Episode 38

The dust, a constant companion, had settled into a fine grit that coated everything: the worn leather of the saddle, the coarse wool of Kicking Bear’s blanket, the very air they breathed. It was a dust born of countless hooves, wagon wheels, and the relentless sun beating down on these vast, rolling plains. Kicking Bear watched the distant shimmer, a mirage that promised water but delivered only more heat. His gaze, usually sharp and focused on the horizon for game or approaching riders, now held a deeper, more troubled intensity. He’d seen the changes, felt them like a shift in the wind. The familiar trails, once echoing only with the sounds of his people and the whisper of the grasses, now bore the weight of strangers.

He sat with a small group of warriors, their faces etched with the same unspoken worry. They spoke in low tones, their voices almost swallowed by the immensity of the sky. “More wagons,” murmured one, his eyes fixed on a faint plume of smoke far to the west. “They travel in larger numbers now, like a swarm of locusts.”

Kicking Bear nodded, his jaw tight. He remembered the first time he’d seen such a procession, a mere handful of wagons, a curiosity that had sparked cautious whispers. Now, it was a river of them, a ceaseless flow that seemed to carve new paths through the land, heedless of the ancient routes, the sacred places. He’d seen the consequences: the trampled earth where berries once grew, the streams muddied and fouled by the passage of so many hooves and wheels, the silence where the songs of birds had once been plentiful.