The first day was agony. The second day was torture. The third day, the pain vanished, replaced by a delirium that was almost sweet.
Khalid walked.
He walked until the soles of his feet blistered and broke, wrapping them in strips torn from his thobe. He walked without food, drinking from muddy streams and cattle troughs. When he coughed, he spat bright red onto the grey dust of the road, marking his path like a wounded animal.
People on the road avoided him. They saw a madman, a leper, a dervish cursed by God. They threw stones to drive him away from their villages.
Khalid did not feel the stones. He was not on the road.
He was in the garden.
"You must keep moving, Khalid," she said.
He looked to his left. Layla was walking beside him. She was young again. She wore the blue silk dress, the one he had bought but never seen her wear. The sun caught the gold thread in her veil.
"I am tired, Layla," Khalid rasped, stumbling over a root. "My chest... it is full of glass."
"I know," she smiled, her voice like cool water. "But we are close. Do you smell it? The jasmine?"
"I smell only dust," Khalid wept.
"Look," she pointed. "Just over that hill. I have the coffee ready. I have the book."
He pushed himself up. He forced his legs to move. Left foot. Right foot. Breathe. Cough. Left foot.
He slept in ditches. He woke screaming from dreams of the quarry, only to find the stars staring down at him. The constellations had shifted in ten years, but they were still his old friends. Orion. The Bear. They watched his slow, agonizing progress with cold indifference.
On the sixth day, his vision began to blur. The world narrowed to a tunnel. All he could see was the road immediately in front of his feet.
One more step, the hallucination of Layla whispered, her hand resting on his shoulder, light as a feather. One more step, my love. For me.
He walked on. He was fueled not by muscle or blood, for he had none left to give. He was fueled by the sheer, terrifying refusal to die anywhere but at her feet.