"Can someone explain to me how this can happen?" says the watch Commander with clear irritation in her voice.
"Ma'am?" asks the nearest of the patrol that had apparently just returned.
"How is it that not one but three of our numbers can just disappear?" the Commander elaborates. "They've been stationed here at North Fort for the last three years at least. These were routine patrols. No signs of any of our usual adversaries. And yet they cannot be found!"
"Ma'am, we do not know," says one, the apparent leader of the small search party. "It has been windy. Their tracks could have gotten covered...erased. If the giants or the bugs got them..." He pauses to shrug and begins to speak again, but he is cut off.
"I cannot tell their families that we don't know," snaps the Commander. "Have you found nothing?
"Commander," says another, taking a step forward and presenting a tangle of wood and sinew. "We found this broken bow sticking out of the sands. We dug as we could, but there was nothing else." The Commander snatches it out of his hand and looks at it as if her eyes would burn a hole through it. She sighs after a few moments, but keeps the bow held tightly by her hip.
"Effective immediately, no one goes on patrol alone," says the Commander with an air of command. "I want no more missing, is this understood?" She is answered by a collection of "Yes, Ma'am's" and "Yes, Commander's".
"Good!" she barks. "Dismis..."
"Uh...Ma'am?" says one of the patrol, somewhat wide-eyed and even looking fearful.
"What?!?" replies the Commander.
"Y-your hand...it's smoking..."
The Commander looks down with irritation at the hand holding the bow at about the same time the tinge of wood smoke reaches her nose. The sight of smoke slipping between her clenched fingers startles her and she drops the bow, revealing an hand-print of char encircling the bow where she held it.