In any event, the primary mission had not changed. To get the book to Suld. Everything else that happened would have to fit around that mission. If it happened, it happened. If it didn't, it didn't.
Sometimes it felt so silly. Here he was, Tarrin Kael. The Tarrin Kael, the Were-cat who had stories, rumors, and now even legends being made about him out in the rest of the world. The most notorious man alive, probably the most feared, and he was afraid. Afraid of himself, afraid of the future, afraid of something as simple as trying to make contact with a Goddess when he spoke to a different one all the time.
He just didn't feel quite as towering as others probably made him out to be. Those were stories. This was his reality. And in reality, despite his size, despite his appearance, despite his history, he was still that innocent, slightly naive farmboy that had left Aldreth so long ago. His outlook and personality may have changed, but it still rested deep inside him. He could deny it, even to himself, but part of him knew that it was true.
Tarrin Kael. He forgot all about Tarrin Kael. A tall, strapping young man who had dreams of being a Knight, of travelling the world and seeing exciting things. A young man with an overprotective mother and a father so mellow that a rampaging Troll really couldn't put him out of sorts. A young man with a cute little sister.
Now he was just Tarrin, son of Triana. Were-cat, Sorcerer, Druid, scourge, murderer, and all-around ruthless monster. He was a Were-cat with a mission, and the Gods help anyone who got in his way. Life had lost its luster, its shine for that Tarrin. Everything was a chore, everything led to nothing but more bleakness. There was no light in that person's life anymore, where Tarrin Kael always found the light in anything.
Tarrin Kael had been an optomist. Tarrin was fatalistic. Tarrin Kael would have found the good in his current situation. Tarrin just found it to be yet another needle in him, to go along with all the other needles. Tarrin Kael would have looked up at the sky and said "Wow, how beautiful!" Tarrin looked up at the sky and simply saw stars. Tarrin Kael would sigh in relief when this was all over, and return to a good life. Tarrin fully expected to die. And if he did not, then there would no longer be anything left to live for. He had done too much evil in this world now… he was beyond redemption. The accusing gazes of the thousands of eyeless phantoms reminded him of that night after night.
He wondered how his parents and Jenna were doing. They were probably still in Ungardt. It was summer there now, a very short summer, starting to wind down into winter. His mother was probably with her father, Eron was probably learning how the Ungardt brewed their heavy ale and whiskey, and Jenna was probably breaking hearts. It had been so long since he'd seen them, remembering how they looked seemed hard now. And Jenna was a year older, she had to be taller, more like a woman and less like a little girl.
It would be good to see them again. But they were in Ungardt, and he was in the Desert of Swirling Sands.
The wind picked up, blowing cold air over him. The thong holding his braid untied, and his hair quickly unbraided itself in the steady wind, fanning out behind him like a yellow cloak. It dragged the ground now when unbraided, and though he could change its length, something inside him liked it that way, despite the weight of the braid and the stress it put on his scalp. Perhaps it was a masochistic bent. Perhaps it was a reminder, a constant sensation to remind him of how it felt to feel pain when something inside him had become dead to it. He really didn't know, all he did know was that it was something he preferred.
He looked up into the sky again… and all he saw were stars.
He closed his eyes and turned into the wind, feeling its icy fingers caress his exposed skin, felt it pull and tug at the fur on his arms and feet, felt it billow out his hair, felt it pool inside his ears as they caught it. This was feeling. Cold biting, the chilly domain of the desert at night, where the air stole away all the heat the sun imparted to things during the day. This desert was two different worlds. The burning fires of day, and the cold hand of night. Yet they existed in the same place, separated by the movements of the sun, forever chasing one another across the land in an endless cycle of repetitive monotony.
Two different worlds.
A dark smudge appeared on the western horizon, and he'd been here long enough to comprehend what it meant. A sandstorm was coming. It was why the wind had started to pick up, it was the wind wall the preceded them. The boulder field was a good place to weather a sandstorm, so long as it didn't bury them. The boulders would break up the wind, protect them from the scouring power of the blowing sand.
He had time. He sat down and calmly rebraided his hair, watching the boiling fury of nature approach, studying it carefully to come to a better understanding of how they moved, how they worked. This one wasn't that fast, but it was still pretty speedy as it neared him. It was a big one as well. He guessed that it would last for some time. Maybe long enough to bury the boulder field in sand, if it died out over them. Maybe taking a few precautions would be a good idea, and for that, he'd need Sarraya's help. A couple of large Wards to deflect the sand would keep them from getting buried.
The time for pondering was past. The reality of the desert had intruded on his musings. It was time to deal with things.
He tied the thong securely around his braid, then scooted over the the boulder's edge and slid down. Time to deal with reality.
The sandstorm lasted for three days. For three long days, Tarrin and Sarraya huddled in the boulder field, inside a tent protected by a strong Ward against the blowing wind and sand. The wind howled and screamed outside his Ward, making it loud in the protected area, but at least the wind was kept off of the tent, denied the opportunity to rip the tent out of the ground and deprive them of their only shelter.
The three days were very slow ones for Tarrin. When not trying to sleep, Sarraya instructed him more and more on Druidic magic. She taught him how to conjure water; it turned out that he had had the right idea when he tried himself. Had he not gotten distracted while making the attempt, it would have worked. She taught him more about conjuring many items, and taught him the techniques behind conjuring very large items.
But through it all, it was still just Conjuring. The core method of it did not change. All she taught him were the little differences and tricks necessary to make it more flexible.
"Well, that's it," Sarraya announced after Tarrin had conjured a stone about the size of a large dog. "I've taught you everything you need to know about Druidic magic. At least for now. We'll have to find something else to talk about from now on."
For some reason, this disappointed him. "That's it?" he demanded. "Sarraya, I've barely broken a sweat! I can learn more!"
"I know you can learn more," she affirmed. "But I'm not a good teacher. I'm not going to put your neck on the block, Tarrin. I've taught you what I feel comfortable teaching you, and I won't teach you any more. You know what you need to know to survive, and that's all I told you I was going to teach you."
For some reason, he was bitterly disappointed. Probably because he felt the same way about Druidic magic that he did about Sorcery when he first started. He was wildly curious, interested, and he wanted to learn everything there was to know about it. But he couldn't use his Sorcery without extensive preparation and help anymore, and there was nobody left to teach him anything. So all he had was Druidic magic. And now he couldn't learn any more of it, because Sarraya refused to train him.
"I'm not worried about learning from you, Sarraya," he nearly pleaded. "You've done a good job teaching me."
"If you only knew," she laughed ruefully. "Tarrin, I did a very bad job teaching you. I didn't do anything that I was supposed to do, and I more or less just let you go on your own. If Triana knew how I taught you, she'd rip off my wings. You know how to Conjure, and you know how to Summon. Because you know both of them, that means you automatically know how to Create-after all, Creation is just the Conjuring of something that doesn't exist. Why do you need to learn anything else right now? Just go with what you know for now, get a feel for the Druidic magic. And when we get out of the desert, when we get back to Triana, she can teach you anything else you may want to learn. Is asking you to wait such a bad thing?"