[h3][i]stop[/i][/h3]
[hr][i]14th Midyear, 4E208
Oasis, Alik'r Desert[/i][hr]
The underground oasis offered a welcome shelter from walking in the dry heat of the desert. Anifaire was relieved to simply have some shade, used to heat but unaccustomed to the sun beating down on her for so long. She was grateful she had bought Hammerfell clothing, as the flowing cloth didn’t stick to her skin with sweat. Alim bought them, not her, she remembered, Alim who was 

She wondered how Shakti could ever remember the expanse of the desert well enough to recall exactly where an oasis might be nearby. After all, each dune looked the same as the last, the dry, endless sands appearing to never change no matter how long the group traveled. She wondered if Alim liked the desert; he was a Redguard. But he wasn’t here, enjoying the desert, because he’d been

A bag of supplies and the smallest tent she could find from the wagon in hand, Anifaire sought out a private area, or at least the closest she could get to it in the cavern. She began struggling with her tent, trying to unfold it the way she’d seen others do in the past. At each turn, the tent fought against her, but no frustration built within her. Steadily, she worked towards her goal. She missed the Three Crowns, where she’d had a bed, she’d been able to eat, where she’d... been paid to fight in a resistance, a resistance she’d seen butchered and burnt and 

Tents were difficult, she concluded. Having never been taught to put one up, she tried to avoid making it obvious to anyone how much she struggled. The Altmer hadn’t spoken a word since seeing the inn, Alim was inside, flipping a burnt body that resembled 

Water, she thought, would help after the heat of the day. She filled a bucket with water fresh from the river. It was chilled water, and fresh, kept cool by virtue of being underground. The water felt good on her shaky hands, grime and sand dust washing away into the river. Returning to her lopsided tent, she knew she wanted nothing more than sleep. Between the rescue and the desert, Anifaire hadn’t been so tired since the group fled the Imperial City. The bucket of water set aside and forgotten, she crawled into the tent. 

The mossy and sandy ground beneath her was surprisingly soft. She had a blanket bunched into a comfortable pillow. The warmth of the desert relaxed her, now that she was in comfortable shade. 

Yet, sleep refused to take her, despite how nothing was out of place. Everything was perfect, in the little tent, where Anifaire lay, counting tropical birds from her homeland in her imagination. The last time she had done so was lost to memories in her childhood, her mother seated next to the bed, singing delicate lullabies. It wasn’t right. Everything was perfectly settled, the party had even stopped earlier in the day, and she had time to get a real rest, comfortable in a cave with a real tent and real blankets, but her breathing shook in gasping breaths. 

She raised a hesitant hand up to eye-level, watching as her fingers shook. She wondered why they shook. Slowly, she touched her face; her golden skin was wet, salty tears dripping freely from her eyes in all directions, catching in her mouth and pooling on her neck uncomfortably. She rolled onto her side, tucking her knees up to her stomach. 

She wondered if any animals lived in the desert. The area seemed barren and vast. She thought perhaps animals knew how to find water, like Shakti. When they’d been in Gilane, Hammerfell hadn’t seemed nearly so vast or dry. 

The image of the Three Crowns in flames flashed in her mind, the scent of blood and burning filled 

If there were any animals in the desert, they must be small creatures. Perhaps they lived in underground areas like this oasis. She wondered if they hunted, or possibly ate moss.

She recalled seeing a Dwemer knocked in the shoulder by one of her bricks get disemboweled because of the distraction, the orc, Mazrah, catching him with her spear. The sight of his innards leaking out of his neck from the wound and the sight of his body spasming as it crumpled to the ground had been

Perhaps the desert housed small weasels, like groundhogs. 

Sobs had begun to shake her, her face shifting to muffle any noise in the blanket. She couldn’t hold back, thoughts scattered as she tried to focus from one idle musing to the next, a wall built to defend against the events of the past day, crumbling like sand. 

The battle was vivid. She’d avoided the thick of it, but the observer’s perspective was a burden; she’d seen many skirmishes all at once, Dwemer falling, frenzied and in chaos, blood on the ground. It wasn’t the same as the Falmer, it wasn’t the same as passing nameless bodies in the Imperial City attack she refused to look just a little to hard at. Anifaire had been a part of it. She’d watched, participated, thrown stones, and she’d felt proud, she’d felt helpful, yet now all she could recall was the blood and guts spilling onto the cobblestone. Feelings on the subject warred within her; she’d [i]helped[/i] her friends, and yet that meant harming the Dwemer. 

Who attacked the inn. The husk of the building was left, the panic filling her as she recalled Alim had been inside, that others had been there. She caught side of a Redguard, face down and burned, a man, on the ground, and reached down to flip him over in a hurry, trying not to wretch from the scent of burnt flesh 

Are there birds in the desert? 

The body was disfigured, burns marred the face grotesquely; the imagine burned into her mind. She remembered him, someone she’d at the inn several times before, and it disturbed her to see someone she recognized limp and lifeless,  yet she was relieved though her horror - not Alim, no, Alim hadn’t been there. They took him, the Dwemer took him while they freed Daro’Vasora, and there was nothing she could do to help when they didn’t even know

The desert must be free of mosquitos. A minor blessing, at least one thing to be grateful for.

Alim was taken, like others had been. Anger tinged her thoughts as she wished she could wade her way through Dwemer until she was sure he was well, yet she could do nothing of the sort, because she was just Anifaire, a useless noble lady who could do little more than throw stones in a fight. Hopelessness surpassed the twinge of anger she’d felt, as she felt disjointed, disconnected, Alim was her friend, this group unlike anyone she'd known in Alinor, yet the Dwemer could just meander into the inn and [i]take[/i] one, leaving behind them a gore-filled mess of bodies and the scent of blood and burning and

Her body stilled, breathing steadier, tears falling gently, an emptiness forming in the pit of her stomach as she cried in the solitude of her tent walls.