persian princess

The sand whirled and danced in front of my eyes….

*

“Can you do that?” Darius smiled crookedly, poison glinting in his eyes. The hall erupted in laughter.

*

The wind picked up with every passing second, I heard something fall.

*

“Running away finally, princess? Well, boys, that’s certainly cause for celebration!!” i thought I could hear their sneers for miles.

*

A lone hawk cried in fright and was blown away by the rising gale.

*

“If? There’s no if about it!!! You won’t survive, Arya, give it up!” concern or a lack of faith?

*

“Arya! We need to get away, the storm’s come sooner than we thought.” A deep, male voice broke my living nightmares.

I blinked and returned to the present at once. Nodding, I said, “I hope you haven’t taken off the saddles?”

Jafar stopped loading his pack and turned to look at me with barely disguised annoyance, “I haven’t.” was all that he said.

I hadn’t taken anything out so I jumped and settled into my horse’s saddle and waited for Jafar to finish. When he was done, we set off at once, the wind pressing against our backs and whistling in our ears. Our horses didn’t need any steering.

Every living creature knows how to run away from danger.

We rode away from the storm. Sandstorms in deserts can be quite deadly. Confused, lost, engulfed in darkness with sand in their eyes, people had been known to die if caught in them.

Though, getting lost is easy at any time, with nothing but sand and gorse bushes stretching for miles all around, there was no easy way to find a path. Jafar and I had to find the merchant road before dark that day. We had been wandering for almost a week and tempers were running high.

“Stop now, we need to eat. It’s been long.” I said after a few more hours. We had outrun the storm and were now back to our original hopeless quest.

“What we really need….is a tracker.” Jafar said without stopping his horse and without looking at me,” If we keep stopping for food, we’ll never be able to find the road. Just hold on for some more time, will you.” I couldn’t make out what he muttered after that.

I sighed, admitting that he was right, I followed. We didn’t find the track in a few hours. We didn’t find the track after our dinner break when we decided to continue searching even in the dark. We didn’t find it all throughout the next day.

When our patience had been worn thin and Jafar had given up cursing me for all the misfortune that had befallen him, we found some wheel tracks. Looking at them, we smiled for the first time in days. But trail following was just as hard as finding one.

The wind blows hard in the deserts. The sand shifted, got messed up so the tracks would just disappear sometimes and we would have to guess their direction. We wandered off track again and it took us another day to finally hit the main road to the city.

Heaving a sigh of relief, we fell in line with merchants and travellers as they completed the last part of their journey.

Camels and horses restlessly waited, hawkers from the city attacked the travellers, insects buzzed and I waited, fighting impatience. The gates were within sight, they stood tall, twenty feet high with a wall of similar height extending on either side. They were wide open but the crowd always got unruly at the entrance and sorting out the chaos took time.

Jafar had already started counting out money, keeping it ready for the supplies we would need after reaching. I wished I could find a way to pass time like he always did. He looked up at me.

“ Do we make camp somewhere or find an inn?”

I thought about it, “We might as well go to an inn. What’s wrong with some travellers staying for a couple of weeks? By the time the trouble starts, we’ll be gone.”

Jafar nodded,” The King’s palace is at the centre, let’s take a look at it first. We need to get more information.”

The line started moving and soon our horses trotted in through the gates. Nothing about the city struck me as different. Bricks of brown and dull gold formed houses that stood in rows, carts were pulled down narrow streets, people bustled and hurried in all directions, dogs weaved in and out of the crowds, dust swirled and familiar scents filled the air.

No one needed directions in Persia. Smells of spice and perfume led to the markets, raucous laughter indicated the taverns, the loud calls for prayers showed the way to the mosques, groups of children meant that the schools were nearby and the wider, cleaner streets went to the richer districts and the palace.