Claimed by the Desert

Chapter Four

This chapter is dedicated to @mckenzierrobinson for being such an awesome reader and commenter! Thanks!

 Chapter Four

Vera flounced down in the hot sand and tried not to scream in frustration. Once again, for the sixth time that morning, her braid had come undone.  Each time it had happened she felt a tug or yank and then all her hair would come tumbling loose. And each time when she turned to find the culprit no one would be there.  She debated just leaving the curly mess hanging loose, but it would always fall into her eyes and she needed to be able to see where she was digging. Eventually she decided on cramming it all under her big hat despite the fact that she knew it looked ridiculous.

"Brains are more important than beauty anyway," Vera muttered under her breath as she stood up and dusted off her trousers. It had been almost impossible to convince her father to let her wear them, but after he saw how difficult it had been for her to wear a skirt at the dig site he had eventually relented. And if she had played up the difficulty a wee bit, well, it had all turned out for the best in the end.

Out of nowhere a strong gust of wind blew up and Vera's hat went sailing across the desert, far out of her reach.

"You have got to be kidding!" she shouted. "There's hardly been any wind all day and as soon as I put my hat on there's enough wind for a sandstorm!"

"I think someone needs a break," she heard her father's voice say over the wind.

She turned to him and threw up her hands. "I might as well," she said. "It's not as if I can get anything done around here!"

"What's got you feeling so cross?"

Vera shook her head in response and walked off in the direction of one of the tents set up around the site. It wasn't as if she could tell him that it had felt like an invisible person had been tugging on her hair all morning.  He would say she had been in the sun too long and needed to lie down. She loved her father, and Halsten too, but they treated her like she was made of glass. She was determined to prove that she could be as good of an archeologist as any man but she couldn't do that if she was at home lying down and not doing the job.

Sitting down on a stool in the tent, Vera ran her hands across her face and then took a long drink from her canteen. Her father wandered in and gave her the look; the one that meant he was worried about her. It only served to further aggravate her.

"I really wish you wouldn't look at me like that," she told him. "I'm not some wilting flower. I just got irritated because the wind kept blowing my hair about."

He grinned sheepishly at her and replied, "I'm not sure what you mean. I'm not looking at you in any particular way."

Vera didn't respond - there was no reason to. He would always worry too much. She understood. She was all he had left now that her mother was gone and he worried he would lose her too. But that didn't mean she had to like it.

"I think I'm going to go have another look at your cave discovery, at least until this wind dies down a bit," she told him.

"You should get one of the workers to go with you, it's a bit dark down there and that snake might come back," he said.

Vera placed her hands on her hips and glared at him. "You're doing it again."

Her father tried to look innocent. "Doing what?"

"Coddling me! I'm not a child anymore, Papa. I won't ever become as good as an archeologist as you and Dr. Peters unless everyone here treats me like an equal."

"Fine, fine. I see your point," he replied. "But at least tell someone near the area you are going in, so that way if you are in the cave too long someone will know to come look for you."