Upon leaving, his day proceeded normally.

He did his usual rounds, stretching his walk from the far eastern side of the dunes, where he assumed they flatted out into the desert and someone else’s home, to the western coast, where the shore was white with sand, and the beach grass shivered against the warm sea breezes.

There was never anything out of the ordinary, save the unlucky discovery of a corpse. It had been picked clean by vultures, and by the looks of it, it was an abandonned child, perhaps too weak to continue on in the desert, left behind by some unknown and unnamed mother. The face was missing all skin and features, leaving nothing behind but the sunbleached white of bone, and there was little left to the rest of the body, save stray hairs that were missed and jutting out from the ribs and where the tail had been. It was unfortunate, but such was the life of the desert.

He feels no pain for the deceased, and instead continues on his way.

Perhaps it had been some few hours before he returned to the spot of the half-drowned mare, enlightened by the discovery of the dead child and expecting to find her corpse as well, but instead, she lies in a heap in the meagre shade of a tall dune, no doubt having given up on her search for water. Blowing a sigh from his nostrils, he curses her for being so difficult, and lingers off to the side, keeping a wide distance between himself and the mare, as well as a cautious eye to the skies as he watched a vulture circling high up, no doubt waiting for the mare to fall deceased.