Sandstorms
Overview
The Sandstorms of the desert are not mere weather — they are colossal, living walls of wind and dust that reshape the land itself. Towering higher than mountains and stretching across the horizon, these storms are feared as the greatest natural force of the Shifting Sands. They grind stone to powder, bury oases in minutes, and erase whole caravans without a trace.
Origins and Movement
Sandstorms are most common in the southern reaches of the desert, where the heat, shifting air currents fuel their birth. From there, they usually surge northward, sweeping across dunes and plains. Yet their paths are unpredictable — some stall for days in one region, while others turn back or split into multiple fronts. No traveler can ever be certain of safety.
The Dead Spires, a jagged mountain range stretching west to east, serve as a natural barrier against these storms. The mountains break their momentum and scatter their force, sparing the Green Plain to the north from devastation. Without the Dead Spires, the fertile lands beyond would likely have long ago been consumed by shifting sands.
Impact
The storms are both feared and revered:
Caravans vanish into their walls, never seen again.
Tribes see them as omens, some interpreting their arrival as messages from the Desert Spirits, others as the stirring of the Buried One beneath the Great Dune.
The sand itself becomes a weapon: carried at impossible speeds, each grain is sharpened by the storm’s fury. It pierces armor, tears flesh, and strips bones clean as if the desert itself were devouring intruders.
In their wake, sandstorms leave behind a changed landscape: new dunes rising like mountains, ruins buried or revealed, and sometimes even shards of sunstone unearthed from the deep desert.
Mysticism
Many believe the largest sandstorms are not natural at all, but weapons of the Desert Spirits, called forth to punish greed, arrogance, or imbalance.
Whatever their true nature, one law is absolute in the desert: no one defies the sandstorms and survives.