He woke face down in the sand.No memory. No name. Only the burn of daylight pressing against his back like a punishment. The world around him was empty an ocean of pale dunes, shifting and sighing under a breathless sky. For a moment, he did not move. He wasn't sure if he had the right to ,"Get up" The voice came from nowhere and It held no anger, no warmth Just fact, He pushed himself onto his hands, Grains of sand clung to his skin, as if the earth itself tried to claim him. His breath trembled, not from fear, but from the strange weight in his chest emptiness?loneliness? perhaps it is indeed fear? ,whatever it is felt so heavy it almost solid.
Before him stood a horse a Dark one the first question that popped in his mind is "is he friendly", he is standing still ,Waiting. Its eyes held no recognition, yet no threat. It was neither guardian nor beast just a presence. He didn't know its name. He wasn't sure if it had one. He wasn't sure anything had a name here. He tried to remember how he had arrived A road? A village? A face? Nothing. His mind stretched backward and touched only fog. "You ran", the voice said, flat and cold."You always run". He closed his eyes ,The words stirred something. Run from what? From whom? There had to be a reason. Men do not wake in deserts by accident and they certainly dont just run away without reason or atleast a known direction
The man stood, legs unsteady, hands shaking though the air was still. Heat yawned across the horizon, bending the dunes like molten glass. Far off, mirages shimmered cities that were never built, rivers that never flowed. Was he alive? Or had he already been judged? or maybe the judgment begins now ,His throat tightened. He reached his hand toward the horse, slow and unsure. It did not move. Its breath was calm, deep, patient more human than his own. He opened his mouth, but no words came. He did not know what language belonged to him." Say nothing", the voice murmured. you knew immediately that words will not help you here. He placed his hand on the horse's flank the warmth beneath its skin steadied him. For reasons he could not name, this creature did not feel foreign. It felt… inevitable. His eyes scanned the horizon. There were no tracks behind him. No footprints. No proof he had come from anywhere at all. There is nothing to return to. The horse lowered itself, allowing him to mount. He hesitated. He had no destination. No purpose. No past. But he had motion.
He climbed onto its back. The saddle was worn, though he did not remember owning it. The leather creaked softly as he settled. The horse moved forward without command, as if it knew the route he could not choose. Sand shifted beneath hooves. Wind dragged across the dunes like a dull blade. Minutes, hours time dissolved the man had no sense of time or direction anymore , just relying on the creature he was riding and the coldvoice guiding him. The sun did not move. Or perhaps it moved too slowly to care,His mind whispered fragments, half-born thoughts: Who was I? Did I choose this? Am I being led… or taken? The voice replied, calm as ever: "You wanted silence. This is silence. You wanted to disappear. This is disappearance". His breath trembled. The horizon pulsed with heat. The world felt endless, merciless, nameless just like him and that horse he was riding . A flicker of fear and doubt crept in wondering What if there was nothing to find? What if he had come here not to seek himself… …but to bury himself? The horse walked on. Sand whispered questions around them and carrying no answers.
The horse walked in silence, hooves pressing into the sand like a slow heartbeat. The horizon, once empty now revealed something unexpected a cluster of decaying mud walls, half sunken half standing. An abandoned village. No wind passed through it. No birds dared rest on its broken roofs, it sat in the desert like a question no one wished to ask. He pulled the reins, not to stop the horse, but as if to remind himself he was still holding them. "You recognize it." The voice moved through him he replied quietly,"I've never been here" "You have Just not with your eyes" The horse stepped forward on its own as if it had seen this place before.
The village's entrance was marked by a single leaning archway half the stone had crumbled leaving only the memory of an entrance, he passed beneath it though he did not lower his head there was nothing left standing tall enough to demand respect ,the streets were narrow cottages pressed together like secrets, wooden doors hung open not broken but left deserted in haste.
A clay jar lay shattered its pieces arranged as though someone once meant to return and fix it but there was No footprints nor any signs of life,Yet he sensed he was being watched but by who he wondered an entity? a human? impossible right? or maybe it was that stoic cold voice following him around.
He dismounted slowly though the horse did not move or flinch it stood like a sentinel as it always did waiting for him to understand something he refused to name he looked around "What is this place?" he whispered. "Where you stopped speaking" the voice said. He walked between the ruins each house represented an unsent letter he peered through open doorways inside, everything felt arranged for someone who never arrived a table with a single wooden bowl A mat rolled in a corner,walls scratched with symbols he almost understood but didn't suggesting he wasn't ready for the truth just yet, His chest tightened He remembered nothing.
Yet his steps moved with caution, like he was trespassing into something sacred "Why did they leave?" he asked. "They waited" "For who?" he asked again "For you." the voice answered, it feels like the voice had every answer already but not planning on revealing everything yet .
The man entered what might have once been a communal square there was a dry well in the center , a rim cracked but intact beside it stood a tree, or what remained of one ;it was pale and lifeless, he approached the well looked inside and there was only darkness staring back at him "You want to see the bottom" the voice murmured the man leaned forward but only slightly "There is no bottom" "No, Just what you refused to drown" he stepped back, a door creaked behind him he turned sharply though no one was there only a house, its door swaying on a single hinge ,he approached and Pushed it gently.
Inside was a single room , empty except for one thing a chair facing the wall, on that wall etched deeply into the clay were five words: "I was here I waited." His throat tightened. He did not remember writing it."You knew this place" the voice whispered. "No," he said, but too quickly. "You built it." the man sat on the chair it did not creak as if it had been waiting for him alone.
He stared at the wall. "Who did I wait for?" he asked.Silence "Who?" he repeated, harsher , but there was only silence again , night was beginning to crawl across the sky, carving new shadows out of old ones. The horse stood at the square's edge, standing still, its black eyes fixed on him .Not urging. Not judging. Just being. He stood from the chair. "There's nothing here." with he left and didn't look back even though he felt like he should.
He walked back through the village, not looking into doorways this time. Every entrance felt like a memory he didn't want to enter ,at the archway, he paused. "If I built this" he asked slowly, "why did I abandon it?" "You chose silence." the voice replied "Silence from what?" ,The voice paused and for the first time, it sounded almost… mournful. "From the part of you that still believed in something" He clenched the reins. His fingers trembled without his permission.
He mounted the horse, behind him the village stood perfectly still no wind blew sand against it no walls crumbled it would remain, untouched, until he returned if he ever did.
As the horse carried him into the dunes, he did not look back. "Did you find what you left?" the voice asked. He did not answer he felt like the silence was the right answer for this question ,the night swallowed them only one sound remained not the horse's hooves, notthe desert wind, but his own breath… steady, controlled, almost lifeless. And somewhere far behind him… …a door creaked closed