…And so we left the oasis together, stepping once more into the endless desert, where the gods still waited with their trials.
At first there was only sand and wind, nothing more. Step by step we left behind the palms, their shadows vanishing into the horizon. Cleopatra walked beside me. Her movements were steady, though her body already carried the weight of fatigue. She was a daughter of the Pharaoh, used to silk and stone walls, not to endless dunes shifting like the sea.
Yet she did not complain. Her pride would not allow it.
"You know what I miss?" she said at last, her voice clear but quiet over the sand. "Music. In the palace there was always music—drums, chants, your flute. Here there is only wind."
I smiled faintly. "Even the wind has music. You just need to listen. When it breaks against the dunes, when it carries sand across the rocks… it has its rhythm. Even silence has melody, if you know how to hear it."
She turned her face toward me, her eyes alight. "You always hear more than others. Perhaps that is why my father trusts you more than priests or generals."
I gave no answer. The Pharaoh's trust was both gift and burden. In my heart I knew, if he ever saw all of me, perhaps even that trust would shatter.
We walked on. The sun climbed higher, its rays burning against the skin. Heat shimmered, making the desert itself seem to melt. Cleopatra wiped sweat from her brow, but her steps did not falter.
After a time she spoke again: "Mehet… back in the oasis, you told me about your family. I thought about it all night. And today I wonder… if you had stayed with them, would you have been happier?"
I stopped for a moment. Her words struck deeper than she knew. Then I moved on, eyes fixed on the horizon. "Perhaps. But then I would never have seen what I have seen. Nor met who I have met. Fate sometimes takes, to give something else."
She was silent, but I felt her gaze upon me.
The path grew harder. The sand changed—darker, firmer. The wind fell away to a faint whisper, as though holding its breath. I raised my hand, and she stopped.
"What is it?" she asked, her eyes searching ahead.
At first it looked like a stone in the middle of a dune. But stones do not breathe. This one did.
From the sand it rose, at first a shadow, then a shape, and then fully revealed. It was no man.
The body of a slender lion, but its skin shimmered with pearlescent scales instead of fur. Its tail ended in feathers that swayed in the wind like ribbons. From its brow grew two pale horns, smooth and gleaming like moonstone. And its eyes—glowing softly with golden light, not fierce but wise.
Cleopatra gasped. "Is it… real?"
"Some say," I whispered, "that such creatures guard the boundary between worlds. Others, that they are messengers of the gods. Few have ever seen one."
The beast did not move. It simply stood, watching us. The wind swirled differently around it, as if an invisible circle protected it.
Cleopatra took a step forward, entranced, but I caught her arm. "No. If this is a sign, it will come to us. We must not break the balance."
So we stood there. The desert itself seemed to hold its breath. Then the creature moved. Slowly, majestically, with steps that left no prints in the sand, it drew closer. Its eyes met mine, and I felt it probing me—not my body, but my mind, my heart.
Cleopatra pressed closer to me, whispering: "Do you feel it? As if it's looking right into our souls…"
I nodded, for I felt it too. Yet there was no hostility in that gaze. Only a test.
At last the creature raised its head to the sky and let out a sound—not a roar, not a hiss, but a deep, resonant hum, like an ancient song of the desert. Then, just as calmly as it had come, it turned and walked back into the sands. Its body dissolved into the shimmer of heat until it was gone.
For a long while, neither of us spoke.
"Mehet…" Cleopatra said at last, her eyes shining, "was it a sign that we are on the right path?"
"Perhaps," I answered. "Or a warning that we are not alone."
…Its body dissolved into the heat until it was gone.
For a long time we both stood in silence. The desert was quiet, as if it too held its breath.
I wanted to tell her that perhaps it had been only an illusion, a trick of weary eyes. But then I noticed something in the sand.
Where the creature had vanished, a feather lay. It glowed as though woven from the light of the moon. I bent down and picked it up. To the touch it was light as breath, yet in my palm it carried a weight no ordinary thing could bear.
I held it out to Cleopatra. Her fingers barely brushed it, and her eyes lit up. "It's a gift," she whispered.
"Or a sign," I said, though a tightness rose in my throat. "It will not vanish with the sand. The gods wanted us to know it was no vision."
Cleopatra pressed the feather to her chest, as if afraid it might fade away. Her breath quickened, her eyes shone like those of a child seeing the sea for the first time. In that moment I knew this—more than stories or lessons—would stay with her forever.
Then she looked at me, her face serious, yet calmer than before. "Mehet," she said softly, "tell me where we go now."
I adjusted my cloak, gazing at the horizon where the dunes stretched like endless waves of the sea. "To where the next trial awaits us. The gods are not finished."
She nodded, still clutching the feather, and stepped forward first. Her stride was firm, as if the sign itself had given her courage.
And so we moved on once more—two travelers in the heart of the desert, carrying within us more than anyone should ever know
We walked for a long time, until the sun rose high. Cleopatra still held the feather close to her chest. After a while, I noticed how her fingers kept stroking it, as if she feared it might vanish.
"Princess," I said after a time, "give it to me."
She stopped, clutching it tighter. "Why? It's mine," she said with a smile that carried both defiance and playfulness.
"I want you to keep it with you always," I answered. "But not like this. The feather is fragile, the wind could take it. Let me preserve it another way."
She hesitated, but obediently handed it to me. I sat down in the sand, pulled out a thin leather cord I carried, and began to work. Carefully, I tied it, fashioned a simple but sturdy casing from a scrap of cloth to shield it from the sand. I fixed it so it would hang as a pendant.
When I was finished, I looked up at her. "Lean down," I said.
She smiled in surprise. "What are you doing?"
"Giving you a gift," I replied simply.
She bent toward me, and I placed the amulet around her neck. The feather rested just below her throat, gleaming in the sunlight.
Her fingers touched it, and her eyes lit up. "Mehet…" she whispered, "you made it into an amulet?"
I nodded. "Now the wind cannot take it. Now it will go with you everywhere."
A smile appeared on her lips, unlike any I had seen in a long time—pure, joyful, free of the palace and its burdens. "It is the most beautiful gift I have ever received."
And I remained silent, for in my heart I felt that perhaps it was also a gift for me—the knowledge that I had given her something that would guard her, even if I could not.