The lights went out. We are back in the sands.
Two years had passed since Salim left Bashir at the Oasis of the Whispering Palms. Salim was now seventeen. His face was weathered by the wind, his gaze heavy and calm—like a man accustomed to looking death in the eye and not blinking first. But the biggest change was not external. A silence was growing within him—the very same silence his grandfather had spoken of.
The grandfather began to weaken. His steps grew shorter, and the hand holding the reins trembled visibly. The caravan, which used to obey the old man without question, sensed this. Groups of drovers began to whisper in the corners, and a new guide, a man named Kasim—greedy, with shifting eyes—challenged the old leader’s decisions more and more often.
“The old man is leading us in circles!” Kasim declared loudly one evening, when the caravan camped by a dried-up riverbed. “He is searching for ghosts, but we need markets! There, beyond the Stone Ridge, is a shorter path. Two days, and we are in the city. Yet he wants to lead us through the Empty Lands for another week. Why? To bow to some invisible Dragon?”
Salim saw the people beginning to nod. Fatigue is a poor counselor. It makes hearts small, and fear turns into greed.
“My grandfather knows the way,” Salim said coldly, stepping toward the fire. His hand habitually came to rest on the hilt of his blade. “The short path often ends in a cliff.”
“Your time has not yet come, boy,” Kasim snapped. “Or do you think because you survived that rockfall, you are now a saint? We need money, not legends.”
At night, that which Salim feared most occurred. Kasim and half the caravan left, taking the best supplies and the strongest camels. They abandoned the old man and the handful of people loyal to him in the middle of the Empty Lands, knowing that without water and food, they were doomed.
When Salim discovered they were gone, he rushed to his grandfather. The old man was sitting on the sand, leaning against a saddle. He looked very calm, almost translucent in the moonlight.
“They are gone, Grandfather! Kasim betrayed us. They took the water. We won’t make it…” Salim’s voice wavered.
The grandfather opened his eyes. There was no anger in them, only an endless sadness.
“Betrayal, Salim, is not when they take your water. It is when they take your faith in people. Kasim did not take our future; he simply relieved us of his presence. But now… now everything depends on you.”
“On me? I don’t know the way! I am not a guide!”
“You are the one the Dawn chose,” the old man coughed. “Listen to me. The Dragon does not grant a map. He grants a direction. Feel it? The air has grown dense. A storm is coming, Salim. Kasim thinks he has escaped, but he is running straight into the jaws of death. You must lead those who remain.”
“How? They are terrified, they hate me for forcing them to stay with you!”
“Leadership is not when they love you,” the grandfather whispered, closing his eyes. “Leadership is when you see light where the others see only darkness. And when you are ready to walk toward that light first, even if no one follows you. Go, Salim. Feel Him.”
Salim stepped out into the darkness. His heart was pounding in his throat. He closed his eyes and tried to catch that very same vibration in his chest. At first, there was only silence. Then—the whistle of the wind. And suddenly… a deep, almost imperceptible hum, like the sound of a massive bell struck beneath the earth.
He opened his eyes. The horizon to the west had begun to turn black. The first thunder clapped. Those who remained—the elderly, women, and a couple of loyal warriors—looked at him with hope and terror.
“Gather everything!” Salim shouted. His voice cut through the noise of the wind like steel. “We are not following Kasim. We are going deep into the sands, to the White Rocks!”
“But there is no water there!” someone cried.
“There is salvation there!” Salim retorted. “Either you follow me, or you die here in the dust. The choice is yours.”
He did not look back. He simply walked forward, into the very heart of the approaching storm. At some point, he felt a massive shadow cover him. It was not a cloud. It was a sensation of incredible power that seemed to part the walls of sand before him. The wind beat against his back, pushing him, not stopping him.
Three hours later, they reached the caves in the White Rocks. As soon as the last person entered beneath the arch of stone, the sky collapsed. A storm like this had not been seen even by the elders. The sand turned into a wall that erased everything in its path.
In the morning, when everything grew quiet, Salim stepped outside. There was no trace left of the path Kasim had taken. There was only a smooth, dead surface. Kasim and his “short path” had vanished forever.
Salim returned to his grandfather. The old man was sitting by the saddle just as before, but his head was