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Orestes closes his eyes against the flurry of sand whipped into his face.
Today, the desert is discontent. It does not want him in it. It does not want anyone in it.
He feels like a trespasser in his own land. The sun bakes him. The heat comes off the earth in transparent waves.
And yet—each brusque touch of autumn wind chills him to the bone. Perhaps it is not only that. Perhaps it is something else,
such as the way the sun does not quite warm his flesh, and the blue above him is so bright it is condemning. Perhaps it is the way the angry whispers of the sand seem accusatory; enflamed; if he stands too long in one place, they shift over-foot, they lash his legs, they pull at him. As if ready to bury him alive.
An angry desert.
He thinks for a moment that other gods show their discontent with the mortal realm through disappearance or apathy. But Solis shows it with his brilliant present; he shows it in the way he burns as Orestes crests a dune, glowing and confused, looking this way and that.
That is when he sees the bull. In other light, the pure black colour of the silhouette would have been ominous. But here, in the desert, it cannot withstand the assault of sunshine and gold.
Orestes runs. The wind buffets his face; the figure dips from his vision as he slides down the dune and up the opposite side, again and again, until only one valley of sand separates them. He says, “El Rey.”
The executioner.
@El Rey / speaks / notes: text text
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