“The Rub’ Al Hamraa’u Desert, it stretches for nearly 600 miles across the Saddle Arabian peninsula, a vast, empty wasteland of sand, sun, and death. Virtually lifeless, its only inhabitants being the hundreds of thousands of sand dunes that billow across the ever-changing landscape like waves on a dry ocean, the Rub Al’ Hamraa’u was once home to one the greatest cities in the world. A thousand years ago, before Nightmare Moon’s eternal night brought ruin upon it, sinking the city into the sands, Mo’adah, The City of Silver, stood as an oasis, and a bastion of wealth. For centuries, the city thrived on commerce, its peoples growing fat and content from the lucrative spice trade with Equestria. But on the eve of Nightmare Moon’s coup, the ill-fated princess approached the citizens of Mo’adah and asked for their help in overthrowing her sister. Being the pious and just people that they were, Mo’adah’s ruler at the time, Serj Alfedah, rebuffed the moon princess. As punishment for his refusal, Nightmare Moon cast a curse upon the city, causing it to sink into the sands to be lost forever. Its people, its culture, and its position as the only city to survive and thrive in the Rub’ Al Hamraa’u Desert, lost forever... along with a boatload of treasure!”
Daring Do let out a hearty laugh, leaning back in her chair and shooting a knowing smirk to Solo Victory, the over-the-hill stallion sitting across from her smoking a thick cigar. He puffed a few times, letting the pungent smoke fill the tiny cabin of the fishing boat they had chartered before crossing his fore-hooves and resting his chin in the crease. He looked Daring in the eye, his own harsh gray eyes searching her, looking for something.
His eyes may have been hard and cold, but the rest of him couldn’t be further from that. His lips and cheeks, so often tugged into that soft smile of his, were saggy and wrinkled, a sign of his age. His mane was graying, a far cry from the dark brown it had been years before, and his ears drooped, only perking up at the occasional call of a seagull, or crash of the wave against the hull. Solo, or Sol as Daring was fond of calling him, was one of Daring’s best and most faithful friends, and right now, he was giving her a look that told Daring, “Yeah, I’ve heard that before.”
He snorted, taking the cigar out of his mouth and tapping the ashes into a small ceramic tray before saying, “Look, kid, that’s all well and good, but ya gotta understand,” he paused to lean forward, “I ain’t the spry young colt I was twenty years ago. I can’t go gallivanting across a desert so big the locals avoid the thing unless I know that you know what you’re doing.” He leaned back, raising a hoof quizzically. “So do ya?”
Daring let out a sigh and closed the book she had been reading from. “Sol, come on, you know me. This is the Mo’adah we’re talking about here. The legendary lost City of Silver. There could be millions in unclaimed treasure just waiting to be found.” She tapped the book for emphasis. “Would I have brought you along if I didn’t know what I was doing?”
He shrugged, picked up his cigar again and took another drag. “Don’t kid yourself, kid. You brought me along cus’ you couldn’t pay for this heap without my help.” He rapped a hoof against the hull of the ship. “And what a heap it is. Oh, that reminds me.” He reached up to the hatch above his head and swung it open. The haggard-looking fisherman who had a missing leg and a stare even harsher than Sol’s gave an icy glare down at them. “How long till we get there, Rogue?”
Rogue Wave, still a little upset over the deal Daring and Sol had finagled him into—half at the port and half when they reached Saddle Arabia—put a hoof to his brow and peered out into the ocean. Still staring, he said, “‘Bout an hour if this headwind keeps, less if it lets up.”
Sol nodded, thanked him and closed the hatch. With the cigar clamped firmly in his teeth, he said, “Good, we still got some time to work this out then.” He reached across the table and grabbed the book, spinning it towards him and opening to the page Daring had read aloud from. “Says here that the city was lost to the sands after the whole Nightmare Moon boondoggle. How the heck are we even gonna find the thing? Not to mention the fact that it’s probably in the middle of a six-hundred mile wide desert.”
“Ah, you worry too much, Sol. I’ve got this whole thing planned out.” Daring grabbed a napkin from the table and unfolded it, swiping a pen with her other hoof. She drew a large square in one corner, and squiggly line to another, smaller, square in the opposite corner. Placing her pen on the large square, she said, “So we land here, in Al Hisan, where we meet my contact.” She looked up at Solo. “He’s one of the Bedouin, so he knows the desert,” she explained. “He said that he’s heard stories about a mysterious lost city in the middle of the Rub’ Al Hamraa’u, and that he can lead us there... or at least to where he thinks it is.”