A Cacti Conundrum

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Not swift enough

I think ruefully as I nimbly dance from ledge to boulder and hurry along narrow pathways carved in the stone. The trail winds almost entirely around the mesa as it descends and I pass into the much cooler air and deep shadow of the east facing slopes quickly. The air suddenly bites at my skin despite my clothes. I can see my breath as I exhale. I pick up my pace in order to escape the cold as quick as possible. I will have long enough in the cold crossing the valley floor and want to be on the west facing slopes before the sun has set all the way. I begin to feel frost crunching under my feet. The cold is setting in fast and I can hear the tinkling of my breath crystallizing and falling to the stones and feel the tiny shards bouncing off me as they fall. I am running through a frozen mist of my own breath.

I consider pausing to spin up another ward. One that will keep the air around me warm; but I know I will need it to cross the valley floor in the mounting dusk. The exertion of my hasty descent will keep me warm enough and I dare not waste more strength until I must. As deadly as the cold is there are creatures far more dangerous that lurk in the desert at night.

I am nearly at the foot of the mesa and clamber over a large boulder, some twenty feet tall, then burst out of the frigid shadows into the rapidly dissipating warmth of the suns final moments. I pause and soak in its heat and light, throwing my head back to look up the cliff face. I can see the ledge upon which I was perched hundreds of feet above. The towering rock bluff has spent all day soaking up the desert heat and I can feel it radiating out into the rapidly cooling air. The wind tugs at me again, trying to lift me and carry me up the mesa. This was the source of the hot blast I had felt at the top. A thermal updraft created by the vertical mass of rock. A phenomenon most pronounced as the surrounding air cools at sundown and the temperature difference is greatest. A great onrush comes racing at me across the valley with the last rays of light and smashes into the mesa before streaming upwards with the added warmth, carrying with it dust and various detritus from across the desert basin. I turn my back to the onslaught and rely on my hide cloak to shield me so I can watch the red gold warmth crawl up the slab of stone until they reach it's peak and it filters, sparkling here and there, through the dust cloud high above. Then it is gone.

True night has fallen in the basin and already I am shivering. Mere moments have passed. I huddle closer to the bottom of the cliff and begin the preparations for my ward. I will need it.

I reach down and grab a handful of dust. I don't need it to spin the ward... But it will make maintaining the spell much easier for the trek across the valley. I grab another handful. Taking a wide stance, closing my eyes and focusing on my breathing I begin the smooth cyclic motions and circles around me and above me to cast the dust into the air, releasing it from each hand in a slow trickle as I do. I can feel the dust cloud forming around me as I enter a meditative trance and channel my breath and my will. I sense the growing cloud cease to billow and fall and instead to coalesce into a thin band, held in place by the pressure of my will and my breath. I increase the speed of my motions, whipping the remaining dust into the encapsuling globe. With a final mental push and exhalation of air I snap out of my meditation and cease my motions. My eyes snap open.

I can see it, barely, surrounding me on all sides. Not much to see... It is just a band of dust and air after all. The dust is only to help me focus on it, to hold it. I start walking away from the imposing structure of the mesa and begin my descent into the basin proper. What I've accomplished is a slice of dead air surrounding and separating me from the cold. The air within it is heated by me, my body heat, my movement, and most importantly, my breath. This little bubble of heat is insulated from the cold outside by the layer of dust filled air, which I am mentally preventing from mingling and circulating with the wider environment. That's why I want the dust... It is easy to lose focus and forget where the edge of my barrier is. The ward would fall apart in an instant if I do. I travel much more slowly than I did descending from the cliff.

Worse. I have to maintain my trancelike breathing in order to hold the barrier in place from the inside. Split Focus, the Librarian's call it. The ability to simultaneously hold two Disciplines in focus is rare, and the reason I have spent the last six months learning with them. Occasionally I allow some small eddy of icy air to penetrate and replenish the stale air that is keeping me warm. This ward is one of my own design. One of the Librarians would have stayed warm with a spirit fire or used their breath or body or mind alone to defeat the cold. I am learning to do things their way and master the Disciplines individually but I know that this ward works. It is not the first time I have crossed the desert alone at night.

My slow pace and quiet movements help to avoid some of the many other dangers the dark landscape holds. As I walk it is transforming. Everything glistens with frost in the silvery light of the first stars. The sky is completely clear, and brightens with each passing step. I reach the bottom of the gentle slope and the world is illuminated nearly as brightly as it was under the sun. Looking back at my perch I can see dark shapes circling in the cold sky above the bluff, using the very last of the days heat to climb towards the stars that suddenly seem infinite above.

Those shapes circling worry me. I set out across the basin, increasing my pace now that I am further from the Mesa and on flat ground. Holding the dual barriers of the ward is draining, but I can hold them. And I am warm. I pass a small group of cacti, their spines enormous and elongated and rimed with ice that spurted out from their storage gourds as they expanded and froze in minutes. Good thing I was not nearby as they did. Cacti in the desert often froze rapidly enough to fire off their spines as projectiles, the enormous pressure of expanding water turning to ice is enough to rupture them and launch spines and plumes of water in all directions. I trek on.

I see a plume of icy mist rising in the distance ahead of me but everything around is barren, frozen wasteland. There aren't even any cacti in view. I take the opportunity to increase my pace again. I start to sweat. Even exchanging air periodically my ward is making me very warm, and now I am running across the basin under the stars. The ward is steady. I look back at the Mesa over my shoulder, the black shapes are still circling above it. Good. I keep up my rapid pace until I can see the next stand of frozen cacti loom into the starlight. This one is a much bigger stand. The cacti are enormous. And ancient. The Librarians call them the frozen fathers of the basin. There are only a few stands of them left full grown, the rest of the cacti in the desert are either other species or too young. This particular stand is used as a marker when crossing to the Library. It is known to be somewhat safe at night. But it is easy to get lost amongst the ice and plants and thorns so I slow my run as I approach and walk calmly into the shadows of the enormous plants, ducking and dodging frozen icicles and the enormous two foot long spines that jut from their sides.