"A few minutes longer and I am not so sure escape would have been possible. You were foolish to risk being captured, habibi." The old man sat, absent-mindedly picking at a cuticle of his wooden prosthesis. A heavy sigh and soft chuckle before he continued. "But here you are, and hundreds owe you their lives. You couldn't make me prouder." 

Back turned to him, Najwa washed away the blood and ash of the previous 6 hours. The remains of the Xanathan uniform she'd expropriated earlier lay in a huddled mass by her father and commander's feet. Having completed her report, she stepped away from the alcove artfully hewn into solid rock and entered an adjoining chamber of her quarters. 

She returned moments later, now comfortable in her fatigues and ready for further admonishing when her environment subtly shifted. Upon retrospect, she could never determine what exactly occurred. Najwa found herself in a dimly lit hall. Gone were the scents of Kethiwe's cooking. The sounds of tired and grateful villagers adjusting to the sudden upheaval of their lives once more. 

Fingertips brushed against the cragged surface of a massive stone tablet, depicting a seated figure draped in many robes. [i]Something... a fire perhaps?[/i] A cold gust of air sailed the corridor's length and on it danced the heady perfume of incense and mucidity. [i]There... breathing?[/i]

Apprehensive at the alien nature of her arrival and surroundings, Najwa drew her pistol and readied it. Like her namesake, the Lioness silently approached the source of what she was almost certain was breathing, passing through several chambers before reaching the wide arch that gave way to an expansive hall. The mountains that broke through the thick haze beyond narrow carvings in the stone were unlike any she had seen across her homeland.

A few steps further and she was met with the locus of her unease. He... It- had its back to her and sat in the center of a pool of sand, neatly surrounded by the dregs of seeds and... what smelled like sap? The Gwinyai brothers told tales of mtyholi, devils of the jungle, that drew power from terrible places. This thing, that seemed to be both living and dead, must be one of them. 

Najwa stood nearly ten yards away, weapon up and pointed at the center of its back. Finger on the trigger and alert for the slightest provocation, she called out in Xhosa. 

[i]"Did you bring me here? What is this place?"[/i]