As she did this,
she realized that one thing more was needful, to accomplish what must
be done.
She needed a tarp, and a woven blanket would not do. It must be
something strong and durable enough to serve it's purpose and not snag
on the weeds or rip open, that the burial should be fittingly
accomplished.
Looking up, her eyes fixed upon the leather door flap of her tent,
suspended across the opening.
Setting down the stone oil lamp, she reached up to one upper end of it
and tugged steadily while sawing at the thin strong threads of sinew
with a knife, until she popped the corner loose.
Ignoring the disapproving and contemptuous look of Borla as he watched,
and oblivious of the stares of the guards, and the Captains of Fifty
who had accompanied Borla to received their Orders of the Day, and the
Emperor himself, Si'Wren reached up to the lone dangling corner of the
tent flap for a fresh grip, and applied the knife to the binding
threads of sinew as she pulled steadily at it, until it also came loose
and dropped into her arms in a thin swirl of dried dust.
She folded the tent flap over and rolled up various items within it.
Then she went out resolutely to her horse, and tied the bundle behind
her saddle.
Then without so much as a backwards glance, she led the black stallion
to a nearby rock, which she climbed, and mounted, and turned and
galloped him across the compound toward the far perimeter of the camp,
with many a warrior's lusting eyes looking on as she rode out of camp
with the oil lamp in one hand.
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