The sun stretched its smothering rays across the blue white sky, crawling over the horizon, rubbing the two wanders skin a bronze-red and blinding their averted eyes. The unnerving humidity taunted them with the false message of rain, its damp heat causing exposed skin to stick and chafe. Josette panted, the heavy thump of her steel studded boots raising clouds of parched dirt, dusting her legs with each puff.
“Not much farther… I hope." She whispered, her voice echoing through the vast expanse of nothing with surprising intensity. They had been traveling for seven days. An uneventful seven days filled with hours of imaging the icy springs of Mystic Wood with utter flawlessness, hours of remembering the cool, spring mist of the grass lands and the diamond droplets of dew that dangled from the green fronds of prairie grass in the early morning, only to be shaken out of their blissful reveries to see more sand, more dust and much, much, much more sun.
Polishing her cracked, rosy lips with a dry tongue she sighed turning to her companion, rubbing her sweat glistening neck with a hot hand.
"Just imagine," she said in her usual light hearted tone, "escaping this god forsaken place! To actually feel the shade of trees again!" lifting her arms up she spun around, creating a tornado of sand. Just this morning, when atop a dune of dust, they had been able to see the frothy green canopy of trees at the base of the mountain range, the wintery peaks hidden by pink clouds. She had laughed with joy as they plunged into their daily routine of hiking, sweating and daydreaming. The mountains marked the end of the desert, and the beginning of a new journey.
Chuck and his companion marched on through the desert's blazing heat. The short elf could never have imagined such a place. He had come from a land abundant with shade and water. His mind could never have comprehended the perils of the sandy death trap. Constant storms of wind and sand sweeping across the dry cracked earth.
Chuck wished he could just ditch his armor. Even with special features of his living equipment to shrink into bands and charms on his body, they were an enormous burden in this pit of fire. But he could not toss away these blessed trinkets of Liradan. He would rather die with them than part from them.
The pair of foolish travelers could now see hope on the horizon. After a week of pure torture from the elements they could see the blessed Annon Mountains on the horizon. Their snow capped peaks looked so inviting to the pair of travelers. The nomad could taste the sweet spring waters rushing down the mountain slopes. It was the only thing that kept him moving now.
The desert was beginning to play tricks on Chuck's mind. Every word that his companion said to him seemed to reverberate in his mind. The world around him kept shaking in and out of focus. He felt as though he was about to pass out from exhaustion. Home and family were the farthest things from his mind. His mission was replaced by the will to survive.
Yet somehow despite the heat and the exhaustion, Chuck felt a strength he had never felt before. He could not help but wonder if this was part of Curin's blessing. The longer the elf kept marching in the heat the less it affected him. Stronger and stronger he became. Was this the powers of the Liradan being released within him?
The other elf was giddy with the prospect of reaching shelter. She spun around kicking sand up every where. Chuck was happy to see that the desert's tormenting vastness was not darkening his companions morale. Her joy brought an calmness to him.
Suddenly Chuck stopped. He starred forward, but he was not looking at anything. His other senses were going berserk. He did not know how, but he could feel the coming storm. The slight changes in the air. The vibrations in the ground. Somehow the elf had grown more accustomed to them.
"We are about to have trouble," Chuck called to Josette.
"Trouble?" she repeated, confused. She didn’t see danger, but then she felt it too. Whispering over the dead terrain a chilly breeze tugged, with Mother Nature’s cocky playfulness, at the curly locks that framed her angelic face. The moisture in the air grew cold, black clouds boiled furiously on the horizon.
“Oh…” she breathed.
The sun, in a matter of seconds, was totally covered by the inky mess that swam through the darkening sky. Big droplets splattered across the dirt, turning it to muck. The mumble of the wind slowly rose to a keening shriek. Rising from the ground was a growing wall of twisting death, a sand storm.
Her breath quickened, her body became rigid with tremors of fear. Grasping Chucks hand in her own, and stumbling backwards, she dragged him towards the tree line, even though she knew it was hopeless.
Striking blue-sliver light, flaming, angry, banishing all hope, took over the sky. Flashing at unknown intervals, the lighting caused complete turmoil. Slipping down, clawing up and tripping through and over sand dunes they went, having almost defeated burning death, only to be drowned by pounds of suffocating sand.
Josette desperately tried concentrating; a thing only novice shifters must do in chaos. She knew if she could change, shift into something fast, furious and athletic, they would be saved. But, at the last suspense filled second, she stumbled and went sprawling into the muck.