Sleep doesn’t come very easily for those that remain behind the first night, but soon the party has settled into a routine. Over the next few days the group gathers dirty water from the stream in the entryway of the delve while Khan fruitlessly attempts to find a nearby critter that he can call without having to shout and possibly attract attention. He doesn’t know why, but when he spots a bird overhead he urges the group back into the shelter of the cave.
Everyone in the party regains three spent points of willpower as they take turns alternating between nights of sleep and watch duty. Everyone is healed of all bashing damage and those with lethal damage recover three points of it, enough for the entire party (excepting Jonathan) to be fully healed (though painful bruises and scars may still remain to heal the negative impact on dice rolls is gone).
On the evening of the third day the Sun sinks over the edge of the horizon, blood-red. “Bad omen.” Mutters Kittix as he picks among the rocks for an insect or desert reptile to eat. “When men die their blood makes sky red.” He collapses in the darkening shadow of the basin wall, groaning miserably. “And little man starting to stink.” His words, as coarse as they are, are true. Oshro’s corpse, set apart from the group in the basin, is beginning to ripen. The dry desert conditions have delayed decomposition but the body’s stench has filled the basin and likely looks ghastly beneath its covering.
Kittix is set to continue his complaints when there is the sound of tumbling rock debris from the valley above. The party quickly scrambles into defensive positions and awaits the arrival of their new guests. Those with low-light and dark vision can see perfectly in the evening light, those without squint and make due. The pause is painful, but eventually shattered when a tall (still nearly eight inches shorter than Khan), musclebound human comes lumbering uneasily into sight. He has dark caramel skin covered in a patchwork of scars and fading tattoos depicting animals of all kinds. His thick hair is bound tight in a knot behind his head and his beard is full of jingling baubles and beads. He wears naught but sackcloth pants, leather sandals and a boiled leather vest but he is very heavily laden with waterskins and hide sacks. He bounds into the basin, grunting beneath the weight of his load with every step, until he stands before the party, inspecting them briefly. “Kari?” Spotting the shaman he hobbles over and lets his supplies tumble to the ground in a pile. The party wastes no time in descending ravenously upon the offered rations: They quench their thirst with clean water and sate their hunger with hard trail bread and the tough, gamy meat of some unidentified animal.
The large Shelic speaks to Khan in their tongue, gesturing back to the valley. Understanding, Karikhan dismisses him and takes a portion of the supplies for himself. The stranger turns and slowly jogs up out of the basin and out of sight only to return moments later with Jikhal at his side and possibly the oldest, frailest man the party has ever had the opportunity to see cradled in his arms: Like his companions his skin is dark and like Khan his head is shaved. His skin hangs off of him in wrinkled folds and he is unmarred by scar or ink and wears ratty wool robes that gives him the seeming of a swaddled baby. Jikhal walks behind his new arrivals, a gnarled walking stick, likely the old man’s, in his hand.
The bigger stranger sets the older one down, steadying him with a powerful hand until Jikhal can equip him with his effect. The old man makes his way to Karikhan in that painfully-slow way that only an ancient like him could manage. The two greet one another with bows, the old man’s shorter than Khan’s, though whether his bow is shallow on account of station or age is unknown to the party. Khan directs him to Brenley and helps the elder over. The old man inspects the wound and prods at the makeshift cap of dirt with a long and curved forefinger. He looks up at Karikhan with a wry grin before patting his hands together and redirecting his gaze at the noble before him and applying a shaking hand to the man’s forehead, checking its warmth, only to be distracted a moment later. He sniffs at the air, wrinkling his nose and turning his head 'round like an owl and spotting the corpse across the basin. He looks to Khan and speaks to him in their language.