Ice-Sand and Glass

Windswept grains of coarse blue-black sand pelted Liam's layered bung-bison pelt coat and thick scarf. Granules rained horizontally on the goggles he inherited from Elder uncle Myro. The straps had been recut from cured hide, but the glass was too old to put a number to it. Countless family members had worn it, until death or retirement.

“Oye! Why are you out here? This is my section!” That voice; Dirk Skymark was working the ice-sands too. Of course, he was.

“Sand doesn't have sections Skymark. Just as how the sky doesn't have marks, but here you still are.” Liam imagined Dirk scowling under the layers of bison pelt, thick scarf and goggles as he shook his head.

“Greetings in the name of the givers of glass, Zlag. At least my initials don't announce how much of a vagabond I am.” Muffled laughter vibrated beneath both scarf masks as the two turned to survey the dark, granular sea.

“Greetings, Dirk. How's your catch so far?”

“We should get enough meat for a fortnight with what I have so far. I found a wide one, big enough to boil water for a household all at once. Besides that, I've found a dozen regular sized catch too.” It was Liam's turn to scowl; he'd found seventeen regular sized pieces. Each one enough to boil one or two drinks of water for one person, but nothing nearly so large.

“You’ve gotten good use out of your trowel today. I'm surprised you're not heading back with such a haul.” Liam said, motioning to the metal tipped stone trowel which hung from Dirk’s waist. Dirk had likely inherited the trowel the same way Liam had inherited his. It was one of the few things not made from wood or animal parts that anyone from the oasis owned.

“Not so! I'm not LZ remember, besides, if I can fill the backpack, we have meat for closer to three weeks. Catch has been sparse for us. We needed this.” Liam nodded and adjusted his goggles until that they fit snugly. He'd have to bore another hole in the strap, it was still too loose. It had to be tight enough to leave a mark around his forehead.

“Same for us.”

Tugging the scarf and coat tighter to ensure no part of his body was exposed, he crested the slip face of the latest dune to rise before them.

Endless, unmoving waves of blue-black sand flowed towards the horizon. Hills, valleys, plateaus, and even mountains to the east stood in shadowy relief against the cloudless sky. Even as the heat roared its hunger from above, the sand remained almost icy.

“I hope you catch a big one too!” Liam scowled again but nodded over his shoulder.

“One large catch is already a miracle.” Dirk let out an awkward half-laugh and patted him on the shoulder.

Stretching from just above his nape to the back of his knees was the glass catcher backpack. It was only half full. With the sun not yet at midday position, he still had ample time to scour the sand for the glint of glass that would signal a new bit of treasure. He shifted the backpack and nudged with his elbow to make sure it wasn't jingling. Broken containers were still precious glass, but much less so. Satisfied he had the right balance of ice-sand and glass in his pack, he kept trudging, with Dirk close behind.

Liam slid down the windward side of the dune with his spread-boots. With oval-shaped soles three times the size of his actual feet, they provided surface area that kept him from sinking into the loosely packed desert. He had checked the soles four times at Myro's instruction.

“Don't let the ice-sand get on you. A few grains were all it took to take many glass-catchers from their families.” Myro's fierce hazel gaze was almost as cold as the sand beneath Liam's feet. He shivered and kept hoisting and dropping one foot after the other, keeping his steps long and narrow, walking a straight line the way Myro had taught him.

“Blasted ice-sand. Yes, uncle Myro, I know, I've been doing this long enough.” He had replied, but the thought of sand grains sticking to his arm or face and ripping the heat from his body made him shudder.

Four hours later, the sun was no longer directly above and any semblance of heat was lost to the sands. It wasn't unbearable, but Liam kept flexing his fingers and rotating his neck to keep them from going stiff. His backpack weighed enough to put him at ease, but one look at Dirk made him want to push further into the sands.

“We'll have to turn back soon,” he grumbled, more for himself than Dirk, who was now resting more than excavating. Liam had seen him top off the last vestige of space in his pack with a container which barely fit with the necessary sand and would have broken if the backpack didn’t have multiple expandable compartments.

“Let's crest one more dune and then go back.” Flexing his ankles, Liam started walking after Dirk got to his feet.

“Sounds reasonable to me. I wish I could leave the pack here.”

“It's so heavy,” they said in unison, Liam rolling his eyes while Dirk bent his back under the pack. Liam’s thoughts drifted back to uncle Myro leaning on his walking stick while staring at the empty cupboards and water casks in the family home.

“I know Skymark. You're the luckiest catcher. Let’s just go.”

With the sun to their left, they could see further right than many catchers dared venture. Amidst a veil of frost rising from the desert, a dark spot among the sand made Liam squint and shield his eyes.

“Skymark, look over that way.” He said, pointing with his excavation stick.

“What's that dark spot in the sand?”

“The whole thing is dark, Zlag. What do you mean?”

“There's a circular dark spot a few hundred strides in that direction. Just look.” Dirk squinted, stooped and jutted his head forward, then cleaned his goggles with a rag from a concealed pocket and looked agin.

“Oh, I see it. Yeah.”

“Let's go see what it is.”

“It might be a sand monster.”

“Oh, come on," Liam said, hastening his steps. Uncle Myro’s big catch had fed the family for months and bought them a respectable house.

“Have you ever seen a sand monster, are you a child? Are you scared?”

“I prefer to never see one, thanks. And yeah, I am scared. Oye! Wait!” Liam was a dozen steps ahead and gaining momentum. Dirk threw his hands into the air and lumbered after him. Liam grinned and sped up. Taking care not to start running.

“This might be my miracle.” he said under his breath, looking over his shoulder to make sure Dirk was following.

Twenty minutes later, Liam stood, jaw loose and eyes wide. A hole ran across the ground and up the slip face of a wide dune not much taller than a man. It was pitch black in the hole, except for scattered glints of what had to be glass. No sound came from inside. It contrasted the howling wind around him and made him quiver.

“I'm going in,” he said as soon as Dirk caught up.

“That looks like a sand monster's mouth. You're going to get eaten.”

“You've never seen a sand monster, and mouths don't look like this.”

“They do when food is this close and about to offer themselves for supper.” Liam chuckled and stepped forward, his joints rigid and his eyes darting in all directions.

“Have you always been this much of a coward?” Dirk kicked at the sand with his feet and let his head hang.

The gradual descent into the entrance forced Liam to use his stick as a cane and his trowel as an extension of his hand to dig into the walls of the hole.

The dark wrapped itself around him like another layer of pelt, until silence made him slightly dizzy. Before him lay undistributed sand and, in it, the prize.

“Oye! Are you digging? Great glass! At least you found something before you get swallowed.” Dirk remarked from just outside the entrance. He was still kicking sand.

Getting to his knees, Liam moved sand with his trowel until enough of the glass came into view. He gripped it with the hook-like excavation stick. It wouldn't budge. After five more minutes of shoveling sand, careful to avoid getting any on his gloved and pelt wrapped hands, Liam stumbled backwards and almost fell back on his rear.

“Skymark! I don't think I can carry this! Come down. I haven't been eaten.”

“That's what the monster wants you to think! It's just waiting until the real meal joins the appetizer.” Liam chuckled despite himself and laughed until he had to brace himself on the stick to keep from falling over.

“Just get down here, Uncle Myro would end you if you went back without me.” Dirk released an exaggerated groan and edged his way down to Liam, a half step at a time.

“What? Oye that's! That can't be a glass pot, is it? It's too big.”

“I know! Well, I don't know, actually. But it's shiny and see-through like glass.”

“We'd both have to carry this between us like furniture or something.” The object before them was wider than either of their wing spans and came all the way up to Liam's waist.

“We have to mark the place and come back. This is something special.” Dirk said, backing away toward the entrance.

“How would we find this place again? We have to take the container now.”

“Liam, we cannot lift something this big all the way to the oasis. Nightfall would come before we got half-way.”

“We can empty our packs, lighten our weight.”

“You just want me to give up my containers.”

“Great glass, Dirk! Look at this thing! No other container matters.”

“I'm leaving Liam, I'm sorry, but there's only so much time left until nightfall.”

“I'm bringing this home, even if I have to drag and pull it all the way. You are a fool. Nightfall won't kill me.” Liam could already taste all the water they’d be able to afford.

“I'm leaving you here, Zlag. This is not a good idea.”

“Fine, please tell uncle Myro my direction, I'll be making my way back with this.”

“You're crazy.”

“Do you have rope?” Dirk groaned and tugged it from his pack. Liam nodded, tied it to his rope, looped it around the massive container and heaved and stomped his way back to the mouth of the hole. Shaking his head, Dirk pushed from behind.

“It's not very heavy at least.” He said after they had covered a sizable distance in ten minutes.

They dragged the large pot up and over dune after dune until the horizon consumed half the sun and filled the sky with dazzling oranges and reds, which stood in stark contrast to the glistening indigo of the ice-sand.

"We're almost there, Dirk. Why'd you stop pulling." They had traded roles a few times, and now Liam was pushing. Dirk shielded his goggles and peered in the direction of the sunset.

“I have to go, Liam. I stayed longer than I should have, I'm sorry, friend.” His voice low.

“Dirk, calm down, we're almost…”

“Do you know how my sisters died? Do you know whose goggles and trowel I inherited?” Dirk said, still staring at the sunset. Liam bit his lips and hung his head.

“I’m sorry Dirk”

"No, you don't know because the leaders forbid us from talking about it. I'm going now. I don't care whether you come with me or not.” He took off at a run. Grunting, Liam looped the rope around his shoulders and took one step, winced at the skin bruising under his clothes, then took another step.

“It's okay, Dirk,” He thought. “I'll see you later.”

Relentlessly, Liam dragged the pot until the light of the sun no longer kept him company. He was close enough now to the oasis that, had there been more light, he'd have been able to see the palm fronds above the last wall of dunes that he needed to cross.

"Almost." he said out loud, then immediately regretted the coughing fit that followed.

A shrill howl caused him to stop mid-step and almost choke on his cough.

Trembling, he pulled the trowel from his waist and brandished it like a knife. He'd only ever used a knife to cut pelts and meat.

“Catching glass doesn't require a weapon. Come back before dark, and you have no need for one.” Liam had written off sand monsters as a way to keep catchers from staying until nightfall and getting lost.

“But that sound…” Liam thought of Dirk and the tremor in his voice before he had run off. The howl came again. It wasn't very loud, but Liam’s bones quaked. Nowhere behind or on either side of him seemed to hold anything but sand. And before him, was home.

“I don't even know what a sand monster looks like. They could be this same ugly sand colour.”

Liam gripped the trowel tighter and marched on as fast as his cargo would allow. Deciding that looking around was slowing him down, he willed his head to stay pointed in the direction he knew the oasis to be. He hummed all the campfire songs he knew, loud enough so that he barely heard the continuous howls. Or rather, he told himself that he barely heard them.

His muscles ached, his heartbeat pounded in his ear and his chest was so tight.

He was on the ground. Containers crunched inside his backpack. He was being dragged by his left leg. Away from the oasis. Away from the big catch.

Liam bellowed and wailed and whacked at whatever yanking his leg with his excavating stick until at last his leg was free. He yelped and pulled back his hands as the stick was ripped from them and flung out of sight. He was being dragged once more.

Sand wormed its way into his palms as he clutched at it to stop himself being pulled away. His fingers would go numb shortly. He bumped and bounced over the uneven desert surface. His head jerked like fruit not ripe enough to be picked. Grimacing at the tearing in his calf and ankle, he gritted his teeth and rolled in the direction he was being pulled. Acrid breath made its way through his loosened scarf. The guttural snarl that followed made his stomach lurch.

Flinging his right side in the direction of the breathing and snarling, he slammed the trowel down but plunged into the sand. His goggles had misted from his jagged breathing.

He was being pulled again, this time by his left hand. All he could see were hazy shadows. Squeezing the trowel until his knuckles burned, he swung towards his left side and was rewarded with a gurgling wail. Liam lifted and slammed the towel down four more times until his hand was released. The fifth stab sank into muddy sand.

Panting, he tried to stand but was resigned to creeping on his hands and knees. He tucked the sticky trowel under his left arm and stuffed a cloth into his goggles to clean them. His scarf was in tatters, his left hand was useless, and his left leg was dead weight. The glint of the large pot guided him back to his path, and it was now dark enough that lights from the oasis made the palms stand in contrast against the night sky.

New howls rose from behind the dunes and shattered the weak smile he'd mustered on seeing the pot intact.

There was more than one howl. At least three.

“Maybe I should've followed Dirk.”

Finally, back beside his prize, Liam slumped against it, chest heaving. His eyelids drooped, and his limbs were heavier than his backpack had been before all the glass shattered. Remnants of the pack clung to the shards flickered in and out of view from the faint light reaching him from the oasis. A new round of howls jolted him awake. Louder than before and definitely more than three distinct voices. Liam considered standing, but a violent shudder wracked his body as pain splintered from his head, arm and leg.

“That’s okay, I’m sure sand monsters don’t eat glass? Right, Dirk? Uncle Myro can collect the pot at sunrise and buy water for everyone.” Liam slipped into a half-sleep, only to be jolted awake by louder howls.

A few of the glass shards embedded in the sand now glowed a warm orange. More and more of them becoming visible with each moment.

"Liam! Liam? LIAM!" Tears slipped from Liam's eyes at the sound of Myro's voice. Echoing his uncle's call were more familiar voices carrying even more glass, illuminating torches.

The howling took on a deeper tone, then receded. Liam's chest heaved and his body sagged. He wanted to call back to uncle Myro. His mouth wouldn't open. His eyes had shut as well. The trowel slid from under his arm and fell beside blackened fingers peeking out from shredded pelt gloves.

"Stubborn, stubborn, stubborn." Myro's voice echoed into his bones. He forced open one and hoped he was grinning.

"You'd have done the same. Greetings in the name of the givers of glass."