During the era of Rising Stability, early in the reign of his majesty Husun the Second, there was war in Shdustu, fought amid the cities of the Nikkad. This was a brutal conflict, fought over the rights and privileges of their princes over their farmers that pitted brother against brother upon their narrow streets and spread throughout their many cities across southern Shdustu. As part of this conflict, the commander of Gudishgul Fortress took his best troops northward to Dusgus, in the hopes of extracting his sister, married to the prince of that city, from captivity and death. The much depleted garrison left behind was led by an officer named Gadsmudal, a dissolute nobleman often in his cups and given to administering severe punishments for the least breach of discipline.
Taskemis was a soldier serving among those left behind. Though Nikkad by birth, he had a half-Kharal father, and this was held against him and stymied all hope of advancement, a status that remains true to the present. He was diligent, capable, and popular among those troops left at the fortress, something their commander was not. Additionally, Gadsmudal had ordered all travel beyond the fortress forbidden due to fighting in Shnududishgu. Merchants were either forced to wait at the isolated defensive post or try and make their way back across the perilous desert at an inopportune time. This scheme served to accumulate great stores of wealth and treasure in the fortress, guarded by bored mercenaries with no means to earn coin and rapidly expending their savings on the many vices on offer. These soldiers for hire, men accustomed to life on the road and poorly suited to stillness, outnumbered the remaining garrison significantly. Wise to the rising wind within the walls, Taskemis took steps to befriend these as well, and he smuggled wine from the garrison's stores up to these men to enliven their nights, a move that kept the mercenaries from rioting.
When Gadsmudal learned that wine he considered reserved for his own consumption was being shared with mercenaries, he had all such practices immediately halted and threw Taskemis in the dock pending a whipping. The imprisoned soldier told his guards that they too would face the whip soon enough, and even if Gadsmudal favored them, there would be no relief in the end. Their commander had been gone too long to return victorious. A new army would claim the fortress soon enough, and they had no strength to repel an assault. Death hung over them all. He whispered instead that if they freed him they could take the fortress and all its wealth and then live the rest of their days as nobles in the Foothill Kingdom.
He must have been a truly persuasive man, for his would be captors placed a sword in his hand and they marched to the commander's suite where, finding him drunkenly coupling with a prostitute, Taskemis severed his head with three strokes. He and his allies then descended on the barracks and swiftly slaughtered all who they believed would not follow them before tossing the severed head of Gadsmudal into the middle of the encampment where caravaneers and mercenaries waited. A proposal accompanied that grisly token; turn rebel and join their host, or perish. Few among the mercenaries deliberated long, and that night the yards of Gudishgul ran red with blood. It is said that it seeped deep into the soil of the courtyard, and on the rare days when rain comes, spots of crimson still bubble to the surface.
In the immediate aftermath, Taskemis made good on his promises. He gathered up riches, trade goods, and animals from the slaughtered merchants, plundered anything of value remaining in the stores of the fortress, and led his followers across the Shdus Desert to the Foothill Kingdom. When brought before the king of Duvust, he claimed to be a Nikkad officer fleeing the war. Initially, this tale was accepted, but when several mercenaries who'd joined him attempted to sell the heirlooms of the dead merchants back to their long time colleagues the truth came to light and they were driven from the city at spearpoint.
Ever bold, Taskemis persuaded his followers to turn around and lead a nighttime raid upon Duvust itself. This attack, known as the Night of Broken Torches, is much lamented in Foothill Kingdom. The king in those days was unpopular and weak, and his soldiers cowered in their barracks rather than rally to oppose the bandits. This allowed the invaders initial success, and they burned and plundered the palace. The merchants, however, did not surrender their hard won riches so easily. They gathered their loyal mercenaries, put arms into the hands of their caravaneers, and took to battle in the streets. At some point during the night, flames caught amid refuse or straw, and the city burned. Duvust, being made of earth, endured this well, and the fighting continued amid smoldering streets and charred gardens for three days of back and forth skirmishing. The dead grew in number, and with smoke still everywhere clean water was scarce. Eventually, seeing no hope of decisively facing down the merchants in the narrow defiles of the town, Taskemis directed his men to break out of the city. They thought to rush out and seize villages in the countryside, reasoning that the king lacked the strength to oppose such petty despotism.
For over a year the bandit army ravaged the Foothill Kingdom, but over the winter peace returned to Shdustu and in the following autumn caravans and riders came west once more for the fair. The new king placed a grand price on the head of Taskemis, and Kharal warriors, eager for what they saw as a simple path to wealth and glory alike, rode hard in search of the fugitive. They were joined by mercenary warriors of high quality drawn from the empire, for the new ruler was among the merchants who'd survived the night battles and intended no mercy.
Three times the bandits evaded pursuit, turned about, and ambushed their pursuers to great success, twice against the Kharal riders and once against mercenary infantry. Their commander revealed in himself a fearless ability to seize upon any opening and a complete will to leverage the desperation of followers who knew surrender meant execution and therefore fought like demons. Badly mauled Kharal chose less uncompromising targets and the mercenaries took shelter in hesitancy and delay as their kind are wont to do when seeking to avoid engagement. Had matters continued in this fashion, the bandit warband, which periodically swelled by recruiting the desperate and discontent, might well have seized a throne for its cunning master. History reveals this has happened more often than imagination suspects.
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That course, however, did not fit the plans of the Divines. In the third major engagement, the mercenary forces that broke before the wild charge of the bandits included crossbowmen, and Taskemis suffered a bolt wound to the thigh. Though the injury was far from lethal, it rendered him unable to ride. His followers attempted but a single engagement without him, in which they were badly mauled and forced to retreat to the edge of the desert.
Several of his subordinates urged a return to Shdustu, but Taskemis knew this course represented naught but a path to destruction. If his forces could not defeat their enemies in the small confines of the foothills, they would be utterly overwhelmed by the far greater forces waiting beyond the desert. Such things have unfolded many times before. The steppe is littered with the bones of fallen warbands turned to banditry. Instead, in an unprecedented move none have since managed to repeat, the innovative former soldier chose the desert. He took his men out into the deep sands and hot stones, daring his enemies to follow. They demurred, of course, believing that the Shdus would claim the offensive bandit soon enough.
Unexpectedly, and to their sorrow, they were wrong.
Taskemis survived in the depths of the desert. His men created hidden wells, found caves where water collects, and instigated an ingenious system to transport full loads of precious liquid back to their secretive fortress without loss. Brick towers rose there, baked by the relentless sun and proof against all pursuit, for none can lay siege in the heart of the wastelands. With this refuge secured, they began to raid caravans as they crossed the desert, taking livestock and supplies to feed their table, and great riches to sell to unscrupulous merchants in the foothills. In time, they amassed incredible wealth, and it was said that Taskemis presented a table to shame emperors and khagans alike. His bandits could strike from all sides of the crossing route and all attempts to track them down and destroy them led to nothing but soldiers dead in the desert and new recruits among his ranks. Travelers began to refer to these men as the Desert Demons, and Taskemis was awarded the title of Bandit King.
For twelve years Taskemis preyed upon travelers as the uncrowned lord of the Shdus Desert. Desperate men pledged allegiance to his banner so as to continually renew his band of raiders. Merchants began to pay out tribute rather than give battle against his attacks. Rumors whispered of the treasure hidden in his unseen fortress reached absurd proportions. So claimed he slept in a room piled with gold higher than his chest and used brilliant silk dresses as rags. His horde of gemstones was so vast that he hired a rogue apothecary to powder them down and mix them into elixirs promised to prolong life.
Merchants, kings, and chieftains alike sent armies to locate the fortress and slay this bandit. It is said only one ever reached the brick walls, and these men, dying of thirst, fell to the last in an ill-considered assault. Far more were lost to the cruel ravages of the sands than ever suffered on bandit blades. As time passed, some even considered that they might recognize the upstart bandit with a proper title and turn depredation into tax.
But, only a fool would think the desert bows to any human, no matter their genius. There are places where the embrace of Tipipashu is crushing and destructive, wilderness where humans are not meant to live. Divine will may not be revealed by the turning of the seasons or the wishes of kings, but in the end it shall be known to all. In the lengthy history of the Shdus the brief tenure of the Bandit King is nothing but a momentary anomaly, barely noticeable.
A pair of bad years came in succession. The snows failed to fill the lakes and streams of the foothills. Trade ceased. Caravans remained at home and the people fed upon their stock lest they watch them starve for lack of forage. With no prey to raid and their wells drying up, the bandits were forced to ride into the foothills and assault villages or starve themselves. Though Taskemis overpowered defenders outside Duvust, when he sought to return to his fortress a sandstorm arose early in the summer, born of parched and loose sands. It wrapped about the column of livestock he sought to drive home, burying donkeys and horses and scattering camels. The bandits who managed to reach their base were without water or food and turned upon each other in the hopes of securing the remaining scraps. The handful who emerged victorious loaded up bags full of gold in the hope of riding to Shdustu. They did not succeed. Their bones were buried beneath the shifting sands surrounded by a lost fortune in gold, gems, and silks that has never been recovered.
Two years later a desert hermit discovered the remains of the fortress, now empty save for bleached bones. She claimed no treasure remained, only broken boards, shattered pottery, and burned out rooms. A single skeleton, dressed in the armor of a mighty warlord, slumped atop the walls, scoured to almost nothing by the sands. Though there is no proof, legend holds that this was Taskemis. The hermit gave his remains to the sands thereafter, a proper fate for the first and last lord of the Shdus Desert. Of his vast plunder, nothing save a single gilded helmet, restored to the king of Duvust, was ever recovered.
Shifts in the paths of water beneath the surface of the dunes soon rendered the hidden wells used by the bandits dry as dust. Their fortress, garrisoned for a single year by an enterprising merchant coalition, was soon abandoned and its west wall shattered to render it indefensible. Aside from this damage, the brick construction stands yet. Four slowly crumbling towers and three walls, gradualy being submerged beneath the dunes as the sand swirls about their base.
In such a dry region sand offers protection. Once fully buried they may well endure thousands of years, the legacy of a bandit far greater than his simple opportunism.