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Night has begun to fall upon the desert, and you struggle to identify the approaching figure - a survivor, surely, but the shadows of the great dunes are cast deep here by the lowering sun.
“...Morrigan, is that you there?” Ahriman’s familiar voice calls out, a hint of pain and confusion coloring the young man’s words as he approaches slowly, clutching at his side, “I feared there were no others left! They slew my men, I was left for dead in the sands.”
“Hail, Captain! Thine eyes see true,” You answer back with a wave of your good arm, squinting to make out details of the man - hair darker than night and pale skinned, he wears a tighter fitting robe than your own, and rounded organic armor made from the chitinous plates of bull beetles. Two carbon pockmarks have scored deep into his ridged breastplate, a few nicks adorn other plates, and his left hand clutches at a bloody side, “What news of the princes thee swore life to?”
There is a long pause before he speaks, and you cannot make out his features well in the deepening dark, “He fell. We were separated, their skimmers cast so much sand I could scarcely see, but I saw a blade pierce his breast.”
“...Fallen?” You ask quietly, unable to muster the strength to shout the word. That cannot be so! The prince was surely the slaver’s most valuable target, their leader even asked to speak with him during the brief parley with the caravan chief. No, this must be a coward’s lie, you won’t believe it. “Thou would swear it, Ahriman? Upon the ancestor’s wrath?”
