The Merchant

Table of Contents

The merchant had traveled the desert many times, and he thought himself safe. His camel was strong, his pack full, and the night sky familiar. The air was cool, and the road lay clear under the stars. But then he saw the light.

It glimmered ahead. Steady, warm, like a lantern swinging gently in a hand. His heart lifted. Perhaps another traveler, or a caravan he could join. The desert was wide, and company meant safety. He urged his camel forward. The light swayed, just out of reach.

Minutes passed. Then hours. Always the same distance ahead, never closer. The merchant began to call out. His voice cracked against the stillness, but no answer came. The lantern only swayed, almost playfully, like someone walking just fast enough to stay ahead.

When he slowed, the light slowed. When he stopped, it stopped. It was waiting. Doubt crept into him. He whispered prayers and tried to steer his camel back toward the road. But the road was gone. Only dunes surrounded him now, and the stars overhead seemed to have shifted. He was not where he had been.

The merchant’s throat grew dry. He drank from his water container, but the water seemed too little, as if the desert itself swallowed the drops before they reached him. The lantern brightened. And then he heard it. A faint sound, like laughter carried on the wind. He froze. His camel groaned, restless, stamping at the sand. The merchant felt his own heart hammering. He called again, voice trembling. The laughter ceased. The lantern drifted farther, then stopped, as though daring him to follow. Fear and thirst pulled him forward.

The dunes grew taller, the sand softer. His camel stumbled, and he was forced to dismount. Step by step he climbed after the light, legs sinking into the ground. Each time he thought he reached the top of a rise, the lantern slipped lower, down into a hollow.

Hours bled away. His skin cracked with dryness. His lips split. His thoughts blurred. The lantern never faltered. Always ahead. Always waiting. At last, he stumbled and fell to his knees. His camel collapsed behind him with a final grunt, its ribs heaving once before stillness. The merchant raised his head, his vision blurred. The lantern hovered close now. Too close. It was not a lantern. It was an eye. A single, burning eye, glowing with yellow fire. The laughter returned, louder, echoing all around him though the desert was empty.

The sand shifted under his hands. It felt soft, like ash. Something moved beneath it — thin shapes, like fingers pressing upward from beneath the dunes. The merchant tried to rise, but his body no longer obeyed. The sand gripped him, pulling him down grain by grain. The last thing he saw was the eye flaring brighter, brighter still, until it filled his vision with fire.

By dawn, the desert was calm again. Only the camel’s bones remained, bleached white in the sun. The merchant was gone, as if he had never existed. They said Abu Funus had taken him.