The Honoured One

"I am sorry, honoured one," one of the men says. "It was just to make it less likely that a movement in your sleep might cause you to fall off the ant-horse." Evidently that's their name for the giant insect, whose presence tells me that I am clearly not in my own reality.

They untie me, and I carefully manoeuvre myself until I am sitting upright on the ant-horse's back. As it isn't moving very fast, I find it easy to keep my balance.

"How far is it to your settlement?" I ask. As the three men are walking rather than mounted on ant-horses, I assume that it's unlikely to be that far.

1. "We will reach it before dawn."
2. "It is seven raki from here." I am left none the wiser. I assume that the raki must be their unit of distance.
3. I never get a reply, as at that moment one of the men shouts: "Bandits!" He is pointing at a group who have just come into sight over a dune.
4. "It's just ahead. Look, you can see it now."

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