Deep in the rainforest, where the canopy swallows the stars and only firelight keeps the dark at bay, a small group of Tabaxi sat around a dying fire. Merchants, porters, a pair of sellswords — all bound for Rigool at first light, all wondering aloud about the desert road.
Someone asked if anyone had made the crossing before.
Smoke Before Rain stared into the coals for a long moment.
“I’ve crossed that desert a dozen times. Wide flat sand, two days hard walking, good coin. I thought I knew it.
There were eight of us on that crossing — four traders, two drivers, myself, and a young one on their first job who hadn’t stopped asking questions since we left the gates. The carts were heavy with cloth and dried spice. The morning was cold and clear. Nothing felt wrong.
We were half a day out from Rigool when the sand moved.
Not wind. Not heat shimmer. Something under us — a slow roll, like the ground itself was breathing. I stopped walking. I remember thinking I should say something.
Then the earth exploded.
It came up beneath the lead cart. Something huge — all black chitin and too many legs and a jaw that split open like it had been waiting its whole life for the chance. It didn’t make a sound. It just had Wind Through Tall Grass in its mouth, and then Wind was gone. Dragged down into a hole that closed behind them like nothing had ever been there.
Everyone started screaming.
One of the traders swung a blade at it. Someone bolted. Then it surfaced again, further back — quicker than anything that size had the right to be — and it opened its mouth and spat. A long hissing stream of yellow-green swept across two of the traders. The sound they made didn’t last long.
I ran.
I didn’t help anyone. I didn’t call out. I ran until my legs gave out. Got up and ran again. Sand to scrubland. Scrubland to rock. I kept going until I couldn’t hear anything behind me anymore.
I was the only one who walked back into Rigool.”
The fire crackled. No one spoke.
“Take the northern road,” Smoke said. “It adds a day.”
They pulled their cloak tight and said nothing more that night.