Saelin to join her. "You can stand guard at that rock."
"Of course, Schreefa," Saelin deferred, his smile magnificent while his left eyelid twitched with anger and his stomach growled fiercely.
He positioned himself at the edge of the oasis, looking toward the west, and settled in for the duration. But he was so hungry that he could not sleep. Instead, he began to pace the small shelf of flat rock above the spring, thinking about how he would dispatch the young digger who had so insolently escaped him the first time.
Two red-tailed parrots chattered overhead at the cluster of dates he had wanted. They busily devoured every date as Saelin eyed them contemptuously. He threw a stone at one of them, but the parrot was not of a mind to take the abuse and swooped over Saelin's head, flapping her wings and screeching in his ears, while her mate scattered him with droppings. He ducked her second pass, fell against the stone wall, and searched blindly for something else to hurl at the enraged bird. Saelin groped gingerly at a little recess in the rock behind him as the parrot continued her assault, but found nothing.
Nothing except Claria's chroniclave.
The parrots and his hunger forgotten, Saelin hunched close the stone wall and drew out the little bundle. He took his dagger to the neatly tied linen wrappings, and soon, before his astonished eyes, the little musical clock gleamed in the desert morning. Saelin grinned maliciously at the fine goldwork on the delicate hands, rewrapped the chroniclave, and stuffed it into one of the deep pockets in his robes.
Riolla would pay dearly for this little trinket. But he would have to sell at just the right time… Saelin began to count his kohli as he finally drifted off to sleep in the cool shade of the rocks, the squawk of angry parrots following him into his dreams.