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directions set out by the Song of Rausi precisely: he had set his course by the stars, and so was she. She knew she was retracing his stepscorrectly. And if you do not reach Abi’Abadshar before the sun sets again, Shadow will not need to touch the Nalzindar, for there will be no Nalzindar left between Sand and Star.
    But as the moon reached midheaven, the lead shotor raised its head, pulling its guide-rope from Shaiara’s lax grasp. Its nostrils flared wide, and it began shuffling forward with renewed energy, the exhausted plodding gait of the last several days exchanged for a sudden desire to arrive at its destination quickly.
    There was only one thing that could so galvanize a thirsty, exhausted, half-starved shotor.
    Water.
    Shaiara grabbed the guide-rope again and wrapped it firmly around her hand, hauling the shotor to a stop and tapping the animal on the knee so that it would kneel to allow her to mount. The other animals smelled the water too, now, jostling and fretting as the Nalzindar coaxed them to their knees. They’d been leading the beasts to spare their strength, using them to carry the hawks and the hounds and the youngest children, but now there was no more need.
    Once mounted, the tribe rode in ghostly silence beneath the desert moon. Their few remaining pack-animals, more lightly laden than those bearing riders, raced on ahead. There was no need to lead them—they would go nowhere other than to the nearest water.
    The moon had crossed very little more of the sky when Shaiara saw it. From a distance, the black shapes looked like nothing more than wind-worn stone. But there was grass growing around the edges of the stone, and she could see the large pale shapes of Nalzindar shotors browsing upon it.
    They had reached Abi’Abadshar.
    The Nalzindar allowed the shotors to lead them to the water. The Iteru was the largest Shaiara had ever seen, standing at the center of what was—now—an open courtyard, though surely it must once have been far beneath the ground, for it was reached by descending a long series of shallow terraces carved out of the ground.
    The Iteru itself was a wonder, for here, in the depths of the Barahileth, it was open to the sky, allowing the wind to steal its moisture as it pleased. Yet the water seemed inexhaustible.
    The thirsty shotors crowded forward, bleating and jostling in their attempts to get to the water, and the ikulas -hounds snarled and quarreled, pushing between them, their narrow bodies gaunt with privation. The Nalzindar shouldered through them, plunging waterskins and cups into the water to fill them, and passing them among the people. All the tribe drank carefully after so many days of privation, but no matter how much water they drew from the Iteru of Abi’Abadshar, its level did not drop.
    At last, the thirst of all was slaked, and every waterskin was refilled, and the shotors were unpacked and unsaddled, hobbled and set to graze. For the first time since she had led her people upon this exodus, Shaiara’s spirits rose. Grass meant something to feed upon it, for the Isvai wasted nothing. And there would be things to feed upon the feeders as well. Though she had long suspected that they would be forced to slay all of their shotor -herd—not only for meat, but because there would be nothing to feed them upon here in the arid waste—it might be possible to delay that time a little longer. And more than that, now that the way to Abi’Abadshar was known, hunters could return to the Isvai to seek food, so long as they carried enough water for the return journey.
    “You have led us to safety, Shaiara,” Kamar said.
    “That is as Sand and Star will it,” she answered absently. There were too many questions that must still be answered before she could know whether Abi’Abadshar represented true safety.
    Without sand in which to anchor the tent-poles, it was not possible to erect their one remaining tent here beside the well, but Shaiara did not wish to pitch it