OOC:  You’re doing great!  :-)<br/><br/><br/>Nadira could scarcely hear anything above the pounding of her own pulse, then some of the muffled cries began to register. No longer begging for alms, the crowd was yelling for Atrain to stop, ordering him to put her down, swearing at him, and taking Allah’s name in vain.<br/><br/>Then:<strong>“FIRE!”  </strong><br/><br/>But why fire?  Something was burning?  Nadira smelled no smoke.<br/><br/>Razor-sharp nails dug into the Rajkumari’s side.  “Atrain, please, you’re hurting me…”   The frightened woman whimpered.<br/><br/>Part of Nadira wanted to see if she could spy where the fire was, but she was too frightened. Instead, she squeezed her eyes tight and, in desperation, clung shamefully to who she perceived to be her guardian, her savior.<br/><br/>An unfamiliar masculine cry emitted from somewhere very near her. If Nadira had not known better, she would have thought that it was Atrain who’d cried, so close did the sound seem, but still frightened, the princess refused to look.<br/><br/>Did the princess refuse to look because deep down a part of her already instinctively knew the truth of what was happening to her, even as she had recognized the danger of the leper’s malady though she had not the words for it?<br/><br/>Then it happened, they fell.<br/><br/>The princess cried out as the razors dug more deeply into the soft flesh of her slender waist. “Atrain!”   She cried, but the sound was drowned out by even louder screams of…<em>horror!</em><br/><br/>The fire!<br/><br/>Nadira felt her perceived rescuer hauling her up from the ground to which they had fallen. At last, she dared open her eyes. Only then did she begin to realize, though she could not ever hope to fully understand, the truth.<br/><br/>The thing that Nadira now knew held her captive, shuddered beneath where it held her lodged upon its shoulder. She watched in horror as its barbed tail lashed out, forcing the already scrambling throng even further back.<br/><br/>It was then that the Rajkumari felt the demon's hand rustle through her saree. Her virgin mind instinctively flooded with unnamable fears.<br/><br/>Pushed beyond her limits, darkness claimed Nadira as Sirrah felt his captive go limp. She had fainted.