Vulcan's wind was scathing beneath T'Kul's brutal midday heat but neither the harsh sand that darkened the sky and hissed along her exposed skin nor the dangerous fire of the sun above were the cause of her heavily emerald bronzed flush.
Saavik gripped the ancient wrought railing of the estate's master balcony until she could no longer feel anything but the pain, a searing scorch of far too hot metal on flesh, and deliberately embraced it savagely as she had once done so often on that other desert world as a twisted sort of half comfort and half self punishment. The wind surged and lashed at her, turning her own dark hair and robes into whips that stung her skin even as the sand it carried began to warn of the raw agony its churning hissing abrasion would soon deliver.
It would be a full storm soon, outright deadly with the threat of suffocation if not severely scarring.
She closed her eyes against it tightly and angled her head to keep the worst of the bitter grit out of her nostrils and ears. Still, it burned viciously as the finer particles worked their way to her secondary eyelids and great tears fell down her rapidly coating face in natural biological protective process.
They gave no true relief and yet she found that she lacked the ability to stop them.
Saavik knew then that she welcomed the storm's agony.