((OOC: It short but I give it a 8 for quality))
A shot sash tugged tightly around the small of a back whisked wickedly in the harsh gales like a rug being flapped clean. The sash even made a sound that would come from a cotton rug being flapper or beaten clean. Harsh flowing gales mixed with sand sprayed upon the muddy looking sash which belongs to none other than the guardian of wind. Her clothes were always flowing like the wind she mastered and controlled so well. Fluid brown endings of her robe danced in the grit ridden desert of sand mounds. She stuck out like a sore thumb for the sands looked so bright whereas she wore dark clothing in the heat of the sun. Dark clothes felt dreadfully hotter to her in the heat, clothes in layers were even worse. But she braved it as only her tanned wrists down, and head were uncovered for the merciless sun; soon to become much darker looking.

Tentacles of raven locks lovingly sprayed being the wandering guardian, and even kept out of those sharp violet jewels. Her tanned face bore a rather warm expression, with a small smile yet unique eyes sharply gazing ahead. Deep thoughts resided in that face, like she was on a journey of great importance. Although the expression was warm, there was also calmness just chaos laying in her sharp violet orbs. As if her jewels didn’t judge good or evil, everything seemed right and balanced, yet not balanced at all. Ploay understood these feeling even when they were complicated, yet that didn’t seem to matter, not when she was on a journey. She would do everything in her power to help both forces of good and evil, even when these decisions seemed very fussy and hard to understand.

Slightly twitching were her tanned digits as she allowed the insane winds of the desert to have their way with her. Controlling the breeze was easy, yet there was a time to control and a time to just let your hair down and relax. This had been one of those times, despite the hellish heat. “It’s a beautiful day today,” she said to herself in a calm voice where her sharp eyes soften in happiness. The voice came out as if she was talking to someone, yet there was nothing beside her but the hard gales. Indeed, the whispering voice spoke in her ears which sounded like a calmer tone of the wind surrounding her.

Hot sand poured into her brown sandals with every step she took in the yellow sands. Tied next to her medium sized hip was the sword of air that hugged tight thanks to the brown sash she wore. Something in her heart told her that something new was going to happen today, yet she couldn’t think of what, she wasn’t physic or anything. Maybe it was just a woman’s intuition. I wonderer what today has in store, she thought to herself in curiosity.

As she thought these thoughts, a mile away something terrible was happening, this feeling, Ploay hadn’t picked up.

The lashing wind and long sprays of sand whipping the crystal sky as light from the terrorizing sun beat down like a harsh master upon a tired slave. A single form dredged through the sands, draped in tattered clothes that filtered out the sand and grit that gusted here and there. A long, twisting head of hair brushed with sand showing many days of walking and sleeping in the desert was atop the tall, tired form as it moved along. A sword hung from his right hand and glimmered against the sunlight, the blade etched and notched from battle and war. He stood tall and true still, despite the feeling of fire from the sun upon his back against his once black, now sand covered shirt. Bits of dust and dirt clung to everywhere that was exposed to the light, his skin heavily tanned and scarred in all the places the sand could reach.

The man was one who had seen many months of solitude, seen the places of desolation and grown colder and darker for it. It showed in his eyes. Pools of green dark like a forest at midnight under a full moon or a lush field under a thunderstorm, they spoke volumes of tragedy and pain, of anger and hate and almost nothing of the good things in life.

Marinar sighed and looked upwards to the sky. He brushed away the sand upon his lips and drew a long drink from a wineskin he had taken from someone not too long before, the moment that it was empty he tossed it aside into the sand. It was little more than a burden at that point and a new one could be 'claimed' from the next band of travelers that the barbarian encountered. He had taken rather well to the more criminal side of things as of late- or as he put it 'doing what one has to, to survive.' But it was fairly safe to say he was never going to be robbing banks and castles for a living.

As Marinar wandered he muttered to himself as he often did, about this and that, repeating things he had read in books once or remembering the good times and telling himself about them. As he walked, the tip of his sword pierced through the carapace of a passing scorpion, he turned the blade about and looked at the twitching insect for a moment before swinging his sword to make it fly off the end of the finely sharpened heavy sword. About then he spotted a familiar figure, due ahead of him. He had begun to follow in her steps and his longer gait was making him catch up with her slowly but surely. He gave no signal to Ploay of his presence, no intentional signal, that is, as he was too far off and shouting would most certainly make his already dry throat that much more unbearable.

Heaves of air flowed into the lungs of the traveling wanderer of wind, yet instantly sands were pushed aside as she breathed. Slowly lashings of gales began to roll around Ploay instead of brushing wind and sand against her. Nothing but her twitching digits, and squinting eyes moved as a small orb formed from wind hovered outside of her body. This was the power she held, and she loved to tame the winds to her will as if they were her loyal subjects and pets. Yet still she held a friendship with the great power of gales, a friendship that none she knew had. Bending winds allowed her to move faster in the harsh dry desert, and time was of the essence. A scream like none other touched her ears, and shook inside her mind like an echo of pain.

I must hurry, she thought to herself as the scream pierced throughout the invisible wind like walls of sand. Such a horrid sound remaindered herself of metal clinging to her to make an ear clenching noise. Yet she knew for a fact that this wasn’t sword play gone wrong, a being’s voice belonged to the scream. A part of her was angry at whatever could make someone scream so horribly, yet calmness soaked onto her tanned face. Raven hair hung limply to her shoulders; no longer being lifeless puppets to the winds every whim, now the wind guardian had the power.

“Don’t fear, I am coming for you,” she spoke in a soft voice filled with dryness, than she closed her dry chapped lips together softly. For now the only thing on her mind was the wind, and that poor scream that lurked into her ears. Even the figure that was following her wasn’t any concern to her, for she didn’t even know someone was following her. Also, if she knew who was following her, instantly she would embrace her long missed friend. The happy though of Mariner kept to the back of her mind as her thoughts begin to race, she was only following the sound, and she had no idea where she was heading though.

As sand kicked up, it soon flung away with a heavy push of air, Ploay didn’t have time to stop for sand. Her presence was need as soon as her sand covered sandals could carry her tall woman figure. That scream, she thought to herself, and knew that it held no words in it, but empty pure fear inside. Who would make such a scream? These thoughts echoed just in time to feel a hard crushing pain on top of her opened sandal. Sharp violet orbs widen in pain, as her hasty feet stopped in their own tracks. Instantly her head bowed down to see what had caused this, and she almost couldn’t believe her eyes.

There in front of her was a feet tall stone looking block, it had smooth sides but on top was very jagged. It seemed to be a piece of many other stones around it, yet Ploay didn’t think about this. Her mind was on her toe, with a quickly closer glance at her toe, there was no blood, which put her mind at ease. As if nothing had happened at all; her left knee bent upwards as she stepped over the foot tall rock. A simple rock or rocks to be exact in the middle of nowhere was almost impossible to believe. While picking her right knee up and over the stone, she began to walk again, but not in a fast way anymore. Slow cautious steps moved her body foreword, just in time to hear another blood curling scream.

Such a horrific noise, the sound of a person refusing to accept their death when apparently little could be done to stop it. He may have become more willing to lean towards the more 'evil' acts such as stealing but as always Marinar was still unable to allow people to suffer needlessly. At the sound of the scream, Marinar deviated from the beaten path and no longer followed Ploay, he turned southwards and jogged under the beating heat through the gusting sands in a short arc from the road to a second pathway in the desert that went northward. This path gave a better view to the village, the source of the screams which were becoming more evident as he drew nearer still.

Looming and lumbering in the center of the village of tattered and broken bones of sand wyrms, draped in the hides of the ancient beasts that must have been prevalent in this region of the desert was a dragon. It stood out because of its dark red scales against the blue and tan of everything around it, three outlines of men stood about the feet of the beast, chains hanging loosely from the dragon's collar to those three. People scurried here and there as five or six men could be seen riding on horseback, but any number of others could have been outside of eye shot. The riders were appearing to keep the people of the village cordoned in with the dragon and its tamers.

Marinar dropped into the sand to lay low for a moment as he pulled his bow and arrows from his back and set them on the ground. He was too far away for his personal bow skills to be of much use other than getting him more attention than he wanted, so he crept forward slowly and carefully, reaching a range he was comfortable with and setting his arrow onto his longbow's string. The wood creaked quietly before the arrow flew forward in favorable wind and impacted with the right shoulder of one of the horsemen. Marinar instantly was down in the sand again, trying to blend in as the riders looked everywhere to find out who had just attacked their man. In a moment another arrow collided with a second rider, knocking him from his horse and throwing the horse into a panic, trampling its dismounted rider as it galloped away from the village.

A third arrow missed any target and the four remaining riders were able to point out which direction the arrow had come from. The sound of hooves against the sand was an odd one, muffled but still foreboding. A final panicked arrow was shot and the number of the riders was cut down to three, one hurled a spear at Marinar, embedding into the ground next to the barbarian wanderer and providing him a weapon with which to combat the riders. The sharp tip of the spear was brought up and in a red spurt a man was placed upon the end, his horse galloping onward and the rider's red making the sand clot and merge. Marinar's foot planted against the man's chest and he pulled the spear out as the other two riders came about and readied themselves for a real charge against their assailant.

Violet jewels widen at the blood curling scream that pierced the desert. Instantly Ploay’s legs moved, no, were pushed forward though the pushing sands. While she pushed her way forward, she vowed never to let that voice scream in terror again. Wind and sand slashed at her as her body felt a hundred times heavier with each sprint. Do not fear I’ll be there soon just hold on a little longer, she thought in her fast moving mind. But each step she took felt slow, no matter how hard she pushed forward something else pushed her back. Both arms moved in large circles at her sides, attempting to have some sort of the chaotic winds. Movement slowly became easier, yet her sight became clouded with sands in front of her. There was nothing she could do about that, but move toward the sound from that awful scream.

Even her ears seemed to become deaf with the sound of gales whisking by and around her. Being blind and deaf wasn’t the best or safe way to travel though a desert. It reminded her of how she used to fly by closing her eyes, and only trusting the air to get her where she needed to go. This was almost like that, but she was running and gales over took any other sounds. Ploay’s ears were her pride and joy, but now they couldn’t help her, once again she was at the mercy of her surroundings. Sand not only blinded her, but tried to go though some of the little openings of her clothes. An itch over came her hands, ankles, and small of her neck. Slightly she moved almost reaching of one of those itchy places on her neck, but quickly stopped her right hand by hearing sounds of talking around her.

Now ignoring the itch, she stopped her running feet suddenly just in time to concentrate on pushing the winds away. Soon the mighty gales obeyed and dirty faces of villagers with oddly dress men behind them. There were three villagers in front of her, dressed in somewhat clean grabs, but their faces were covered with grit from a battle. Behind them, she guessed with soldiers wore red grabs much brighter than any maroon color she ever laid eyes on. All three villagers were on their knees, with all the soldier’s swords raised above their heads. Then that was when they noticed the ball of sand and wind in front of them, with one darkened clothed and ashen wing woman inside.

What was the meaning of this almost came out of her mouth at twelve orbs stared at her. Six were sharp stares full or madness, the other six were full of hopelessness. Her raven hair blew wildly, so she could only guess what they were thinking and what they should do next. Yet three on their knees took this stunning chance to move, and fast. Soon the three soldier looking men noticed that their game had run off but they didn’t move one inch, for the woman in the winds hadn’t moved one inch. That scream she heard came from a child, and she didn’t see a single one, if she stayed her, than what if the child screamed again. She couldn’t take the child screaming, never or ever.

Soon the two soldiers ran towards her with swords above their heads now, while one other ran off maybe for help or maybe they were just running for their lives. Hardly any mortal knew what Ploay looked like; when she worked she usually did it above their heads, or in a form of some avian animal. She wasn’t going to waste her time with these two, her goal didn’t involve them. Outstretching her ashen wings, they beat hard against the air, and pushed herself above the ground. Quickly she flew over the two and gave them one last hard hateful filled glare.

Buildings became of form, or rather small hut looking homes. Her head hang low to see what she could find, who she could find. From the looks from above it appeared that the soldiers were trying to over throw the villagers. But as she gazed at the tattered city, she saw a great beast with only chains keeping it down to earth. Its scales were red in color, they stood out against the pale tan and pale blue of the sky. At first glance it looked like a mound of blood, yet nothing could be more further from the truth. The soldiers were controlling the dragon. Ploay would quickly take care of that problem, but she needed to save the child first. Something in her heart told her that the child was in great danger. She just prayed that the village could hold it own without her for just a few more seconds.

Maybe it was being above the stronger gales that allowed her to hear, but after a few minutes, she caught sound of a child crying.