A week in the desert. A week of hell.

  It was only safe to move at night, and with no furs to protect them the cold had gnawed into their bones, steadily sapping their strength. Their armour had become a curse; holding the chill close to the chest.

  They had spent the first day in a panic; rushing and scrambling in every direction as enemy scouts appeared from nowhere, hunting their scent. On the second day Rexis instructed them to learn from the local wildlife, which by day hid in the dunes.

  Thus, they buried themselves in increasingly smaller holes as they grew weaker, attempting to replenish what little strength they had left.

  Callia had passed by them on the fourth day. She came sliding down the dune in which they were hiding, smeared with dried gore and wailing like a banshee.

  Her movements were erratic, confused. She made too much noise and a wound she had sustained in the battle left tell-tale droplets of red behind her. Aiur moved to urge her inside, but Rexis tugged at his arm and shook his head. As soon as she had appeared, she was bolting off up another dune. A scant few minutes later they heard the distant rumble of hooves and feet bounding across the sand.

  She was the last and only sentient being they had seen that was not in chains. Any hope of others escaping from the burning hamlet had long since been snuffed out.

  Aiur ran his mind back through the recent weeks that led him to be buried pathetically in the sand as he lay there for the seventh day in a row. He felt as though he was being punished. He could not see the others, and he dared not speak to them, and so to save his sanity he…recounted how he had come to be here. Again, and again, and again.

  Perhaps he had fed his ego too much? Had there been some act of hubris or evil that had gone unnoticed. Had he offended greater beings, perhaps even Aten somehow?

  Or did he simply make a poor choice in this expedition, a bad judgment made on selfish impulse…

  Perhaps that train of thought was not the best for his sanity. But anything was better than sleep now.

  The dreams had become unsettling in recent days. He continued to find himself falling into a depthless void, yet for a void it did not feel so empty. Though he could hear nothing, see nothing, feel nothing, there was an unearthly sense of a… presence. He could not quite quantify it, but it felt as though there was something there, something attempting to impart meaning.

  It terrified him.

  He had expected to lose track of time, for the entire experience to blend together into a nightmarish amalgamation in his mind. In truth, the exact opposite had occurred and. he could feel every second ticking by.

  Thus, running through the events of recent days and evaluating his own actions in excruciating detail had become somewhat of an escape from the inexorable passage of time.

  He was comforted in that, and came to the conclusion that without liberally employing the gift of hindsight, he would not have acted any differently. Of course, had he known there would be a Naga in the area he would have suggested this expedition in the first place.

  He lay there, musing on this as the day inched by, waiting for the hated embrace of night.

  ***

  A few meters away, Daiss was asleep.

  The man was supposed to be on watch, remaining vigilant for the Naga’s minions. But the pain was simply too much to bear in total stillness and silence for hours on end. At night he could grumble, groan and stretch to his liking as they trudged through the sand, but by day he was all too aware that the slightest movement could give their position away.

  Rexis listened to Daiss’s heavy breathing as he slept, and he thanked Aten that the warrior didn’t snore. He, on the other hand, was trying to figure out where they were.

  He’d been guiding them with an air of confidence, but in reality he had no clue of their precise location. He knew where he wanted to go: south, across the Ahbek, and then along the banks to the port-city of Balanzar. House Amunet may not be their allies, or even on particularly friendly terms, but their history of fighting the Naga should work in their favour. That was the plan at least.

  How far was the Ahbek? How far was Balanzar? He had no idea on either score. He knew they were heading south, that was the easy part, but how far they had gone and how far they still had to go was a mystery to him. It was made worse, now they had run out of water.

  He had said nothing about their plight to the others, but what he’d been able to scavenge had finally run out after seven days of extreme rationing. With no clue how close they were to the river, the nearest source of clean water could be hours, or days away. He recalled how Daiss had collapsed the previous night after several hours of marching. They didn’t have days.

  Finding water in the dead of night was going to be almost impossible. They would have to start taking risks.

  ***

  Night came, and they emerged from their sandy prisons.

  The darkness was total, the dunes transformed from shimmering gold and yellow to dull black, the pale light of the moon insufficient to see more than a couple of metres ahead.

  Rexis stared upwards, marvelling at the beauty of the infinite stars above them as Aiur pulled Daiss out into the open. The ever-constant presence of the Corpal stars; a bright turquoise ring-constellation on the southern horizon, made finding his bearings easy.

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  It appeared directly before him, hung low in the sky. A single streak of light, a shooting star, struck across the face of the grand constellation. A good omen.

  Their heading was simple. The nearest source of water however, remained a mystery. The terrain before him was a dark, rolling landscape of never-ending sand punctuated with rocky outcrops and deep valleys. It stretched on seemingly without end, as far as he could see.

  As he mused over their situation, Aiur had moved up to his side, with Daiss following a few meters behind. They both looked awful, their heavy armour inundated with sand and faces drawn with fatigue; the scales around the eyes were sunken and dark, twitches and shivers becoming incessant as they fought a running battle to stay awake.

  “We head for the crevasse. Nestled between the dunes over there,” Rexis declared, pointing out the yawning opening in question; a tiny crack in the landscape, only visible from the way the pale light caught on the exposed rock.

  “Seems far. Think we can make it?” Aiur asked, reflexively rubbing his scarred right arm. A makeshift bandage bound it, but it had turned red days ago.

  “It is. We’re going to have to start taking some risks,” Rexis said, eyeing the gloomy horizon.

  Aiur sighed. “Daiss can’t handle moving during the day.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” Rexis said, shaking his head. “We have no choice; we’re not moving fast enough. That crevasse will be our lifeline, it’ll let us get our bearings come dawn.”

  “Because of the horde or the lack of supplies?” Aiur asked. The knowledge that their chances were slim was plain on his face, and that Rexis’ confidence was as fragile as their hope.

  “Both,” Rexis said. “The horde is going to do one of two things; continue to raid and reave in the countryside, leaving with such a large toll in slaves there will be no-one left for the harvest this year, or…They’re going for a bigger prize. They might be getting bold and plan to strike Balanzar itself. Either way they need to know. Meanwhile we cannot survive on tiny scorpions for much longer.”

  “Then leave me behind,” came the pained voice of Daiss behind them. He’d staggered up to them, his tail dragging a furrow in the sand behind him. “Get me to that hole in the ground. I can hide there, and you can come back for me…maybe with a horse?” he chuckled grimly, and immediately winced.

  “No!” Aiur snapped. “We got you this far, not only would abandoning you now be pointless, but I refuse to simply let you die out here.”

  Daiss motioned to the fused mass of metal embedded in his side. “This has long since cooled, I’m not getting any worse. You on the other hand…Every day you don’t see a priestess you’re running the risk of puncturing a lung, or that arm getting infected.”

  “We are getting you out of here. We are getting you to Balanzar. That. Is. Final,” Aiur snarled

  Rexis stepped between them, putting a hand on each of their shoulders. “Either plan means we get to that crevasse tonight. I doubt I need to remind you that a shouting match would also be a terrible idea. You both need medical attention, so shut up and walk.”

  Both nodded, knowing that arguing with him was fruitless, but Rexis continued regardless.

  “Let me remind you that you are both key members of your House. You both have people who care deeply for you in Nerkai. People who would doubtless kill me if they knew I left either of you in the desert alone by choice. There is no argument to be had here. There is no comparison of your suffering to be made. We will get you to Balanzar, and we will come back with hunters for this thrice-dammed serpent.”

  Rexis marched off towards the crevasse, leaving Daiss and Aiur to exchange glances before following along as rapidly as their injured bodies would allow. Neither had ever seen Rexis so decisive with his superiors.

  ***

  The crevasse was like an old war wound; from afar it seemed little more than an insignificant slit in the sand, but up close it was something else entirely.

  Although narrow, it ran so deep even the splintered starlight could not filter down to its gloom-ridden, craggy depths. Pale stone was rendered inky, and jagged impressions loomed out of the darkness, some yielding to the slightest touch and others as implacable as fortress walls. To add to the precarious nature of the place, piles of fine sand were indistinguishable from rock in the darkness, and could give way underfoot at any moment.

  All of that together ensured one thing: it was cold, so very cold.

  “If we’re staying down here, we’d best be making a fire.” Aiur shivered an unfamiliar and unsettling sensation that was only compounded by the jolt of pain every lurching step on the uneven stone sent up his spine.

  “Smoke would give us away,” Rexis said absent-mindedly. The lanky scout had found something amongst the rock and rubble, and he was focussed entirely on trying to move a particularly large stone. He tried to force his numb fingers into the cracks around its edge or to curl around its face, tugging, shoving and dragging in his attempts to move it, yet it refused to budge.

  Aiur frowned at the scout’s back for a long moment. He knew it was the cold seeping into his bones, into his mind, twisting him up and making him wrong with its devilish touch, but he could not shake the unease he was feeling.

  “Change of plans?” he mumbled, peering over Rexis’ shoulder. He could see what had caught the scout’s attention now; there was a slight but noticeable seam between the stone and all the other featureless slabs of rock around it. “Thought we were staying here until dawn.”

  “Well call me curious, but this looks sealed for a reason.” Rexis sighed, motioning to it. “Smacks of civilisation to me.”

  “Need help?” Aiur winced as he shuffled over the loose ground to get a better view from the side, sending tiny pebbles skittering about their feet with each step. He slid his khopesh out from the loop at his belt, weighing it in his good hand.

  Rexis shrugged, leaning out of the way as Aiur stepped forward. He squinted, peering at the rock in the gloom and scraping the slim point of his weapon into the crack. He wiggled it, pushing it forward with a groan and scrape of metal, and after several manoeuvres the blade inched in. He froze, letting the echoes bounce their way along the valley walls and filter out into the desert.

  Even Daiss, perched slightly higher up on a flat rock keeping watch, turned to look down at them. Aiur was sure he detected puzzlement behind that chainmail mask.

  Using the blade as a lever, Aiur began to push. At first, nothing happened. He put all his remaining strength into it but the stone would not budge until, teeth gritted and pain jolting through his cold, aching body, the rock sprung free into Rexis’ waiting hands with a dull scrape and a sharp snap that Aiur hoped didn’t mean what he thought it did.

  Cold air, cold even for the crevasse, seeped from the opening beyond and breath began to mist in front of their faces. Rexis stooped into the entrance and disappeared, his boots tapping on the stone as he seemed to descend into the depths of the earth.

  The cold is not a place for lizards, was all Aiur could think, as he peered into the hole. Even swallowed in darkness as it was, he could just make out the impression of a sloping tunnel and the first few stairs of the descent. He shivered again, taking a moment to examine his khopesh. The end of the blade had snapped off, and a lengthy sliver now lay on the crevasse floor.

  “I was fond of that,” he mumbled to no-one in particular, twisting the weapon slowly in his hand with a measure of mournful regret. His knees groaned in protest as he knelt to reverently collect the snapped shard of his weapon off the crevasse floor.

  “Are we going down there?” Daiss whined, snapping Aiur from his reverie as the man loomed at his side. He leaned on his glaive to peer over his master and into the hole, breath misting the air in short puffs.

  “It seems we are.” Aiur shuffled forward and peered into the gloom. He could barely see more than a few feet beyond where he stood and the escaping air had a stale smell. He looked over his shoulder, back at Daiss. “If this cold drives us mad, stab him first.”