Qedhar slipped out of his tent and surveyed the encampment around him.  His 
children, slave and free, were playing in front.  His wife's eldest son, 
Rashar, who was three, suddenly objected to Omana's taking one of his toy 
horses and flung a rock at her.  Omana came running, tears streaming.

Qedhar smiled at his eldest child.  "You shouldn't take your brother's toy."

"He wasn't playing with it!" she protested.

"You have toy of your own."

"I don't like my toy, I like his."

Qedhar sighed.  She would be a warrior woman, he could tell.  She didn't 
like the dolls and toy dishes he had so lovingly given her.  He opened his 
mouth to speak, when he caught something out of the corner of his eye.  He 
looked up to see a storm cloud on the horizon, heading his way rapidly.

No.  It wasn't a storm cloud.

"By Gamal, what...?"

Then it was over them.  Strange, ash grey forms descended on the tents, like 
avenging ghosts.  A horse screamed, then another, then he saw a woman 
enveloped by one of the forms.  He pulled his sword and it flamed into 
glory.  Omana clung to him.

Rashar screamed and Qedhar looked to see his son, the heir of the tribe of 
Gamal, swallowed in a grey form.

******

Qedhar limped through the ruins of his camp.  Tents smoldered where his 
tribesmen had caught them afire in their attempts to kill the horrors.  
Bones of men, women, children, dogs, horses, littered the camp.  Nothing 
moved, save by the wind from the heat of the fires.

His left arm burned where a horror had grabbed it.  His clothes were in 
tatters where they had eaten through and into his flesh.  They stuck to him, 
glued there by dried and drying blood.

His tribe had fought honorably, but swords didn't harm the creatures.  The 
blessed Sword of Gamal, which he bore as chieftain, had killed them with its 
flaming blade, but no common sword worked.  The parts of the creatures just 
continued moving and attacking... and feeding.

He had witnessed fifteen of his sixteen children killed.  Omana lay, swathed 
in bandages near the ravages of his tent.  He had watched his wife die... 
the wife of his youth... Raisha.  His concubines... his children...  A body, 
half-eaten, lay before his mother's tent.  He couldn't tell if it was her.

Qedhar couldn't go on.  He collapsed in the path and cried.

Some time later, he noticed a horse limping through the village.  It was 
injured, eaten into.  Qehdar considered killing it.  He had lived his whole 
life as a warrior, had taken pride in the great swards of men, women and 
children who had fallen by his blade.  But now he couldn't kill this creature.

He had to leave this place.

He caught the horse by the reins still on it and led it to Omana, laying so 
still.

"My daughter Omana, do you still live?" he asked, as his right hand sought a 
pulse.

It was there.  He sighed in relief.  He lifted her carefully, gritting his 
teeth at the pain that ran through his left arm, and laid her on the horse. 
It took a while to secure her because his left hand wouldn't work.

Then he began walking, leading the horse, not caring where he went, so long 
as it was away.

******

He didn't know how many days he had travelled.  He had collapsed for the 
night here, by this river within this ravine.  He had no idea where he was. 
There was an awful stench coming from his arm, Omana's legs, and the horse. 
He carefully unwrapped the bandages and looked at his arm, the stench nearly 
overwhelming him.  The arm up to a little below the elbow was the 
black-green colour of dead flesh.  He knew if he didn't remove it, it would 
poison him.

But first, he examined Omana's legs, and was greeted by the same sight.  He 
didn't examine the horse.

He pulled out the blade of Gamal, watching as it burst into flames.  It 
should cauterise the wounds.

"Lila, protector of child, help my daughter Omana.  Hehran, healer, touch 
us.  Gamal, look to your servant and bless me.  I am your last.  I serve you 
as I have in past.  My daughter Omana, forgive me."

With that prayer, he raised the sword and swung towards his daughter's legs.

After the deed was done, he threw up, though he had had no food recently.  
Then, he lay his left arm on a log... and prayed he could manage this.

As the sword seared through his flesh, he fought for consciousness.  He 
studied the stump as the darkness flowed over him.  It was done.  Gamal 
protect him, it was done.

And then there was darkness.

******

The morning sun glinted off the hides of the two dragons as they landed and 
let their riders dismount, surveying the horrible scene in silence.

Respectfully submitted,
 Lynette R. F. Cowper
  Qedhar

[NRPG: Qedhar is in the Cleft.  Anyone finding him, he'll be unconscious, 
half-starved, dehydrated, with many wraith injuries, missing his left arm 
just above the elbow (though the missing part is lying nearby), clutching a 
strange flaming scimitar.  Omana will be barely alive, wraith-injured and is 
missing both legs from mid-thigh down (likewise on those parts).  The horse 
is dead, also wraith-eaten.  He doesn't speak or understand the DragonLands 
tongue (not that he's going to be conscious any time soon).]

 **********************************************************************
 * Lynette R. F. Cowper       *  Official INWO Rules NetRep & Goddess *
 * lcowper@io.com             *        Circle of Janus Secretary      *
 * lcowper@indy.net           *   VP of P.U.R.P.L.E. (People United   *
 * http://www.io.com/~lcowper/*   Respecting Purple Legal Equality)   *
 **********************************************************************
 *    I write of things which I have neither seen nor suffered nor    *
 *  learned from another, things which are not and never could have   *
 *  been, and therefore my readers should by no means believe them.   *
 *                                            --Lucian of Samosata    *
 **********************************************************************