Mariata remembered little of the journey from the Adagh to Imteghren: she hardly noticed anything, so focused was she on the pain that burned inside her. As they crossed the Vallée de l’Azaouagh, entered the Tamesna and headed north, she would not eat, but turned her head away from food. She lay at night on a blanket on the ground with her eyes open, staring at the stars, a small scrap of dried, rusty indigo cloth clutched against her heart. Her brothers found her in the same attitude in the mornings, and it made them afraid. They invoked charms against the evil eye, when they thought their father could not see them and cuff them for it. ‘If your stepmother catches you acting like an ignorant baggara, she’ll throw us all out of the house. We are going to be modern people now, so you’d better start getting used to it.’(But as they’d crossed the Great Erg and a sandstorm threatened to swallow them, they’d heard him murmuring all manner of charms to appease the djenoun.)Mariata did not make a good impression on her new family.
