THE WIND FEELS LOSS
Short story by Daniel Whigham
Illustration by Cindy FanWe do not build shelter from wood alone. The trees of the Herdlands are small and lonely,
and their boles are like the spinal bones of cattle if they were browned and brittled and
twisted up in a stack. Not good for woodwork. We must flay the stallion and the mare and
stretch their dried skins over the frame of the yurt.
Even in this small way, our survival is built on sacrifice.
A Crownlander will tell you a man owes no debt to Mother and Father, for the choice of
being was not his own. We cannot accept that lesson here. Here we see the Mother return
home bloodied after surrendering the day’s hunt to wolves and the Father lose a runaway
colt after tracking it across the barren steppe as the skies pass.
Now stand and feel the wind. Feel where it blows. It is a Djinnward wind. It will blow
all the way down to the Djinnlands, and carry with it the unburied souls of the steppe,
where they will be born again, but not as man-kin. The wind is telling us that tonight’s
tale shall be of Soqtani and the djinn that took her life.
- Fifteen years after Soqtani’s father carried the nameless changeling to the cairn — its
wails smothered in the screaming wind — Soqtani herself made the journey to that place.
She was a true Herdlander. Strong, hale and fearless, though her skin was covered in
fadedpockmark scars. She knew her life was yoked on the pains of her mother, her father,
and one other. This other she had come seeking.
For her entire journey a scorching wind had blustered her along (If you feel a hot wind
up here on the cold, cold steppe, you will know that a djinn is riding it) and now she saw
a terrible visage at the base of the cairn. It appeared as many different shapes at once: a
red mare, a grey she-wolf and a hill of black smoke. They all wore the same flaming mask
with curling lips and rolling eyes.
Soqtani called to it. “Are you the djinn who was once a man-kin? Did you die here for
the life of another?”
“I died for nothing.” The djinn spoke softly, but its voice filled the air like soot, and
around the cairn the scorching winds screamed their outrage.
“I was taken by raiders in the night. Their leader swaddled me in your blankets, called