"The Temple Under Fire - 1. The Beginning" by Aida Vicens

The Beginning

That damned fog didn’t let her open her eyes. Then she was walking blindly between the rocks, stumbling at every single step. With the eyes nearly closed, she went to the fierce peak which stood in front of her, hurling embers. She could not breathe, because of the yellow fog which was all around her (and, most of all, which was a nuisance). Searching somewhere to take shelter, Shârawer came upon a shadow (solid enough, by the way).

Protecting herself with her hands, she was trying to guess which sort of thing could be that with which she had bumped. While she was thinking, what seemed to be one of the upper extremities of “that” spread towards her. With a sudden movement, a sword hit it, but the steal broke. While the pieces of metal fell to the dry ground, the girl jumped at one side. It might sound queer, but the shape laughed affably and pointed to place few meters away.

Shârawer had learnt to pay attention at her intuition. And, at that moment, her intuition was telling her that, maybe, there where that thing was pointing could be something better than standing up between the fog, avoiding the incandescent embers falling from the top of the mountain. So it was.

A rock was standing straight at that point, protecting of the wind, rain and cold whoever stood in front of it.