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Message: <blockquote data-quote="spyscribe" data-source="post: 2510250" data-attributes="member: 5808">Yeah, yeah, John.  It's all fun and games until someone loses their guide...Part the One-Hundred FiftiethIn which: What?  Another encounter?  But we haven’t slept yet!It’s late afternoon on the same day as the sandworm attack and Reyu is on high alert for signs of anything that might be hostile.Nothing like being swallowed alive to drive home the dangers of the desert.Currently, she is crouched on the ground examining a patch of sand.  The rest of the party stands behind, waiting for her pronouncement.  Reyu checks again.  Yes, there is no doubt.“They’re footprints.”“What sort of footprints?” Eva asks.Reyu shakes her head.  “I’m not certain.  They look almost like an elf, or human, but… quite small.”“Someone like Hue?” Thatch asks.“Perhaps,” Reyu replies.  “I cannot be sure.”With little discussion, the party decides to follow the footprints and see where they lead.  After all, they are only guessing that Djamel was leading them in the correct direction to find Pesshetaup, and even if the person whose footprints they are following is lost, at least they can then be lost together.However, aware that not everyone in the desert is friendly, they send Kiara in swallow form ahead to scout.Perhaps twenty minutes pass before she comes winging back to the party, flying as though there were a hawk behind her.  Remaining airborne, she shifts just to her hybrid shape and—between halting breaths—tells the party what she has seen.“I followed the tracks…  There’s a giant scorpion fighting… something invisible in the air.”Anvil frowns.  “A giant scorpion did not make the tracks we saw,” he informs her.Kiara shakes her head as she gets her breath back.  “There was as body on the ground.  A child.  I could hear someone else shrieking.  We have to go help.  Now!”No discussion at all is necessary this time as the party urges their camels to their fastest pace, following behind Kiara who is already flying ahead. As they ride hard over the sand dunes, Reyu turns to Anvil.  “How much healing do you have left?”His expression is grim as he answers.  “Some.  I would advise avoiding close combat if possible.”Reyu nods.  She does not have many spells left and she is not certain about the others.  This is going to be… difficult.Soon the party can hear the shrieking sound that Kiara told them about.  As they approach, the shrieking turns to crying.When they reach the source of the sound, the giant scorpion is snapping at something the party cannot see.  The broken body of the human child lies on the sand a little distance away.Wary of putting themselves in the path of the scorpion’s giant claws, the party takes what cover they can on top of and behind some scattered boulders in the area, hoping that the scorpion will not be able to easily scale them.The battle does not start auspiciously for the party.In the first barrage of arrows and crossbow bolts, only Thatch’s does not bounce harmlessly off the animal’s tough exoskeleton.  However, they have succeeded in gaining the monster’s complete attention.The scorpion skitters forward improbably quickly over the sand on its many-jointed legs, and—to Lira’s dismay—steps easily over the fifteen-foot mound where she had taken cover.  A massive claw plunges down towards her.Reacting before she has time to think, Lira ducks just as the claw comes snapping at her middle, shoving herself away off its tip as it as it closes on the air in front of her.  She backs up quickly, firing two magic missiles as she does.Eva takes advantage of the scorpion’s distraction to tumble past the range of its sweeping claws and tail.  She takes a shot as she gets into position, but her arrow cannot penetrate the outer shell.Kiara flies over to flank as well and—having watched the difficulties of the others—manages to take careful aim and bury her arrow right in the joint of one of the giant arthropod’s knees.  It makes a sound unlike any she has heard before, and the creature is clearly not pleased.The scorpion scampers off the mound after her and in that instant, Annika casts a web spell.It was a tactic she chose mostly because she was out of lightening bolts and magic missiles, but her choice proves fortuitous.  The web anchors on three of the rocky outcroppings, and the scorpion is soon completely ensnared.Thatch gets into position and shoots the creature twice, both arrows embedding deeply in a joint in its tail.  Anvil casts bull’s strength on himself and draws his sword, ready to charge at the first opening.Kiara hits with another arrow, and Reyu finishes summoning a dire wolf.  The wolf launches itself fearlessly into the fray, ignoring the hardening strands of Annika’s web and sinking its teeth into the joint above the scorpion’s right claw.  The scorpion tries to jerk away and succeeds in almost ripping its own limb clean off.That was the opening Anvil was looking for.  He closes with the scorpion and calling upon the mighty strength of Kettenek to be with him, he slashes down with his sword.  He hits true and severs the creature’s leg.  The scorpion stiffens and then topples over.  Dead.Thatch barely has time to get his breath back when he hears the sound of skittering sand behind him.  As Kiara shouts an alarm, he turns just in time to see the giant claw of another scorpion swooping down at him.There’s no time to get away as the claw snaps around his waist and hoists him clean out of his saddle in its painfully crushing grip.His comrades look on. For a second they are all frozen, aghast.But in the next moment, the party snaps back into action.“Do you have another web spell?” Lira yells over to Annika as she pulls Sheesak’s horn from her belt and prepares to sound it.“No!”“Okay,” Anvil directs the troops, “We’ve got to get that thing to drop—”“Something’s coming!”At Eva’s shout, those not immediately holding off the scorpion turn.  A low rumble trembles in the air, and from the other side of the dune just behind them, a cloud of sand approaches.“What the—?” And then, cresting over the ridge, a group of at least a dozen camel-mounted riders come charging towards the party.Lira watches and suddenly realizes that they are all casting.  More than that, they are all casting arcanely.  She just has time to register this when a barrage of magic missiles along with two freezing rays come flying at the scorpion, hammering it to the ground.If the monster knew what hit it, it probably wouldn’t have believed it was true.The camels come to a stop, skidding in the sand only a few yards from the party.  The group is led by a woman, riding a camel who wears an elaborate cloth headdress.  The woman throws a quick look over the party and shouts, “Nobody move!”When the party seems to be heeding her command the woman calls out again.  “Tia?  Imad?  Are you alright?”A child’s head suddenly appears, upside-down, in the air approximately ten feet above the ground, the same place previously so interesting to the scorpion.  “I’m okay.  Imad’s hurt.”“Come down,” the woman instructs the child, “let us see to him.”The head disappears to be replaced moments later by a rope, somehow anchored in midair.  The child climbs down, and two of the riders quickly dismount and come over, climbing the rope and disappearing.  A few seconds later, they reappear with the bleeding body of another child.“He’s alive,” one of the riders reports.  “But barely.”Lira looks over at Anvil, questioning.  He gives the smallest nod, and she clears her throat.“Excuse me?”The lead woman turns to Lira.  “Yes.  Who are you?”“My name is Lira.  And you are?”The woman ignores the question.  “What are you doing here?”“We saw tracks in the desert.  We followed them, heard the children in trouble, and came to help.  If the child is in need of healing, we can—”The woman cuts her off abruptly.  “Are you military?”“No.”The woman looks over at her camel for a few seconds, then back to Lira.  “Then what are you doing in the desert?”Lira debates for a moment, and decides on honest, if not full, disclosure.  “We were abandoned by our guide.”“And why was that?”“I don’t know.  He didn’t leave a note.”While Lira and the woman are talking, Anvil casts detect magic at the group on camels.  He doesn’t see anything.  One of the riders, however, notices him casting, and, giving Anvil a look of annoyance, detects magic back at him.  As he finishes the spell and examines the party, his eyes go wide.A whispered report makes its way back to the woman in charge.  Lira notices again that she turns to look at her camel before responding, almost as though she is consulting with it.“If you can stabilize the child, it would be appreciated.”Anvil nods and goes to see what he can do.“Might we check on our own wounded?” Lira asks, indicating Thatch, who is tentatively getting back to his feet.The woman does not appear to have a problem with this.“I’m sorry…” Lira says, “I hope this isn’t a rude question to ask, but… are you sorcerers?”There is a tense silence.  “Why do you ask?”“So am I.”Lira watches carefully, and this time she is sure that the woman is taking cues from the camel.  However, before she can decide what that could possibly mean, the woman addresses her again.  “If you are willing, we will escort you back to our camp where you may sleep and refresh yourselves.”“Willing?” Lira asks.“We would ask that you agree to be blindfolded for the journey.”Lira looks over at her companions, several of whom are clearly not enthusiastic about that plan.Lira turns back to the woman.  “Is that necessary?”“Yes.  If you do not know where we are, you cannot betray us to those who would harm us.”Lira sighs.  “With all due respect… we’re already lost.  Knowing how to get to your camp from a patch of desert we could never find again if we tried is hardly useful information.”“We would,” Reyu adds, “appreciate the gesture.”The barest pause.  A glance to the camel.  “Very well.”  Then.  “Wadiah.”Lira is confused.  “I’m sorry?”“You asked my name.”Although Anvil is not able to heal all of Imad’s injuries, he is able to stabilize him.  Meanwhile, other riders have wrapped the body of the third child in a blanket to be brought back to camp.  With nothing more to attend to, the party members mount their own camels, and ride off with the strangers from the desert.</blockquote>

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