Emmaline let out a squeak of panic as the bolt of concentrated dark magic flew at Amal. She didn’t even have a moment to call a warning before it struck the thief. To her shock and delight the bolt seemed to fly wide somehow, desiccating a patch of rushes rather than sucking the life from the thief as it ought to have done. She didn’t understand the shouted exchange between the creature and Amal and she crouched down behind the dyke racking her brain for something to do. The only method of escape she could see was the carpet, but the thing had been too sluggish to give her much hope it could carry them any distance. 

Magic seemed the only answer, but she didn’t know any spell that might turn the tables. Grimly she resolved to try anyway, casing aside her staff and squatting down on the moist earth to gather her energy. To her surprise the staff shimmered into the form of the cobra that had bitten the bandit back in the cave after the caravan attack. It raised its head slightly and hissed worriedly before ducking back down out of sight. It glanced left and right and then struck at a patch of earth perhaps five feet from Emmaline. It looked at her critically and then struck again, batting it wedge shaped head against the dirt. Emmaline arched an eyebrow, risking a quick glance over the dyke to see Amal racing full tilt around the edge of the oasis pursued by the chariot rider and his skeletal horsemen. She looked back at the snake that was worrying the dirt with its face.

“You want me to dig?” she asked in Reikspiel. The snake nodded emphatically, bobbing its hooded head up and down. Emmaline sunk her fingers into the dirt, scooping up a handful of the mud. To her surprise there was something solid in it. Quickly she scraped away the muck to reveal a rusted piece of iron, perhaps a wheelwrights nail the top of which still glimmered with gilding.

“How is this supposed…” Emmaline began but even as she did so she understood. Amal was shouting obscenities at his pursuers as he fled around the wadi. On a straight course the skeletal horseman would have caught him in moments, but the curve and the boggy soil kept him ahead of his pursuers for a few more moments. Emmaline sketched an arcane design into the soil with a muddy fingertip and set the nail in the center of it before beginning to incant. 

Amal’s lungs burned as he raced, pondering his chances of leaping into the oasis to escape his pursuers. The thunder of skeletal hooves reverberated off the half ruined walls turning the dozen or so pursuers into a brigade about to ride him into the dirt. He risked a glance over his shoulder to see the chariot only twenty paces behind him. It would have been an easy spear cast for the rider, but the mummified creature clearly intended to finish the business in a more personal fashion. Suddenly, the chariot itself was limbed in golden light and it seemed to fall away behind Amal. He watched in amazement as it flew backwards along its path, dragging the skeletal horses attached to it like boat anchors, its wheels a foot above the ground. The remaining horsemen flowed around it like a tide, intent on ending the impudent thief. Amal drew in a shuddering breath and ran onwards. To his utter amazement the chariot continued to fly backward around the oval of the oasis, though by now it had turned broadside due to the steeds continued attempts to paw for purchase on the ground. It rocketed around the shore in opposition to he racing riders pursing Amal. He heard Emmaline yell something as the chariot raced towards him but Amal’s reflexes were already throwing him to the ground. The chariot flew over him, missing him by mere inches, the windrush obscuring the ancient obscenities being shouted by the mummy thing.

The noise was tremendous.

The metal body of the carriage and horses smashed into the onrushing cavalry, none of whom had been able to maneuver to avoid it. The sound of splintering bone was deafening as the chariot scythed the horseman down like new mown hay before a scythe blade. Pieces of ossuary rained down into the oasis with a pattering splash before, with a final violent convulsions, the chariot itself seemed to pitch into the center of the pool  raising a vast geyser as the chariot, its horses shattered and gone but its rider still pinned in the mangled metal framework plunged beneath the water. The was silence broken only by the ripples washing ashore like waves. Behind him Amal could see a ruin of shattered jagged bone. Here and there a skeleton was trying to drag itself forward but for the most part the ruin was too complete to be believed. 

Emmaline stood up from behind the dyke where she had been concealed, her hands muddy and with blood running from her right nostril. She leaned heavily on her staff, her golden eyes clearing to their usual blue.

“Tada…” she breathed and then her knees buckled and she sank to the ground.