemed to sprout like demon foliage. Leering atop their windswept perches, the planted skulls leered with their death-head grins.

Again, as if preordained, the wind began to blow, coursing through the skulls’ eyes and mouths. The first notes of the music they produced sounded in K’ret’s head, faintly, like the snufflings of wild dogs tracking some unlucky prey.

The female Etache kneeled at his side. "Know you this, mercenary thief—countless cycles ago, the man’s people drove the Etache they did not openly slaughter in their evil religious wars into the Hinterlands, taking our land, our riches and our way of life. For no reasons other than lust and greed and fear."

K’ret shook his head, trying to rise, the harsh light of the daystar searing his vision. "What?" he gasped, not understanding. "Why are you telling me this?"

"The man’s histories are wrong, written by the evil oppressors. All that was true then has been forgotten. Except by those of the Etache who have bided their time, waiting for the right moment to strike back, the right omen to move us to action! The right sacrifice to be deemed the last." She held her club out in front of her as if it were a sacred talisman. "Will the man join us to right such a terrible wrong? Will he help the Etache to take back what is rightfully ours? Will you fight for justice against your own people? Hmmmm?"

Judged. Tested. K’ret was being given a way out of this situation. There was still hope. He looked at the piles of bones surrounding him. Had their owners all escaped from the slave dens? Had they all refused to help these foul desert beings? What fools!

He nodded fiercely. "Yes, yes!" he croaked. "I will help you! Anything..."

The female cocked her head to one side, a thin, pointed tongue flicking the corners of her mouth. Her eyes gleamed with purpose. "Ah, so. We needs thank the man but cannot abide his methods—the killing of the woman who cared for him, yes? The ruthlessness he possesses that is so like the others of his kind—uncaring, unforgiving. A teller of lies to save his own life. You would betray your own kind?" She spat into the sand. "I think not. For all of that you must be dealt with, like those lying here who revealed to us the darkness within them as well. Our gods must be strengthened for the struggle ahead. The Etache have waited for the right omen to come for a long time. We can wait a little longer."

"No! Please..." But the female and the others were gone, their hissing laughter already distant. K’ret pulled himself up, the wind stronger now, the music more insistent. It clawed inside his head, clenched at his heart.

He grabbed one of the poles, tried to wrest it from the ground. But the skull atop it seemed to be laughing at him now, daring him not to listen to the crazed sounds bubbling up within him.

K’ret saw her then, standing only an arm length or two away. She stood as he had last seen her—head and tunic covered in blood yet still beautiful somehow. Her staring eyes held his, filled with accusation and betrayal—and disappointment. He reached out to her, calling her name. And then, like smoke on the wind, the ghost of M’lena too was gone.

No! No! K’ret, ex-mercenary and failed thief, began to laugh, a sound already tinged with madness. He swayed to the music of the bones like a drunken dancer, mouthing gibberish and waving his arms. He looked down to see his sword lying in the sand, realizing that the sand-spirits—the Etache—were not entirely without mercy.

As the music built to a roaring climax and his mind began to break, K’ret grasped the sword in both hands...