The Lost Owl

The horses thundered down the canyon, their hooves pounding the dust into powder that carried away by the wind. There were forty of them, each of them wilder than the one before it; forty wild horses never broken and never ridden. They moved across the landscape with an easy, confident pace that belied the rough terrain they cross. The coarse wind swept away the evidence of their passing moments later; it filled their prints filling with loose red sand. The sand slid along ahead of the wind, driven by the howling whip of Tiawa. The lead horse eased his pace and pulled his black head skyward, drawing in the hot, dry air and snuffing it. His nostrils widened, then narrowed, as he tasted the wind. He shook his head, tangling the dark black mass of his mane, and he neighed loudly. He quickened his pace, and the other horses followed, the drumming of their hooves echoing and dying on the dead rock walls of the canyon.
2. The land was hot, blasted, and very dead. Even in better days, it had never been a place of lilies and songbirds; never a place where streams bubbled down over mossy rocks among green ferns. It had always been a hard land, but even the little it had boasted was gone. Tall black trees, scorched and brittle, cast their empty shadows across the baked ground. Their branches were bare and gaunt.
3. The hand of darkness was heavy on the lands of the canyon. The wind roared through the creaky branches, roaring like a bear, screaming like a baby, and wailing like a dying woman. It snatched up the sand from the ground and whipped it through the sky, scouring the branches clear of the dead bark until even the ghosts of the trees were dead.
4. The dark man sat at his sooty fire, stirring the embers with a charred piece of stick. He could hear the fading echoes of the horses, and shrugged. He knew chasing after them was pointless. They were too far away, and dark was coming on. He squinted as smoke rose up and burned his eyes; he rubbed them with a calloused hand and groped on the ground for his glove. He seized it and waved it into the smoke, and finally stood up from his squat. His name was Darcy.
5. Darcy left his fire. His eyes watered and smarted, and he turned his back. Blinking a few times, he cleared his his eyes and sat down on a stone. Darcy rubbed his eyes again, finishing with a pull at his nose and a general rub around on his chin and cheeks. His tin cup was full of bitter coffee, and he blew the dust from the top of the steaming liquid. The sand was light, and took a little while to settle and sink. Quick action and strong lungs could clear coffee before the sand on the top had time to mingle with the grounds at the bottle.
6. He had a memory of green trees, music, brightly lit halls, and glittering women.
7. "But it's all gone, like a memory of a dream." Darcy tossed the last of his coffee in the dust beside the dying fire.
8. The sun eased down to the horizon, smearing the sky with a last blaze of its torch, and darkness fell on the land like a weight. Darcy blew his embers into flames and fed a few broken branches to the hungry fire.
He had chosen his campsite with the singular care which had kept him alive for years in a land that killed overnight. There was the fire, and there was the carefully gathered pile of fuel. There was the horse, hidden in the draw, with a single line of yellow barb wire strung around it on six precisely places stakes. There was the circle of driftsand, and here Darcy sat within it, carefully managing his fire.
9. The fire was most important of all. Too small, and it would die, and the tumbles would come in such number that the driftsand would not stop them. A fire too large would draw other visitors, just as dangerous and less bothered by the burning sand from the Valley of the Monuments. To survive, a man had to gather enough fuel during the safety of daylight hours, perpare himself, and tend his fire while he dozed. It was an exhausting, exacting work, but Darcy had perfected it.
10. The wind frowned across his small camp, and Darcy heard a small snap behind him. He did not turn to look. He knew what was there, and that by the time he turned, it would be gone.
11. It was a tumble. It unrolled its thin fingers and groped across the ground, stopping when it found the driftsand. Moaning, it shoved its pawlike hand to its mouth and sucked.
12. Darcy wiped his coffee cup dry with with scrap of faded red hankerchief and stowed it in his backback.
13. "Don't try it again, friend. It's the whole way round and it'll burn you right good. Go on home now, and eat one of your friends."
14. The tumble growled, tucked its long arms around its whispy body, and rolled before the wind, dropping its limbs again on the other side of the campsite.
15. Darcy could see it now. It was a rare sight, seen by few and survived by fewer still. The tumble stretched its skinny arms toward him, and the light from his campfire made the nails of the tumble grow. Tumbles fastened serpents' teeth to their nails, scratching their victims with the poisonous teeth of the tiny pink vipers. Darcy nodded with satisfaction when the tumble howled again.
16. "I told you, friend. Now go on and get."
17. The tumble did not go on and get. It tucked and whirled again.
18. Darcy stretched out beside his fire and tilted his hat forward. "Stupid smoke." He patted his pile of fuel and nodded. There was enough. He closed his eyes and went to sleep.