“Are you ready Reyes?”

Elyna looked up from with a smile, raising one hand to shield her gaze from a sun that was bright, despite the early hour. The other hand she kept firm of the girth strap, holding the leather in place before she concentrated a moment and fastened it firmly around the centre of her horse. “Ready as I’ll ever be,” she replied, cheerful.

The young woman had braided hair that was then curled into a knot above the nape of her neck. She wore a long pale tunic of cotton over brown breaches and shirt. The knight had adopted local customs, with a wrap of cotton around her head and neck, protection from a merciless desert.

It was barely dawn and already the day felt too hot. But Elyna couldn’t regret her decision to stay in Nejem instead of going home to Renmere. Nejem was new, fresh. Heart ache didn’t follow her here.

The young woman swung up into the saddle and found herself at home. Her sword belt was comfortable around her waist, her bow attached to the saddle and arrows at hand. The man who had addressed her shook his head as he climbed onto his own horse.

“I swear you look more local than me,” he grinned. Ceka was half N’jiin with a gift for Hindsight. It was for that reason, that the younger woman avoided contact with him as much as possible. Determined to keep her memories as hers, and hers alone. Still, he was a nice enough man and Elyna wondered if she was simply naive to trust him so easily. He spoke the same tongue as she at least, and had been a useful conduit to communicating with the red and black Guard. Six of whom made the majority of the party setting out to cross the desert.

Elyna peered at the party, six Red and Blacks, Ceka an Aramanian woman who was financing their excursion into the sand. An ambassadors daughter who seemed more than a little eccentric, but someone who Elyna hoped to learn more about.