Naji swayed as he stumbled through the sandy dunes, the hot sun blistering in the sky and burning his dark skin. His vision blurred, seeing double of the dunes and the vision of his sandal covered feet fuzzy and unfocused. Naji swallowed down his dry throat, lips and body screaming for water, but there was none.

He struggled up another hill, slipping on the sand as he dragged his way up to the top. He panted, looking around with half lidded eyes. It was all just sand. Piles and piles of fine powdered rock as far as the eye could see. Despair filled Naji’s chest. This was his life now. All because of his cursed step-mother. She always had it out for him, but convincing his own father to banish him and strip him from his title as the crown prince was a new level he didn’t know could be stepped down to. Naji nearly collapsed to his knees, barely conscious as he realized this was the reality he lived in.

He willed himself to continue forward, slipping down the sand dune as grains flew up into his eyes and mouth, getting under his scarves and shirt. He coughed and sputtered as his momentum stopped at the bottom, and he just laid there. The gold collars and chokers around his neck and the cuffs on his wrist seemed to burn not just from the sun, but with the memory of everything he’d lost at the corrupt hands of his cruel stepmother.

He was filled with hate, anger, betrayal, sadness, loss. How was he supposed to live like this, if he lived at all? If the blistering and burning heat of the day didn’t kill him, it would be the frigid night. And if it was neither, it would be robbers or bandits or even a wild animal tearing into him. He reached for his flask, desperate for at least a drop of water. There was nothing. He laid back down and curled up in the sand. There was no point anymore. No one was coming to save him. He was going to just die here.

“Anubis please just spare me the agony and take me to the afterlife already…” He said to himself, his voice raspy and dry.