It was on a morning run, mandated by her bond, now, although Ashtaroth would have taken it regardless. Fast on her feet from expectant conflict, clever tongue, pretty little pelt. Seated in the sand, looking down into the pit.
   A story she was never told is that of a battle in the promised land, her short time with Captain Iti not enough to relay the locations of every spike trap in the sand, but a passing mention of their existence. It keeps her sharp, the snap-categorization of heat mirage or a trap left by the bond that abandoned this land. This one, that the would-be Tactician surveys with a flickering tail, is deadly indeed. Just not to her.
   Of course her coward-brother had fled; without Anamelech to torture him with existence, Oukoku-Kai would dispose of a crippled cryptic. Ashtar isn't surprised, nor disturbed. It's not the first of her siblings she's seen dead.