The Six Aspects

Banished from her caravan for a theft she didn't commit, Teresa had been walking for days, perhaps weeks. She couldn't say. The desert was so vast, and the nights came and went countlessly, and her supplies dwindled. This is what she knew. As of that morning, her canteen was empty, and she was gripped by thirst. Her eyes raked the horizon looking for cacti, or anything that looked like a place where water might gather. She hated the desert. She hated it more at night, because it was cold.

There were no cacti. She walked along. The sun pricked her skin, and she wished she could catch it in a bottle to get her through the night. Ahead, on the crest of a dune, she thought she saw a small shape moving. It was moving towards her. She wondered if it was hungry. Resigned to an imminent death in any case, Teresa moved towards the shape in turn. As it came into focus through the shimmering heat, she saw that the shape was a desert fox. Its huge perked ears and plush fur were covered in dust, and a cloud of dust seemed to hang around the fox, looking almost like smoke. It walked up to her and sat down, cocking its head and chirping lightly.

"Good afternoon," she wheezed. The fox blinked. Teresa stared at it for a moment and then sighed. She turned to walk around the fox, but it moved and set itself in her way again.

"Eh? Why?"

The fox blinked. Again, Teresa turned to walk around it, and again, the fox blocked her path. She briefly considered kicking the fox, but the thought of it made her weary.

Instead, she sat. The fox prostrated itself before her, lying flat on its belly. The sun was high and the sand was warm and soft. Teresa leaned back and looked up at the sky. Not a cloud or bird in sight. Only the sun, glaring and constant.

"I'm never going to make it out of here."

The fox raised its head and spoke. "Then stay."

She looked down at the fox. It stood slowly, yawned, stretched, and shook its fur, sending a thick bloom of dust into the air around it and Teresa. The dust filled her mouth and throat and she gasped, but did not choke. Instead, she felt cooled and quenched. The dust covered her eyes and filled her nostrils and she was shrouded in it. When it settled, the fox was gone.

Teresa stayed. Feeling suddenly unthirsty, she sat and meditated in the place where she met the fox. Days passed and her hair was bleached and her skin grew leathery and strong in the sun. In her meditations, visions came to her and showed her many things, and she grew powerful with wisdom. Eventually and more than once, travelers chanced upon her with camels and horses and wagons in tow, offering her passage to safety. Each time, she refused, sitting on the ground and baptizing herself in sand as the travelers looked on, mystified.

Soon, word spread of the woman in the desert who took no drink or food. Seekers traveled across the land to see her, baptizing themselves in sand and meditating, discovering that so long as they sat with Teresa, they too were free of thirst and hunger. In time a great throng amassed itself around her, silent and serene.

At noon on the 1st day of the 4th year of Teresa's meditations, the fox reappeared. Moving lazily through the crowd and drawing awed whispers from the otherwise silent congregation, the fox wound its way towards Teresa. It sat before her and blinked.

Teresa, stirred from her meditation, looked to the fox.

"You are Rytren." She said, speaking the name from her visions.

"Yes."

"Well, fox. What now?"

"You will follow."

The fox stood and began to walk slowly to the West. Teresa stood, brushed herself off, and followed. So too did the congregation. The fox led them overland, always west, and the path they walked came to be known as the Circuit of the Sun.

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