Chapter 1: Sand In Their Breath
"Keep your trouble to yourself, and the whipping that's sure to follow," Yîgeke protested. She was a thin slip of a girl, easily overlooked. Though the work she did for her master was strenuous - at this moment, she was wringing out his horse's dressing, having just beaten the dust and sand out of it - she seemed never to put on any muscle. If she drew herself to her full height and a proud posture, she would have been striking, even pleasing to the eyes, despite her slim form. But this was something she never did. She preferred to crouch and be overlooked. Those who were overlooked were rarely punished.
"It's not my trouble. It belongs to Kargöz, and to all of the Haehînbór!" Yîgeke was unswayed; Qemik always thought whatever was happening was of the utmost urgency, and even more so, that it was time to act. Qemik liked to take action. It was far easier than thinking, particularly for him. What Yîgeke wondered is why he seemed so determined to involve her in his schemes. Kumzu would insist that it's because Qemik fancied her, or "has an eye for you," as Kumzu would put it, but Yîgeke doubted this. Or perhaps just hoped it wasn't true. There seemed little point in fancying or being fancied; the Haehînbór were slaves to the last, and had no rights to choose for themselves. The whole idea of romance seemed like yet another means of getting into trouble. Anyhow, Qemik probably fancied Oyana instead, Yîgeke reasoned. She was like him, tall, strong, and fierce. Well, not entirely like him. She had cunning, and saw much. Yîgeke reasoned she was what he needed to balance out his rash and thoughtless ways.
With a sigh, Yîgeke passed one end of the horse-blanket to Qemik, and without even thinking, he held it and braced himself while she began to twist it once more. Beneath, a large pan caught most of the drippings wrung from the cloth, which would be used to clean other things, to water horses, or, if it had become too foul even for that, would be given to Yîgeke and the other slaves of the house to drink. No water could be spared here. Farther north or west, nearer the Sea of Rhûn, the land was fertile and the springs and streams generous. They had great croplands and deep rivers. In Dorwinion, they even had terraces, atop which grew grapes they made into the strongest wine in Middle-earth, or so Qemik claimed to have heard. Yîgeke had never seen grapes, nor a river, let alone a sea, and could imagine none of them.
"Kargöz is a fool, and so are you to believe these rumors. The Six Spears tell us that we must be wary of false signs. If people act too quickly, the Ortheri will be ready when…" She paused in wringing and leaned a bit closer to whisper. "When the day comes for the Haehînbór to rise. If this were the First Spear, which it cannot be, there would be time to find out without taking rash action. By stirring up others, Kargöz isn't just putting himself in danger, and those who know him and may be punished with him; he's endangering all of the Haehînbór. Should we act too soon, or reveal the prophecy, the Haehînbór shall fall, sand in their breath, and perish unto the last child, to the end of days."
Despite himself, Qemik was mouthing these same words as she spoke them. Every child of the Haehînbór learned every word of the Six Spears at a young age, even before they could understand them. It was safer to pass this secret knowledge to children; if they waited until the child was older, the Ortheri might overhear, or the child might be taken away before the lesson could be taught. That was a dread fate, indeed. Every Haehînbór child had before him a lifetime of servitude, of punishment and poverty, being passed from one owner to another like kine, hoping only to escape the cruelest of masters. There was nothing to sustain one in this life, save the foretelling in the Six Spears. A day will come. Four words, the first four in the prophecy, muttered under the breath in times of tribulation and pain, could sustain any of the Haehînbór. They were an incantation of hope. But the Six Spears also spoke warnings. A wiser man than Qemik might, when driven to take action in anger, murmur another incantation: sand in their breath, as a talisman of reserve. If a day will come, every Haehînbór must wait for it, patiently.
But Qemik was neither wise nor patient. "He's being brought to the well, but the Ortheril Dond doesn't know who broke the vase yet. And with so many of the warriors gone away to invade the Westerlings, many places go unwatched. I have a plan. If we..." But he trailed off. Yîgeke was not arguing with him; that was not her way. Even when she was drawing a line in the sand and refusing him, she did so quietly, meekly. She had turned her back on him, ostensibly to squeeze a few more drops out of the blanket; but in so doing, she had made as clear a statement as she ever would that she would have nothing to do with his plan. Sighing, he said, "You don't wish for trouble. I understand. One day, trouble is going to find you, and having no experience with it, you won't know how to grapple it." But she wasn't listening. He looped his end of the blanket on a nearby post, then turned to stalk off, his gray eyes flashing with ire.
