Hadrian Dustwhistle's Arc

Chapter 6 of 7

By the second dawn in the dunes, Hadrian knew he was lost. The ridges he'd crossed at moonrise looked the same as the ones he crossed at noon. He pulled the burned map from his coat and smoothed it on his knee. The three-legged scorpion stared up at him, scorched edges curling, no road, no marker, only sand drawn on sand. He shook the metal canteen. The water sloshed thin and high, less than half. He had been rationing since the blockade, and still it was going. The sun climbed white and merciless over the ridge, burning the air above the sand into a wobble. He walked till midday, then stopped. In the trough between two dunes, pressed into the soft slope, was a single set of mule tracks crossing his path. He set his own boot beside one. A match. He had walked a full circle and not known it. He laughed once, short and dry, because the alternative was sitting down. Hadrian climbed the next ridge instead of going around it. At the top, far off and pale as a tooth against the sky, stood the peak. Not the scorpion. Not the pool. But a thing that did not move. He took a small swallow from the canteen, set his shoulder to the peak, and started down. He had a direction now. He also had half a canteen, and a long walk between.