The relief! 2076 words

Running total is now 8125. The sad thing is that writing should surely be about quality not quantity, but mine is certainly none of the former with this nightmare focus on word count.

Still, I'm enjoying it more than I thought I would.

I did have one disappointment though. This new software (it's so great - I really do encourage you all to try and find some for your computers) keeps a word count and a character count at the bottom of the page. Only I misread it, and at one stage thought I'd done 500 words when in fact that was characters, and I'd only done 99. That was some agony, I can tell you :(

Anyway here's tonight's snippet. It's an example of how I'm trying to work actual UAE history and events into my otherwise entirely ficticious story:

"Those are the Assiqassiri caves*," Dastan told her. "They're quite famous here. The local bedouin won't go near them, they believe they are haunted. There was a newspaper story not long ago about the caves making strange noises at night which the people claimed were djinns - genies - snoring. They even had government officials investigate. They decreed it was water moving underground, but the people weren't convinced. Supposedly goats have vanished there without trace. At one time they left offerings to appease the djinns, but the village imam found out and accused them of demon worship. People are very supserstitious here."

*these caves turn out to be highly significant. Arabic speakers will probably guess it in advance ;)