Chapter 30 - Arabian Nights

After defeating the four skeletons, the group set up a temporary camp consisting of little more than a small fire fueled by whatever scraps of wood and debris they could find nearby.

The flames provided just enough warmth to partially offset the freezing nighttime temperatures of the Desert of the Dead. Beyond the circle of firelight stretched an endless sea of darkness and sand, cold enough to make even Adam thankful for the heat.

By the time they finished eating a simple meal of bear jerky Adam had prepared the day before, the massive sandstorm surrounding the giant dune at the center of the desert began to dissipate.

The swirling wall of sand slowly settled.

As the dust cleared, something enormous emerged from within.

A pyramid.

It rose from the desert like a mountain carved by the hands of gods, its massive stone sides stretching so high that it seemed to touch the stars.

For several moments, nobody spoke.

"Every night the pyramid appears, and by the end of the night it'll be buried beneath the sand again," Granessa commented while staring into the distance. "Or at least that's what gramps told me when I was a child. I've never actually been to the desert before."

She poked at the campfire with a stick.

"He forbade it, saying it was a cursed place. Especially for young women like myself."

Mei tilted her head.

"Young woman? How old are you?"

Adam had wanted to ask the same question, but he'd figured it would be rude.

"Orcs count age differently than humans, but by human standards, I'm nineteen."

Both Adam and Mei stared at her in stunned silence.

Granessa was the largest nineteen-year-old either of them had ever seen.

More importantly, she didn't seem nineteen.

Not that she looked old.

She just didn't look nineteen.

Both of them had assumed she was around their age, if not older. Instead, it turned out they were the older ones.

Granessa looked between them.

"Why? How old are you two?"

"Twenty-five," Adam answered.

"Twenty-four," Mei added.

Mei immediately felt a little embarrassed. She had even called Granessa elder sister when they first met.

Then again, considering Granessa's absurd strength, perhaps the title still applied.

"Oh." Granessa nodded. "You're older than I thought. It's hard to judge human ages."

Her eyes drifted over Adam and Mei.

"So tiny."

Adam took that personally.

He wasn't particularly tall, but he definitely wasn't tiny, in any respect.

Unfortunately, compared to an eight or nine-foot-tall orc woman, practically everyone looked tiny. Some of Granessa's own people were probably considered short next to her.

Honestly, she was the strange one here.

"What did your grandfather mean when he said this place is cursed?" Mei asked.

Her voice had dropped into a whisper, as though speaking too loudly might attract the curse's attention.

Granessa slowly shook her head.

"Um... I'm not entirely sure. I don't think he knew either. It was just an old story passed down from one generation of shaman to the next."

The desert wind howled.

Ooooo...

"Hic!"

Mei jumped and immediately grabbed Adam's arm. Hard.

Pain shot through his body as her nearly superhuman grip threatened to shatter several of his bones.

"It's just the wind," Adam said.

However, Mei wasn't looking at him. She pointed a trembling finger into the darkness beyond the campfire.

"T-that doesn't look like wind to me..."

Adam and Granessa followed her gaze. At first, they saw nothing. Then a gray shape drifted through the darkness.

Faint. Translucent. Floating silently across the sand.

A ghost.

And it wasn't alone.

Dozens more gradually emerged from the darkness. Then hundreds more after that.

A silent crowd of pale spirits gathered at the very edge of the campfire's light, their indistinct forms swaying gently in the desert wind.

The atmosphere around the camp instantly became much less comfortable.

Adam glanced at Granessa.

"Thought you said ghosts were scared away by fire."

Granessa shook her head.

"No. I said they won't approach fire."

"Fair point."

Adam watched the crowd of ghosts lingering just beyond the light.

"What's with them anyway?"

Granessa blinked.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, why are there ghosts in this desert?"

She thought about it for all of two seconds.

"The curse," she answered with a shrug. "Probably."

Adam nodded. That actually made sense.

With hundreds of ghosts lingering nearby, nobody was particularly interested in sleeping. Even if the spirits weren't attacking them, their silent presence was more than enough to keep everyone awake.

So instead, the three of them remained around the campfire, talking quietly while the ghosts watched from the darkness.

At one point, Adam glanced around the campfire and asked, "Would either of you like to hear a story?"

"What type of story?" Granessa asked.

"If it's a horror story, I'll bite you!" Mei bared her teeth at him like a rabid dog.

Having experienced her grip strength earlier, Adam wasn't eager to discover what her bite force was like. A deeply disturbing image briefly flashed through his mind.

He immediately shuffled a little farther away and subtly crossed his legs.

"It isn't a horror story," he assured her. "It's more of a fable. Or a collection of fables, I guess. You'll probably recognize it. It's called Arabian Nights."

"Oh, like Aladdin?"

"Uh, yeah. That's one of the stories."

Mei tilted her head.

"But why bring it up all of a sudden?"

Adam glanced toward the massive pyramid looming over the desert.

"The desert reminded me. And it was one of my mom's favorite books. She read parts of it to me when I was a kid. Though, to be fair, the original version is definitely not a children's story."

"Oh..." Mei's expression softened. "I wish I could have met her."

Adam smiled faintly.

"Yeah. She would've liked you. I've said it before, but the two of you are surprisingly similar."

Granessa looked back and forth between them in confusion.

"My mother died a long time ago."

"Oh. I'm sorry."

Adam shrugged. “Don't worry about it.”

"Mine too,” she said.

"Ah..."

An awkward silence settled over the campfire. No one seemed quite sure where to go from there. After several moments, Adam cleared his throat.

"Anyways, the story."

Both women looked at him.

"It starts with a sultan whose wife cheats on him. So he executes her, then decides to marry a new virgin every night and execute them the following morning."

Mei blinked.

"Your mother read this to you as a child?"

"Yeah." Adam nodded. "Like I said. Not a children's story."

Granessa looked mildly horrified.

Mei looked even more horrified.

"So did all the fathers rise up and overthrow him for murdering their daughters?"

"Uh... no."

Adam scratched his cheek.

"The sultan eventually marries a girl who comes up with a plan to save herself. Her name was... Shahar... Shashara... Shashasha..."

He frowned.

"Something like that."

"You don't know her name?" Mei asked.

"It's not important."

"It feels pretty important."

Adam ignored her.

"Anyways, she starts telling the sultan stories every night. Right before reaching the ending, she stops."

"Smart."

"Yeah. I think she falls asleep after that."

"You think?"

"Maybe."

Adam pointed a finger at her.

"Don't interrupt the storyteller."

Mei stared at him.

"You barely know the story."

Ignoring that entirely, Adam continued.

"The sultan gets hooked on the stories and keeps postponing her execution so he can hear what happens next. She keeps this up for one thousand and one nights. Eventually the sultan falls in love with her and decides not to kill her."

Silence.

Granessa and Mei exchanged a glance. Then they looked back at Adam.

"Is... that it?" Granessa asked.

Adam thought about it.

"...It's all I remember."

Mei slowly lowered her face into her hands.

"It was a nice story," she said diplomatically. "But what exactly was the point?"

Adam shrugged.

"I don't know. The giant pyramid in the middle of a desert reminded me of it, so I figured I'd share."

"Okay." Mei nodded seriously. "I think you need to work on your storytelling."

"Probably."

"And weren't there supposed to be lots of smaller stories? Like Aladdin?"

"There were."

"Where was Aladdin?"

Adam paused. "...I don't remember."

Mei stared at him. "What about Sinbad?"

"Don't remember."

"Alibaba?"

"Nope."

Mei facepalmed so hard the sound echoed around the campfire.

Before she could continue criticizing his storytelling abilities, a booming voice suddenly rolled across the desert.

"A virgin has entered my desert. Bring her to me!"

The voice thundered through the night, shaking the air itself.

The campfire crackled. Silence followed.

Adam and Mei slowly turned toward Granessa.

Granessa's blue cheeks had turned a deep shade of purple.

Mei looked back at Adam.

"Don't tell me that's the sultan from your story."

"Uh..." Adam glanced toward the pyramid. "It shouldn't be. Sultans don't usually live in pyramids."

"You sound uncertain."

"I am uncertain."

Mei pointed an accusing finger at him.

"Did you jinx us?"

Adam opened his mouth. Then he closed it. Then he opened it again.

"I... honestly can't say with complete confidence that I didn't."

Mei groaned.

"Anyways," Adam said, choosing to ignore the accusation, "should we run?"

"Too late." Granessa pointed into the darkness beyond the firelight.

Adam and Mei followed her finger.

Before they saw anything, they heard it.

Rattling and clanking.

The sound of countless bones striking against one another. The noise rolled across the sand like an approaching storm. Then shapes began to emerge from the darkness.

Skeletons.

Hundreds of them.

An entire army was marching toward their tiny camp.

“Scheherazade!” Adam said suddenly. 

Both women glanced at him as if he had lost his mind.

“What?”

“The girl's name. It was Scheherazade.”

“Which girl?”

“The one from the story. The girl who married the sultan.”

“O… kay? Is that important?”

“No… I just remembered, was all,” he shrugged.