She stopped and stood motionless, a puny figure of a wayfarer, with her silly little oil lamp in her hand. Lamps were used to dispel darkness, and to carry their blessed light into any place where evil might lurk, but here was evil in the day.
The biggest hyena finally made a run for her. She stood her ground until almost at the last, then with a deft side-step she shifted lightly to one side and swung the lamp out in a quick little semi-circle at the big scavenger.
Fire gouted from the lamp and engulfed the hyena. Immolated in living flames, the surprised beast spun around and ran madly across the field, squealing and howling shrilly as if demon-possessed and leaving a series of burning and smoldering green vegetation patches that smoked and roared and popped as they burned in the aftermath of it's wayward wake. At it's approach, the other hyenas broke and ran, the whites of their eyes rolling in maddened fear and squealing their weird frenzied laughter as they scattered mindlessly in all directions.
Si'Wren wrinkled her nose at the stink of the hyena's burning flesh and singed hoary hairs, watching the smoke from it's still-flaming hide. The unity of the squealing pack had been thoroughly disrupted. After watching a moment longer, Si'Wren set down the little clay lamp on the rock, experiencing a grim sense of momentary relief. She had expected hot oil to come out, not fire. Next, she turned resolutely to the ravine.
It was a daunting task she had chosen, but she set herself to the job with a deep, shuddering sigh and stepped in, her mere presence sufficient to scare off any vulture that might have dared oppose her.
Behind her, the sounds of the scattered hyena pack could still be heard as they screamed for their lives, with the burned one screaming endlessly the loudest. The few visible remaining hyenas stood at a respectful distance and watched in great agitation, but none demonstrated the slightest tendency to challenge her authority a second time.
She stood over the ruined body of the executed foot soldier, eyes set to the task. With the scavengers safely backed off, she had a little more time in which to consider what to do next, and returned to the stallion and took a braided hemp rope from the saddle, and knotted one end through a leather pack strap.
Then she untied the tent flap, and took down her little sewing kit in a leathern bag, which consisted of a single thin bone needle, a collection of fine sinew strands, and a flint cutting stone too small to be called a knife, but more like a crude flaying tool.
Backing away from the blessedly stationary horse, which still neighed and stamped his hooves at the distant hyenas, Si'Wren began to uncoil the rope as she descended the broad, gently sloping shoulder of the ravine again. It was not too steep where the body lay, and she did not need to use the rope to keep her from losing her balance.
Nearing the body, which lay face-down, she waded ankle-deep through the white-streaked blue trumpet flowers and little round green leaves of the morning glories and positioned herself, before spreading out the tent flap with a quick shake and a sudden snapping motion to lay it out close beside the body. Because of the morning glories, the tent flap did not fall immediately flat, but suspended itself just above the ground, in a lumpy sheet that continued to settle gradually but more slowly after the initial crush.