Lady Melei's expedition set out the next morning. They entered the desert, passed through Panner's Canyon, and began making their way into the sunlit wastes beyond. One of the wagons broke a wheel in the canyon, after taking an uncontrolled tumble down a narrow path, but the carpenter was able to fix it, and apart from that they ran into no significant problems. Arai, Sir Estil, and the other knights did their part to fight off the monsters, but Hiero's machine did most of the work: the radiator, situated on the top of the lead wagon, was constantly spitting out little puffs of monster-repelling smoke, which kept them from getting close. The lurkers, snakeheads, and geckos within the canyon avoided the party entirely, and the slug-like monsters in the desert proper -- miniature versions of the huge Engulfer -- kept their distance.

Keeping the monsters at bay was important, of course, but acquiring fresh water, maintaining their food supplies, keeping the animals healthy, and taking care of the wagons was equally important. Fortunately Lady Melei seemed to have thought of everything; they had large amounts of food on hand, enough spare parts and tools to repair just about anything, and specialists of all kinds -- a metalworker, a carpenter, a surgeon, grooms for the camels, and various others, in addition to all the merchants, knights, squires, and servants. Hiero had even invented a complicated device which could extract small amounts of water from the air, which had been placed in the wagon with the radiator. It only produced about a half a gallon of water every day, but they needed all that they could get.

The terrain on the western side of the canyon was mostly flat, with sparse vegetation. It was an inhospitable land, very hot and very dry. Arai couldn't bear to wear his armor and leathers in the blazing heat of the day; he stashed away his breastplate in one of the wagons and began wearing a bare tunic instead, with a white cape thrown over his shoulders as a shield against the sun.

Arai, Sir Estil, and Damon often rode a few miles ahead of the main group, on camelback, scouting out the landscape and returning with suggestions on how to proceed. It was dangerous work -- if they ventured more than about two miles beyond the radiator, monsters would begin to accost them, and sandstorms eventually became a danger as well -- but Arai welcomed it; the glacial pace of the caravan frustrated him, and he couldn't stand sitting in a wagon all day, doing nothing.

He invited Lillandra to join him on these scouting expeditions, but she was busy with her own projects -- tutoring Shell, learning archery from Lady Melei, and fashioning a handful of new zemi -- and she seemed to be trying to keep her distance from him in any case.

I can't forget him. I can't fall in love with someone else.

He sighed. They had been friends before. What were they now?

Though they encountered many little hardships, and a few close-call monster attacks, their journey across the desert proceeded relatively smoothly for the first two weeks. When the Riven Mountains finally came into view, on the western horizon, Lady Melei was elated. "We're almost there," she exclaimed. "Once we've crossed the mountains--"

"We'll still have several hundred miles of desert to get through," Arai pointed out. "And the Riven are treacherous, besides. It's too early to start celebrating."

She shot him a dark look. "This is an accomplishment," she insisted. "Very few expeditions make it this far. And there are fewer monsters in the mountains than in the desert; the only hazards we'll face there are natural ones. Blizzards, bandits, and the like."

"Those are bad enough," Arai muttered.

He continued scouting ahead for Lady Melei, with Damon, Sir Estil, and occasionally a handful of other knights and squires, drawing closer and closer to the mountains. The terrain was a bit rougher here, the flat land gradually becoming more hilly and boulder-strewn. One hot afternoon, upon cresting a hill, the riders found themselves looking down at an unusual landscape: a long, shallow valley, pockmarked with enormous craters and full of impossibly huge skeletons, and in the center of which stood an absolutely massive sandstone fortification, as big as a mountain, though half of it appeared to have caved in and the entire complex was in ruins. Arai had never seen a man-made structure of such size; it made the Long Wall look like a goat fence. Earlier, at her insistence, Arai had sipped on one of the potions Shell had received from Emi, which had improved his eyesight; he was grateful now that he had done so, because it allowed him to see the great fortress in great detail. Huge columns, massive stone figures, high battlements, all weather-worn by the desert sand, and surrounded by mammoth walls, rose up out of the weird, cratered valley.

"Urumkesh," Sir Estil said gravely.

And indeed, the huge fortress could only be Urumkesh, the last redoubt of mankind. This was where the tide had turned in the great battle between humankind and the demons who had invaded the world during the Harrowing. It was from this fortress that Maximine, the legendary heroine, had sallied forth to fight Enlil, the Demon King; it was here that the world's few remaining sorcerers had banded together to cast the White Rain, which had weakened the demons to the point where they could be killed by ordinary spells and earthly weapons. It was the titanic mage-battles that had taken place here that had reduced the Scarred Lands to desert, and permanently sundered the two halves of Iona Magister.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

"Looks like a good place to set up camp," Sir Farrow noted.

Damon disagreed. "We should keep our distance. There's an incredible amount of magia swirling around that place. I'm getting a headache just looking at it." He rubbed his temples. "It's sure to be crawling with monsters."

"Monsters are no threat to us, so long as we have Mr. Gil's radiator," Sir Farrow countered, "and we can hardly avoid the ruins in any case. We must pass through this valley, and the easiest route runs right through Urumkesh."

"He's right," Sir Estil said. "But Damon's right, too; we should try to keep our distance." He turned his camel around. "It's getting late. We should head back to camp now."

They nodded and followed him back to the caravan, which took several hours; they made it back just before sunset. Arai rolled off his camel -- he was still getting used to riding these beasts -- and handed the reins to one of the grooms. Shell was there to greet him.

"And what have you been doing all day?" he asked her.

"Oh, nothing much. Helping Lillandra with her zemi, mostly, and practicing with my dagger. Did you see anything interesting out there?"

"The ruins of Urumkesh," he said casually.

"Really?" Shell loved hearing about famous landmarks; Plint's Travels had filled her head with romantic notions. "What did it look like?"

"You'll see it soon enough. We'll be passing right by it. Where's Lillandra?"

Shell jerked a thumb over her shoulder. "Where else? By the radiator."

This wasn't surprising. The extreme amounts of magia in the desert tended to give Lillandra headaches, so she spent a great deal of her time near the wagon containing the radiator -- in addition to repelling monsters, the purple mist coming out of Hiero's device also thinned out the magia in its vicinity.

He started for the wagon, but Shell ran on ahead of him. They found Lillandra sitting on a large rock, sewing something together -- probably some kind of zemi. Though she didn't have the time or the resources to craft any great magics, she had thought it might be a good idea to assemble some simple devices, which might come in handy in the future. She had already crafted a Kraken's Nail, a zemi which warned of approaching storms, and a Black Box, a container which could not be opened except by a sorcerer; she had already secreted their other zemi within it. Now she was working on something else, an oblong bit of fur and fluff, with a metal cap on one end.

"What's that one?" Arai asked, sitting down nearby.

"A Rabbit's Foot," she said, without looking up. "I've already made one; I'm just putting the finishing touches on the second."

"What do they do?"

"The two of them are linked. One foot will always point in the direction of the other." She shrugged. "Might be useful."

"Might be. How are your headaches today?"

"Not bad." She hesitated, then added, "I've been having some very strange dreams lately, though. I don't know if it has anything to do with the excess magia, but..."

"Bad dreams?"

"No, just strange, vivid." She frowned. "It's probably nothing."

"Are you sure?"

"You don't need to worry about me," she said, rather bluntly.

I can't help it. That's what he wanted to say, but he didn't; he merely nodded, sadly. "We saw Urumkesh today."

She stopped. "The fortress?"

"It was huge. How did our ancestors build such things?"

"Magic."

"That's all it takes?"

"I imagine a certain degree of engineering skill was required as well, but carving out a whole mountainside and moving monumental stones around can only be done with magic. Powerful magic. But there were more sorcerers in the distant past than there are now, and they were much, much stronger. And many secrets and recipes were lost during the Harrowing."

"Well, it's a sight to see, anyway. We'll probably pass by the ruins tomorrow."

Her frown deepened. "I hope we don't stay long."

"The sooner we're out of this desert, the better," he agreed. "The sooner we're back home..." He trailed off, thinking of Velon and all that he had left behind there.

"Home," Shell muttered.

Arai glanced at the elf girl, who was wearing an uncharacteristically melancholic expression. "Something bothering you, Shell?"

"Velon is your home," she said. "It's not mine. I thought I would be staying with you two, but you're going to part when you get back to Velon, aren't you? And then what will happen to me?"

"We're not going to abandon you, if that's what you're afraid of," Arai said. "But you've never even seen Velon. You might come to like it. You might come to consider it your new home."

"I don't know," she said distractedly. "There's no elves in Velon, are there?"

"So you'll be the first. Perhaps if this expedition is successful, some other elves might begin to make their way west."

"I don't know," she said again, doubtfully. But her expression had changed from melancholic to thoughtful. "But I know this much. I want to stay with the two of you as long as I can."

Arai gave her a reassuring smile, but the conversation had got him thinking as well. What was going to happen to Shell, when they returned to Velon? What was going to happen to Lillandra? If the people of Velon were to discover her true identity...well, many of them were sure to want revenge.

He shook his head. They had plenty of time to think about these things; Velon was still thousands of miles away.

One step at a time, he told himself, glancing at Lillandra. One step at a time.