I looked left, following the line of fallen hillside. And found the chimney.

Beit al'Shahar.

It had collapsed, breaking apart into sections. You could still see the suggestion of the columnar formation here and there, but it no longer existed as a true chimney. Del and I had not left it that way. Something more had happened.

Something powerful enough to open the way for an underground spring.

I tapped the stud back into motion and rode on. We passed the tumbled pile of slab-sided rock sections that gave birth to the stream, still following wagon ruts. Here we traded stony ground for soil, the first sparse scatterings of grass. Ahead, vegetation sprang up along the stream's meandering sides: reeds, shrubbery, thick mossy growths. Grass increased. The canyon widened. Thin, infant trees stood no higher than my knees.Oasis. Sheltered by canyon walls, with access to water, it was cooler here, shaded, with grazing and fertile soil.

"It was nothing like this," Del murmured.

Nayyib raised his voice. "Someone's farming here."

Indeed, someone was. The spring fed narrow, manmade ditches dug to water patches of fields and gardens, set apart from one another by low walls built of stones no doubt hacked out of the soil. We left behind wilderness and entered a private paradise.

"There," Nayyib said.

There, indeed. A scattering of flimsy pens held sheep and goats. A small pole corral contained a handful of horses. They had already smelled our mounts; now that we were in sight, all came trotting over to the fence rails to offer interested greetings. The stud stuck his head high in the air and commenced snorts of elaborate superiority, stiffened tail swishing viciously.

Behind me, Del's gelding pealed out a whinny.

"Look," she called. "They've built houses against the walls."

Low, squared, small houses built of adobe brick, surfaces hand-smoothed, with poles laid side-by-side and lashed together for roofs, chinked with mud to keep the rain and wind out. Un-painted, the dwellings were the color of the clay mud from which they were built: rich tan with an undertone of red. They blended into the canyon walls.

Faces appeared in wide-silled windows. Then the bodies took residence in the open doorways. Wagon ruts continued along the stream, fronting the dooryards of mudbrick homes standing cheek-by-jowl. Chickens had free run of the place, pecking in the dirt around the houses, pens, and corral.

"Sandtiger! Sandtiger!" A man emerged from one of the little houses. He came pelting down the ruts, brown burnous flapping, turban bouncing on his head.

"Mehmet!" Del exclaimed.

I grinned. "And his aketni."

"Sandtiger! May the sun shine on your head!" Mehmet arrived, dark eyes alight. At once he dropped to his knees, bowed his head, slapped the earth with the flat of his hand, then drew a smudged stripe across his Desert-dark forehead.

"Oh, stop that," I said. "You know how I hate it."

He sat back on his heels, enthusiasm undimmed. "Jhihadi," he breathed. And then he sprang up and began shouting in a dialect spilling so quickly from his mouth that I could only catch a third of what he said.

"Jhihadi?" Nayyib asked dubiously.

I arched supercilious brows. "Didn't you know? I've been declared a messiah. I'm even worshiped by—" I paused. "—however many people remain in Mehmet's aketni."

"Aketni?"

"His little tribe. An offshoot of his original tribe. Apparently not everyone wants to worship me."

"And the Vashni," Del put in. "Remember?"

Nayyib's expression was odd. "This is a joke."

I sighed. "No, actually, it's not. Though it certainly feels like one to me."

"You're a messiah?"

"I'm not a messiah. They just think I'm a messiah."

"My brother said you were," Del remarked.

Nayyib was totally lost. "Your brother said Tiger was a messiah?"

"It's complicated," I explained.

"A messiah?" he repeated.

I made a dismissive gesture. "Don't worry, it's not true."

"You're a legendary sword-dancer, the grandson of a wealthy Skandic matriarch, a mage—and a messiah?"

"A man of many parts," Del told him. "That's what the prophecy says."

I knew she was taking great joy in this, despite her bland expression. I shot her a quelling look. "Look, I have no control over what people say or think. Or that my grandmother is wealthy and powerful, or that I'm stuck with whatever this magic is inside me. What I know is that I'm a sword-dancer. That's good enough for me."

Neesha's expression was indescribable. Del took pity on him.

"We rescued them," she explained. "They'd been led into nowhere by unscrupulous guides, robbed, and left to die. Tiger and I found them, helped them."

Neesha's brows rode high on his forehead. "So they declared Tiger a messiah?"

"Not exactly." Del seemed to realize no explanation could sound reasonable. "But they worship the jhihadi, and they think Tiger fits."

"Why are they here?" Neesha asked.

"Because this is Beit al'Shahar," I answered crossly, knowing the whole thing sounded ludicrous, "and this is where I led them." I paused. "Supposedly."

Mehmet was waving his people out of their little homes. I saw the old women swathed in veils and robes, gray braids dangling from beneath head coverings, but also a few younger men and women and even a handful of children. Mehmet's aketni had increased in size since we'd last come across the tiny caravan.

Everyone gathered around, falling into a semicircle. All eyes were fastened on me, staring avidly. Mehmet stood in front of them, eyes alight with pride.

"We have done as you wished," he announced.

Since I didn't know what he was talking about, I prevaricated. "And you've done it well, Mehmet."

An outflung hand encompassed stream, ditches, grass, pens, corral, fields and gardens, and the small, square adobe houses huddled against the canyon walls. "We have turned the sand to grass!"

Ah, yes. The infamous prophecy.

And then I realized it was true.

Del, behind me, began to laugh.

Nayyib muttered, "I don't believe any of this."

Mehmet was exceedingly proud to know the jhihadi personally. After everyone had offered deep obeisances, he sent them all away to begin preparations for an evening feast. In the meantime, he offered us the hospitality of his own "unworthy house." He and his wife would sleep in the front room, while Del and I were gifted with the tiny bedroom.

He tripped a little over what to do with Nayyib, until the kid said he'd be perfectly happy sleeping outside near the water, if that was all right. He even added he was unworthy to be under the same roof as a messiah, which earned him a scowl from me and a snicker from Del.

"When did you get married?" I asked Mehmet. "And where did you find a wife?" The first time we'd met, Mehmet had been the only young male left in his aketni, which was comprised of old women and one old man, who'd later died. There was no one to marry in his own small tribe.

"I found my wife in Julah," he said proudly. "A caravan came through and stayed a few days. I went out to their encampment to welcome them, and I preached the prophecy of the jhihadi. A few of them decided to stay on and serve. Yasmah was one." His joy was infectious. "Now, come—these men will take your horses and make them comfortable."

I decided against protesting the preaching part for the moment. Certainly the sand had been changed to grass, at least right here; when we'd left it was desert, if not the sere harshness of the Punja and its immediate vicinity. But I rather had my own idea about what had caused the change.

Mehmet bowed us into his house, whereupon he presented us to his wife. She was a small, slight, black-eyed woman wrapped in robes and veils, quite shy, unwilling to meet my eyes at all. The gods only knew what Mehmet had been telling her about his jhihadi.