Saddle Arabia; Midnight.
The sun had sank and the moon had risen full in the sky, stars sparkled and tinkled in the night sky as the blazing heat of the Arabian sands turned cool and mystical. The mountains and desert sands whispered a silent song as the wind howled across the desert lands of Saddle Arabia as night. Truly a marvelous sight and it had been for generations and all who came to view its grace had always spoken well of it; and it was this majestic allure that a dark figure with a darker purpose stood in wait, a bird perched on their shoulder preening its feathers in an erratic fashion.

"He tests my patience." A sinister female voice spoke as she held a large staff that poked into the sands below, the head of the scepter being that of a Cobra. Suddenly her ears perked up and she was approached by a small chubby dirty looking man covered in rags and what appeared to be blood. "You.Are.Late."

The man hops off the horse he was riding and grumbles, her jumbled and rotten teeth rattling in his mouth as he spoke in a thick Arabian accent. "My deepest apologizes your grace; one must not linger when acquiring artifacts that one doesn't have the coin to pay for."

"Ah so you have it then?" She asked intrigued. Her piercing yellow eyes narrowing towards the short gross looking man.

He grinned as best he could with his messed up teeth and went into his 'clothes' and pulled out a piece of treasure that looked like it had another half. "But of course; had to slit a few throats and jump across a few roofs but I am true to my word." The woman tried reaching for the item only for him to recoil and clutch the treasure close.

"Ah ah ah, first? My pay-HEY?!" The bird that was on the woman's shoulder swooped in and snatched the treasure from him and handed it to the woman the treasure landing in the blood red palm of her hand.

"Patience my repugnant little friend; you'll get what's coming to you."

"What's coming to you! Rawk!!!" The bird which was revealed to be an all blue bird with red tipped feathers and black tail feathers as well as a large black beak.

The woman revealed a second piece of treasure, one that looked like it fit with the one given to her and once they came together, attracted as if they wanted to find one another they combined into a four legged mini winged creature that buzzed around and zipped away into the night leaving a rainbow trail behind it.

"QUICKLY FOLLOW THE TRAIL!" The woman shouted as she hopped on her own horse and gave chase after the trialing rainbow light with the thief she hired following close behind.

They gave chase after the light through the desert sands for a good twenty minutes until the pieces of the treasure separated again and dug themselves into into a nearby rock formation in the mountain range in front of them on the outskirts of the city.

It was then the rocks began to fall away and shift, the ground began to tremble which caused their horses to run away in fear and the sands began shifting. Then it stopped and what they saw was a large face of a stallion looking down upon them with glowing eyes and then it began to speak as the two people stood there awestruck.

Her eyes lit up even in the shadow of the hood she was wearing."At last; after all my centuries of searching and being led astray by that bastard Solomon and his false clues. I at last have found his cave of wonders; isn't it magnificent?" She asked the dirty little thief as she gazed upon the majestic horse looking down upon them.

"By Faust, I have never seen a horse with a horn before. I thought those were mere a-"

"Myth? Legend? A fairy tale like most all think the Arabian nights are?" She asked seemingly to be offended that he thought such things were not real but in a sadistically glad way as well.

"Eh well. Yes? I have never seen such wonder..." He said as he began to walk forward only for the statue to whinny loudly sending the thief to the ground kicking up some sand.

"WHO DARES SET FOOT UPON THIS HOLY PLACE?" The thunderous voice demanded, its eyes gazing directly at the thief as if to judge him.

The thief would look to his cloaked employer and she would usher him to answer the giant talking magical horse.

"I-It's I; Grubber. A humble thief of this land" He lied as he bowed before the mighty being of stone.

The statue would examine the thief and speak again. "KNOW THIS! ONLY THOSE WORTHY MAY ENTER HERE! THOSE WHO'S WORTH LIES DEEP WITHIN! DIAMONDS IN THE ROUGH"

"What is that supposed to mean?" Grubber asked confused scratching his head.

"It means that you are worthy to enter. Now remember-" She grabbed him by his rags, her sharp nails digging into his skin past the flimsy fabric covering his body. "Bring me the lamp! The rest of the cave is yours to do as your heart desires but the lamp? Is mine. Now go and reap your reward" She released him and pushed him forward towards the entrance of the cave that lay behind the head of the horse in the mountains base.

As he walked toward it he felt apprehensive but as he got closer he felt there was nothing to fear and as soon as he crossed the threshold he took a breath of relief and then greedily rubbing his hands together he couldn't wait to pilfer this entire cave of all of its riches. However? He'd never get the chance.

"UNWORTHY!" The booming voice of the stallion spoke as it's horn charged up with energy and blasted the thief into oblivion with nothing but his rags left behind.

"No!!! Raaaah curses! Damn you Solomon! Again with your blasted safe guards and tricks!" The woman shouted at the towering stallion of stone and then it began to speak again.

"LEAVE THIS PLACE AND ONLY RETURN WHEN THOU HAS FOUND A TRUE DIAMOND IN THE ROUGH" The stallion's head magically returned to normal and the gold pieces that had activated the spell fell back into the sands and all was silent. That is until the bird perched on her shoulder flew over grabbing the gold pieces and then? It began talking

"Well now wasn't THAT a big ass success...NOT!!" The bird spoke in a shrill and crass female voice as it rolled its eyes and scoffed. "How many years have we been looking for this damn place?! Don't answer that! IT'S BEEN 10,000 YEARS! 10,000 AND WE COME THIS FAR ONLY FOR SOLOMON TO BE LIKE 'HEY? SCREW YOU TWO!' " The bird complained and screamed to the point where its feathers began molting and coming off bit by bit. "Oh, oh great! Just peachy! I'm so stressed out I'm friggin' molting! We are NEVER getting our hands on this stupid lamp!!"

The woman rolled her eyes and sighed as she picked an ear with one of her fingers. "Are you quite finished squawking? Because's your giving me a headache."

"Oh sure, sure, what was I thinking; getting all upset because we've been trapped in this Faust forsaken world for 10,000 years and on top of that we got all our magic stolen and the cherry on top?" She flew up to the woman and squawked in her ear. "I GOT TURNED INTO A DAMN FLYING RAT!!!"

The woman lifted her staff and bonked the flying annoyance on the head with her cobra scepter and narrowed her snake like slit eyes at the bird and appeared to hiss. "Don't remind me I am well aware of our unfortunate situation Ifrit." She grinned and tickled the angry bird under her beak. "Besides, I prefer you like this. Much cuter and a lot less fiery."

"I LIKED BEING A BIG FIERY DEMON! I AM NOT YOUR PE-" She stopped all protest when she was tickled under the chin and cooed as a bird would but then realized what she was doing and shook her head. "KNOCK IT OFF YOU KNOW I HATE THAT!"

"Heheh you pretend too but you're actions speak different. Though now isn't the time for argument. We have encountered another road block in our plan thanks to Solomon." The woman said with a clear line of irritation in her voice.

"Oh ya think? So what do we do now? Apparently only some goodie two shoes with a chip on their shoulder can enter that place from the sounds of that cryptic horse. So what now?" Ifrit asked now perched on the woman's shoulder she began to walk away, the horse she rode her had run away when she and the thief had arrived and awakened the cave; though that wasn't an issue.

"Simple. We find a couple of diamonds; and see which ones are in the rough enough to enter that cave without breaking" The woman stated with a tone cold as the desert night air.

Ifrit visibly smirked and could feel the evil dripping out of that sentence. "Oh you are just bad you know that Djinn?"

Djinn giggled evilly and nodded. "It's in my nature. Now; lets see who in Saddle Arabia is a true diamond in the rough." She said as she smacked her staff into the ground and began to speak an ancient lost Arabian language and text began forming out of the sands around her and she then scattered them and sent them out into the city.

"Ah the spell of desires; haven't seen ya use that one in awhile. Sure its a good idea to use a spell that strong?" Ifrit said impressed that her old friend still held such magic power even after all this time.

"I may be running low on magic but if my gambit is right? Neither of us will have to worry about this world being without magic for much longer and all of it shall be ours." Djinn said with a vicious smile as she smacked her staff into the ground again and vanished from the surrounding area, in her place lay the mark of the evil Djinn spirits.

Author's Note

Oh yeah. We are doing this now. I wanted to do something more light hearted and fun but also still stuck to the writing style I have set for myself which is mostly reference or pop culture based.