Fifteen minutes later, Bojo stood outside the soldiers’ fort and stared at the lake. The fort was built on a small hill across the river from the town, with a commanding view of both the village of Stone Lake and its shrunken namesake. It was the only building in town that was not built on stilts. Just like the new Low Court in Mol, it was constructed of Chott’s black sandstone. It had room for fifty men, and extensive storerooms were dug three levels deep into the hilltop.

The village’s garrison of Imperial soldiers consisted of three young, inexperienced, and generally useless recruits from the cool green forests of Zivlinna, six hundred miles to the north. They were about as suited to life in the grey salt desert of Rut Arak as Bojo was to the bottom of the sea. They were dismal soldiers and horrible farmers; they would have starved long before if not for the generosity of the village children, who came to hear the stories of the endless forests and mountains of the north. One of the soldiers, Corporal Dameg, could speak Uthollossi, which was a second language to most of the villagers, but the other two knew only the Ziv tongue, and so were forced into silence. Every man in the village had beaten at least one of them at one time or another, and they spent most of their time cursing themselves, the villagers, the desert, the army, the king, the empire, and the world itself. They had been there for nearly a year, and would be there for a while longer. There was no chance for advancement at what was optimistically known as Fort Arak.

“Who goes there?” a voice cried out from just behind him, punctuated by a knife poking in his side.

“It’s me, Trighe.” Bojo turned and removed his face-wrap, partly to prove his identity, but mostly to rewrap it more tightly.

“Oh, hey, Bojo,” Corporal Trighe Dameg san Ron said tiredly, sliding his corroded knife back into its sheath. You should signal when you’re coming up here. That’s why we put that horn in the village. Next time you might get a knife in your ribs.” He shook his sunburned head and sat down in the shade of the barracks wall.

“The horn’s cracked, Trighe. It hasn’t worked in years. And that knife couldn’t cut anybody.”

Well, you people are supposed to take care of the horn. That’s your part of the deal. You maintain the horn, and we maintain the fort in case the dragons come back. You think the army’s just going to send a new horn from the coast because you people can’t take care of the one you’ve got?”

Bojo laughed. The fort had been built forty years before after an initiate at the monastery at Goq had reported seeing a yellow dragon flying northward toward the Rut Nrg. No one had seen hide nor scale of any dragon in the area since, but the soldiers insisted that their mission was to ward off dragon attack. The thought of the three village idiots, as they were known, warding off anything was simply hilarious to the villagers.

The other two soldiers came around the building from their makeshift garden on the west slope. They both waved to Bojo, and the taller one -- his name was Hinrig -- asked Trighe something in the guttural Ziv language. Trighe nodded and pointed into the fort, then told Bojo to follow him inside.

Bojo followed Trighe and Hinrig through the thick wooden doors, with the other soldier, Yadivik, bringing up the rear. Having been inside several times before, the boy knew the way as well as the three men, and when Yadivik cracked his head on a beam that the other three had just ducked, Bojo couldn’t hold back a giggle.

“Grottescek! Meig kronas ag doggru Nebboludeg!”

“Jros, Yadivik.” Trighe drew a finger across his lips and looked at Bojo sheepishly. “You shouldn’t have to hear that kind of language.”

“But I can’t understand it anyway, Trighe,” replied Bojo, who understood most of it perfectly well.

“Good point. Never mind, Yadivik. Nag jros ag vingkal. Nekroddik.”

They came to a small wooden door, which Hinrig opened with one of the three dozen or so keys at his belt. Inside, sunlight streamed through an intricate lattice design in the ceiling. A table occupied the center of the room, with six chairs surrounding it. Eleven full wine casks stood in one corner, and in another were three empties. “The officers’ mess,” Trighe explained. “Not that we have any officers anymore.” Bojo nodded. He had been here before.

Trighe drew his knife and punched a hole in the cask with it, cutting his hand open in the process. While the other two Zivs laughed at him and held their steins to catch the gushing wine, he threw his knife against the wall and began jumping up and down clutching his hand and filling the air with “Grottescek”s and “Nebboludeg”s. When he had calmed down enough to speak, he looked at Bojo tearfully. “I told you that knife would cut. By the way, doesn’t your mother have some of those herbs? You know, the ones that stop bleeding? Oh, and some of those for the pain, too.”

Bojo ran out, laughing all the way home.

When Bojo entered his mother’s kitchen, he was struck as always by how relatively cool it stayed, even on a day as hot as this. She had explained to him once how the ash-covered walls drew the heat out of the air, but he had not understood. The kitchen was a welcome refuge from the vengeful sun, and that was all that mattered.

“Why are you not at the Ounit’s?” she demanded as she pulled a loaf of chunky unleavened bread out of the oven. Her hands were like lightning; she had broken up the bread, mixed the chunks with salty grosbiste milk, and thrust it back into the oven before he could unwrap and answer. “Well?”

“He won’t see me for another hour at least, Mother.” He sat down and took a hardtack biscuit from the box on the table. It was salty and rocklike, but struggling with it gave him something to do while he prepared for the lecture that he knew was coming.

“Well, then, where have you been? It’s hot enough to bake a lizard out there. Does it look like rain?”

“If it were going to rain, wouldn’t the Ounit have told us?” The biscuits were harder than usual today. They had been sitting out for a week; the high salt content and lack of moisture prevented their spoilage, but nothing short of drowning could improve their edibility.

“Don’t speak to me like that, little-son.” At ten years of age, Bojo was no longer the “little-son”; that honor went to his six-year-old brother, Kasimerang. His mother still used the name from time to time, though, to remind him that he was not quite grown. “If you weren’t with the scribe, you should have been out helping your father. Anagir’s herd got out again last night, so he’s been mending fence all morning with that fool boy of Dariv’s.”

“Father’s giving Samou his trial today, so he wouldn’t let me help if I wanted to.”

She hmphed a couple of times, then asked, “Well, then, why are you back here? I know you don’t just want to watch me bake all day. Or were you just dying for some hardtack?”

“Well, uh...someone needs some of those herbs that stop bleeding.” He hoped she wouldn’t ask just who needed them.

“The mashanu?”

“Yes, that one. And the morephu, too, for the pain.”

“Why didn’t you say so? Daqe, they could have bled to death while you sat here like a rock! Who is it? I’ll tend to them myself!” She reached for her own ferasho.

“No! I mean, I can take care of it. He’ll be alright. They’re not that stupid.”

Her head whipped around and her eyes narrowed. “Who’s not that stupid? Have you been talking to those soldiers again?” The word “soldiers” was accompanied by a horrifying sneer.

“Trighe cut his hand, Mother. I promised him I’d get the herbs for him. Please?”

Swiftly, she found the herbs and placed them in her son’s hands. “You tell Trighe Dameg that he and the other two idiots will spend tomorrow mending fence and rounding up Anagir’s grosbiste and doing anything else your father needs done. You get them to swear that, and not by one of their barbarian gods, either. You get them to swear by Daqe.”

“Yes, Mother.” He wrapped and ventured once more into the searing day.

By the time he got back to the fort, the village idiots were well into their cups. A dusty rag was wrapped around Trighe’s left hand, and he was apparently trying to sing to it.

“Sssaaaaagdils, Nodolooooodo gusduuuul lagalagalagalaaaaagaaaaa …”

Bojo wasn’t sure if this was in Ziv or drunken Uthollossi or something totally alien, and he wasn’t about to ask for a translation. He merely handed the package of herbs to Yadivik, who was rubbing a massive black bruise on his forehead, and left for the house of the Ounit.

Except for the skeletal grosbiste tied to the front steps, Ounit Hadi’s house might have been mistaken for any other. The mule-like creature was named Happy, though the only thing that she seemed to enjoy was biting plugs out of anyone, including her master, who got to close. She was fed by everyone in the village in the hope of winning her favor, but stayed skinny and vicious. Hadi was able to ride her only by taking preemptive action; before trying to mount, he would smack the beast between the eyes with his staff. Since the bony plates on a grosbiste’s neck prevented it from reaching behind its head, he was safe once astride her broad back.

Happy was busy trying to chew through one of the hut’s supporting legs, and doing a fairly good job of it, when Bojo ran up the steps and into the scribe’s hut. He entered, unwrapping and fastening the door tightly. Hadi, as far as Bojo could tell, was mixing powders together to see which ones created the most evil stench.

“Who’s there?” Hadi yelled, not turning around.

“Bojo, son of Gajhak the farmer, Ounit. Today is my trial.”

“Today? Today is your trial? Boy, you should learn now, while you’re still young. Every day is your trial.” The old man turned around, casting an appraising eye over Bojo. “Well, you don’t look like much. I suppose it could be worse, though. Take off your ferasho and sit down at the table.”

Bojo did as he was instructed.

“First things first. This,” said the shaman, waving a small wooden box, “is your first test. I assure you , it won’t be the last.” He opened the box, revealing a set of large, brightly-painted paper cards. “The Rutii Nakat. There are seven sets in existence. Since I own one of them, and six other Ounite own the other six, then the seven of us are a brotherhood. Do you understand?”

“Y-yes, Ounit.”

Hadi shook his head. “No, no you don’t. There are three lessons to be learned now. The first is that anything that people have in common binds them together, however loosely. The second is that you do not understand. You understand nothing. You have not truly learned anything yet. If you can’t embrace that fact, then you’ll never learn anything. The third is that from this point on, you are to refer to me as ‘Master’. Now, I’ll read your reflection in the cards. Shuffle them until you think you’re through.”

The cards were rough and didn’t seem to want to be shuffled, but Bojo managed to put them in what he thought was a fairly random order. He handed the cards back to the old man.

“You’re through? Good. I thought you’d never stop shuffling.” Hadi picked up the cards and held them as if weighing them in his hand. Then he closed his eyes and lifted the top card from the deck, placing it face down. Lifting the deck again, he took the bottom card and placed it beside the first. “Split the deck,” he said.

The boy grabbed the top half of the deck and lifted it, setting it down beside the bottom half. The shaman, eyes still closed, took the top card from each stack and placed them to the top and bottom of the first two, so that the four cards were arranged in a diamond shape.

“Turn one over.” The old man opened his eyes.

Bojo stared at the cards. He had heard of this being done, but had never thought it would be done to him. For a moment, he was too excited to respond. “Which one?” he finally asked.

“Any of them, boy. I don’t have all day to wait for you. Just turn one over.”

Bojo flipped the one to his right. “The Westward Bearing, the Grosbiste Facing West,” Hadi said. “You will seek something you need. You could desert everything to find the object of your search. Another.”

The one to the left this time. “The Eastward Bearing, the Lungfish, inverted. You will find yourself forced into a decision; your options will slowly disappear. Another.”

The top card. “The Northward Bearing, the Yellow Dragon. Your actions could bring danger to all around you. You will become a beacon for outside forces. Another.”

When the final card was revealed, the scribe sat up quickly, as if startled. “Hmm. All animal cards. Interesting. The Southward Bearing, the Spider of the Rock, inverted. Boy … listen to me, boy. This is a powerful card in itself, and to have it inverted beneath these others bodes ill. I must research this later. Now, since they were all animal cards, pick any card from the deck. We must see if there’s to be a guide for this herd.”

He restacked the rest of the cards, leaving the four in their positions. Shuffling the deck twice, he fanned it out to Bojo. The boy took one from the left side, near the center, and laid it face down between the four.

“Turn it over.” Bojo did so.

This time, Hadi actually shivered. “Central Bearing, the Qhiwil-Min, the Sand Demon, the Drinker of Souls. This is very disturbing, boy. I will have to meditate on this. Do not disturb me.”

He remained motionless for two hours, eyes closed, breathing steady. Suddenly, he opened his eyes and spoke.

The smith and the fisherman are leaving for Goq in the morning, aren’t they?”

“Yes, Master.”

“Good. Take this list to Vagaderig and tell him to get these things for me. Tell him this makes us even.”

“Yes, Master.” Bojo turned and headed for the door.

“Boy.”

Bojo stopped and turned back around, his face half-wrapped. “Yes, Master?”

“Do you want to be my apprentice, boy?”

“Yes, Master. Very much.”

“Good. Today you are the Ounit-gi, the little wise man. Don’t make me regret my decision.” He stared at Bojo. “Go.”

Without answering, Bojo dropped his head and left, smiling as he wrapped his face against the all-powerful desert.

Bojo worked and read and learned for two years.

The drought continued; he could count the times it had rained on one hand. Children were born, and people, including Hinrig the soldier, died. Vagaderig, having depleted the once-huge lake of fish, gathered his family and left with Chott’s twice-yearly caravan, never to return. Nouak continued to travel to Goq for ore, trading whatever he could. He spent as much time there as he did at Stone Lake. Anagir and the other herdsmen struggled to keep their animals as the grosbiste tore down fences and wandered west in search of water. Bojo was officially named the Ounit’s successor, and his mother set about arranging a marriage for her oldest son. Nomadic relatives stopped from time to time to trade their crafts and their daughters, and soldiers came periodically from Mol on the coast to replenish the fort. Through it all, only Grandfather Spider seemed unchanged.

During that time Bojo learned the four Rutii dialects, both Ollossi tongues, and a good bit of Ziv and Gokle. It was while reading a Gokle history that he ran across an account of Ounit-merghai Kalijiral.

“Master, have you seen this?” he asked, bringing the dusty tome to the scribe’s desk.

“I don’t have time to read it,” the old man snapped. “Read it to me.”

“In the year 73 of the Destine Emperors,” Bojo began, “the Great High Shaman Kalijiral of the Desert of Salt devised a magic most fearsome, by which to bring rain to the endless wastes.

“The spell allowed the Lake of the Stone to draw rain unto himself, using only the necromantic energies of a single dead spider to power its workings.” Bojo closed the book. “It goes on to list the components and gestures of the spell, but basically it says that the spell can be emplaced for a year, and every time in that year that someone kills a spider, it’ll rain. Is that true?”

Hadi looked up. “Yes, it’s true, but I wouldn’t try it if I were you.”

“Master, I wouldn’t think of using spells yet --“

The shaman’s face creased into a knowing leer. “Boy, I’ve seen you practicing the gestures, and I saw the sand-sculpture you made for your soldier friend. The spellcraft was good, but the anatomy was horrible. We’ll have to give that a lot more study, just so you won’t embarrass yourself.” Bojo groaned. “But back to the spell; yes, I knew about it, and yes, it’s true, and yes, it did work. But ask yourself this: have you ever seen a live spider, other than the Igseraknpamerg? Of course not, and do you know why? It’s because Daqe himself killed them all, and continues to kill every one that wanders into the Rut Arak. When Daqe made the world, he left this corner of it dry and salty for his own purposes. Kalijiral tried to usurp the plan of his god, and was punished horribly for it. In addition, all but a few were made to forget that it had happened, and those few were scattered all over the broad world, to remind men not to tamper with the designs of the gods.”

“Goru’s said he’s seen a spider.”

“Goru also said I sold my soul to the wraiths. Do you always listen to what liars and idiots tell you?”

“But what about Grandfather Spider? Why didn’t Daqe kill him too?”

“Because the Igseraknpamerg is Daqe’s most faithful servant. He is the guardian of the Rut Arak, and to even speak of his death is to verge on blasphemy.” The old man glared at Bojo; his gaze bored into the boy’s head. “Don’t ever speak of that again, boy. Do you understand me? If you do, you’ll be hauling stone with Chott, getting buggered up and down the coast for the rest of your life. Now, get back to your translation.”

He tried, but as he sat at his desk and stared unseeing at the strange words before him, the same phrase kept repeating itself in Bojo’s mind: kill a spider and bring rain.

“Come on, Kasi,” Bojo said, shaking his little brother awake. “The sun’s almost up.”

“GowaaysshhBojooonnnggggg...” The eight-year-old Kasi was not an early riser; getting him to leave his warm pallet for the cool morning air was a job in itself.

“If you don’t get up, I’m gonna water you again.” The older brother began unfastening his loincloth.

“Okay, okay, I’m up, Bojo,” Kasimerang mumbled irritably. “Don’t pee on me again.” He half-heartedly stood and shrugged himself into his clothes.

Kasi resembled a smaller version of his brother, with the same dark reddish-brown skin and straight black hair. Where Bojo’s eyes were a brilliant green, however, his brother’s were the same shadowy blue-grey as their father’s. They had the same stocky build, and while Bojo was easily a good six inches taller than Kasimerang, the latter could easily hold his own against his brother. Even Chott’s son Goru, the closest thing Stone Lake had to a town bully, steered clear of pushing Kasimerang around. Indeed, Kasi showed every sign of following in Goru’s footsteps; the younger children already lived in mortal fear of him.

In spite of all that, when Bojo said get up (and especially when he added the threat of watering), his brother got up.

Bojo had a list of ingredients -- no, Ounite called them components, he reminded himself -- that he wanted to gather before going to Hadi’s for the day, and the only way to get them was with Kasi’s help. He didn’t like it, because his brother, like all little brothers, had a very big mouth, but he really had no other choice.

“Get me some nerkweed from under Baniza’s house, but just the stems, not the roots or leaves. When you’re done with that, I need a hunna blossom and about three handfuls of grosbiste dung.”

“Eewww! You get it yourself!” Kasimerang bounced hysterically from disgust to laughing his head off.

“Get the dry stuff, nerkhead. You gather it up every day when Father tells you to.”

“You’re not Father, even though you try to act so big. I don’t have to do what you say.”

“No, but one day I’ll be the Ounit, and you’ll wish you’d done what I said.”

“You’re a double nerkhead,” the younger boy replied, but did as he was told, running across the packed dust that stretched around Grandfather Spider’s rock to Baniza the seamstress’ hut.

By the time Kasimerang returned, Bojo had finished gathering the rest of the morning’s list. He took his brother’s bundle and tied it, together with his own, in an old ferasho that they had both outgrown. “You’re helping Father with the arakfiagi today, aren’t you?” Bojo asked cautiously, eyeing his brother.

“Yeah. So what?”

Bojo hesitated. What he was about to ask could get them both in serious trouble. The arakfiagi -- “little salt eaters” -- were fist-sized, rock-hard mushrooms that grew only in the extremely saline soil of the Rut Arak. They fed on the salt, purifying the soil and making it possible to grow crops on the salt flats that surrounded Stone Lake. By moving them from field to field, Gajhak and the other farmers were able to farm a section at a time, providing enough grain to support the village. To be caught stealing one of the mushrooms would demand a very stiff punishment. After a moment, Bojo decided that the rewards outweighed the risks.

“I need you to bring me one of them. If you get caught I’ll tell him it was my idea. Besides, it’s for the Ounit, so Father won’t mind. You can bring me one of the old ones that’s about to die anyway. Just don’t let Father know if you can help it.” Kasimerang looked uncertain, but finally he agreed, and the brothers parted in the pale grey light of dawn.

For three months Bojo gathered materials for his spell. Nearly every morning, with or without Kasi, he scoured the town, the lake, and the great salt flats that surrounded them both. Once Hadi had him accompany Nouak and Anagir the herdsman to the monastery at Goq, sixty miles away at the source of the Stone River. The monks there lived among a few ragged hills and this, brushy woods; Bojo, who had never seen a tree or a real hill before, was in awe. One of the monks, Brother Aron, showed him the spring from which the river flowed, and Bojo was allowed to drink, for the first time in his life, water untainted by dust or salt. He felt like Daqe had taken his soul to the Eternal Waters.

Brother Aron said that he was from Bouiae City, far to the north in the province of Nelshala. He spoke Uthollossi with a strange accent, and said his people were related to those rebelling in Tegar Cier. “Menny refoogees coom to us from de Tay-gah. You know bout de Tay-gah?”

Bojo said that he did. “Dey say you de leetle mageek-man. You ah, mebby you use you mageek to hep me brothas in de Tay-gah?” Brother Aron laughed and slapped the boy on the back. “Mebby you do dat, or mebby you got you own problams, eh? Mebby I go back to Boo-ay and hep em maself.”

During the week that he was there, Bojo collected nearly all the remaining components on his list. On the way back, it rained for the first time in nearly eight months, enough to raise the lake seven feet.

A month later, Nouak brought Aron to Stone Lake, and three weeks after that, the monk rose to the coast with Chott. No one from the village ever saw the Nelshalan again.

At last, three days before his thirteenth birthday, Bojo was ready to cast his spell. He had the thirty-three components, he had memorized the sixty-six gestures, and he knew the ninety-nine secrets to whisper to the wind. He would bring rain to the Rut Arak. He would succeed where Kalijiral had failed. First, however, he had to get out of the house.

The spell had to be cast under a rising, waxing crescent moon, which would be the next night. Unfortunately for the budding Ounit, his father closed the house tight as a drum at night, to keep the warmth inside and the sand out. Finally, he was able to bribe Kasimerang to shut everything behind him and not say anything by giving him the pine branch he’d brought back from Goq.

He carried all of his materials to the great stone island that had given the lake its name and returned to the village to wait for dark.

Bojo sat under the grey moon and meditated, using every trick that the shaman had taught him to relax himself and clear his mind. When he thought he was ready, he raised his head and gazed at the stars, the constellations that he had learned as a child. To the south, Acir the Lizard. To the west, Mechag-gron, the Night-Vulture. To the north, Jacarinaturek, the Serpent-Who-Never-Sleeps. To the east, shining red almost on the horizon, were Minecrote, the Four-Brother-Demons. And directly above, staring down at one tiny boy on a large island in a huge lake in a vast desert, was Serak the Spider. Bojo breathed a prayer that he had been taught as a very small boy and, standing naked on the rock, began his chanting in a tongue as ancient as the desert.

“Joguchu ugafijadas gyrasdafeiujinyar jokudfakyfakunoh …

“Karake shek-kashik nofudojukrdushig …”

“Qhiwo-nankdjr eidhajk Fhvaur wuhruwehnw gahadajakad …”

On and on the chanting went unbroken as Bojo added the components to one another in ever-changing patterns and combinations. His hands flew furiously, his body contorted as the power of the spell flowed through him. The mushrooms pulled the salt from the lake water … the water melted the dung … the dung flowed over the nerkweed … the nerkweed burned the oil from the pine needles … the oil dripped into the hunna blossoms …

“Oejhak luufdjokar uijfdiyerfvagjd duiuq puqweqjk …”

...hunna blossom falling into the water …

“Kkan kuujnarak …”

… pine needlll …

“Serraaakkkk …”

Finally the ritual was over. The components had consumed themselves in an orgiastic frenzy of completion, and only a ribbon of white smoke remained in the still air. His body exhausted, his mind emptied, Bojo wrapped his ferasho around himself and crawled into the buoyant, saline water. He floated to the shore with one thing left to do.

In the center of the village, with great love in his heart, Bojo brought a chunk of Chott’s black sandstone down on the Igseraknpamerg, killing the great spider in the first vermilion rays of the morning sun.

As Grandfather Spider’s thick ichor dripped out onto the stones, a cool wind began to blow from the east. Bojo walked to the house of his father and climbed underneath, falling asleep to the far-off sound of Happy’s nervous wheezing.

Just as the sun cleared the horizon, the sky exploded.

*****

It rained for three das before they could wake Bojo.

It was a hard, driving rain that should have run its course in ten minutes. Instead, it seemed to get more powerful with each hour, the screaming wind and rolling thunder wrangling over rulership of the sky. Lightning struck Anagir’s stables, collapsing the clay roof and killing nearly all of his grosbiste. Mud walls that had stood for a hundred years suddenly began to sweat and melt, leaving only a few with roofs over their heads. Chott, one of those few, managed to get sixty others into his spacious house; minutes later, they all died when the suddenly liquid walls gave and the whole thing slid into the nearby quarry. All in all, two-thirds of the fewer than two hundred villagers died in the first two days. Ironically, it was the village idiots who saved the rest, when Trighe opened the fort to the terrified villagers.

The first thing Bojo saw upon waking was his mother cradling Kasimerang and rocking back and forth very slowly by candlelight. Eventually, he realized that his brother was dead. When his father didn’t return for what seemed like several hours, Bojo assumed that he was dead, too. He managed to stand and was surprised to find that he was in the barracks of the fort. Making his way upstairs and pushing past a bedraggled Trighe, he looked out towards his village.

He saw nothing.

The grey of the sky blended with the grey of the sludgy water covering everything. The lake, the village, the salt flats...it was all one vast grey mud plain. As he stared out of the window, the rain slowed, and a voice came into his head. It was a small, tired voice, the voice of someone who has had to endure incredible sorrow and may never be truly happy again.

“Bojo, son of Gajhak, son of Daqe, you are the cause of the destruction of all you love. You are forever cursed and banished from the Eternal Waters, set to wander the earth. You have defied me, my son, and shall suffer as none has suffered before you. I am Daqe, the Forever, and this is my judgment.”

Bojo turned around and saw Trighe behind him, holding out a ferasho, a pack of food, and a water-skin. “Go west,” the soldier said. “Go to Mol and find a ship, or just walk up the coast. Just don’t look back.” The little wise man took the supplies and stepped out into the slacking rain, staring at a rainbow that stretched over the newly cleansed world.