Jude had been about to admit the camels were maybe a bad idea, but Toy’s skyward glance and sulky pout had made Jude’s mouth snap shut. It had been like this from the start of the expedition — Jude’s suggestions were greeted with heavy sighs, and Toy’s best martyred expression until Jude backed down.
Well, not this time! The camels were staying, and Toy would just have to learn to live with the spit and the smell and the never-ending noise of jangly bells and huffing.
The camel herder was delighted. “They are good beasts!” he said through a giant smile, head bobbing up and down and eyes glued to the enormous stack of bills he cradled in his hands. ”They will give you many years of service.”
From the crest of the dune, the sand stretched for miles. A dry and dusty golden ocean in constant motion, and capped by a sky bleached by the heat of the sun. They’d been travelling south for just under two days, and they were surrounded by desert. The city they’d left behind, with its red sandstone temples and yellow pillars, could have been on the moon for all the traces they could see of it out here.
Toy wasn’t happy. His camel, he insisted, was staging a coup. He could see an evil twinkle in its eye. It had already passed along its fleas to his blanket, and now it was deliberately mistiming its step so that Toy was almost thrown from the saddle at unpredictable intervals. Also, it stank.
Jude couldn’t argue with the last. All the camels had a distinctive, and rather off-putting, odour. Still, they’d only had the camels for a few days. Perhaps they just needed a bit more time to get used to the smell.
—-
Hmm. Maybe worth a part two?
