The sun beat down on the Adilyte’s black leather suits like millions of daggers, but they remained unaffected from the heat. Their king had set a goal, and in their minds, nothing was more important than their king’s order, not even their own lives. It was an Adilyte’s oath.
Damon looked up at the raging sun. The six men had been walking through three blistering days of the Algora Desert as soon as they started northwest from Agronia City’s ports. But the five Adilyte weren’t the ones suffering.
The young clergyman stumbled over an unstable slope of sand and landed into the back of Mortimar. Mortimar, who could look terrifying when needed to, turned around to give the clergyman an unnerving glare.
“Praise the Lords,” the clergyman moaned. “This heat is making me go mad.”
“Let us pray he doesn’t lose his faith,” whispered Erion, the youngest of the Adilyte, to the oldest, Ciro. The two started into abrupt laughter.
“You think you are so funny to mock the Lords,” the clergyman said. “Just wait. Your day will come and when you lie, dying on you deathbed, they will smite you for your foolery.”
The middleman of the Adilyte, Piero, walked over to the clergyman helping him out of the pile of sand he had stumbled into.
“Thank you,” the clergyman said humbly. “May the Lords be with you young Adilyte. Aquwei.”
Piero said nothing, a silent man, but nodded, acknowledging the holy man’s appraisal.
Damon walked with Mortimar. Throughout the journey he had endured so far, Damon was thinking of the Keeper’s last words before his departure.
“The Divinity of Light is powerful. Make sure it is used in the right way, or else your kingdom will fall to the hands of the Wicked. Bring a holy man with you to read the ancient language spoken. It is an old language, not even you, King Damon, will know this tongue.” The Keeper had said this all in a warning, prodding tone.
Damon began to regret bringing the clergyman along on the journey, especially with the clergyman talking all nonsense of the Lords smiting Damon for using such fowl and vulgar language of the Wicked, despite their evil ways.
“He’s quite the optimist,” Mortimar said to Damon. “Always looking for good in others.”
“Who-the clergyman?” asked Damon. Damon was beginning to grow irritated of the time wasted in the desert. His intentions were to get the Divinity of Light and eliminate all Wicked. Not go for a stroll through the desert with a babbling clergyman with no backbone. “Remind me why we brought him.”
Mortimar laughed heartily.
“He’s the only one who understands the language,” Mortimar said.
Mortimar’s giddy demeanor abruptly left, his face forming into a slight scowl as the oncoming rainstorm rumbled in the distance.
“We need to find cover soon,” Damon said. “Look, the mountains aren’t far from here, I can see their peaks.” He looked off in the far distance, over the tall sand dunes. The Shyra Mountains were just peaking over the third dune.
“It will take us a good hour to get to them,” Mortimar said. “We should find cover before the storm hits.”
“We’ll make it if we run,” Damon said, looking over at the Adilyte.
“We won’t make it,” Mortimar pressed. “The clergyman is ready to die from the heat.”
Damon walked briskly over to the clergyman. All four Adilyte watched as their king stripped the clergyman from his robes until he was only in his undergarments. The clergyman, being of dire modesty, began to blush with bright intensity. Damon, his hands glowing white, made a small amount of sand drift up into the air. Before the clergyman’s eyes the sand formed into a light weight tunic in midair.
“Wear this,” Damon said, walking away. “You’ll need something lightweight to catch up, kiyet.”
The five Adilyte began in a brisk jog, allowing the clergyman enough time to get into his new wardrobe and follow at a slower pace behind. When the clergyman caught up, Damon slowed to the holy man’s pace.
“Thank you my king,” the clergyman said, bowing slightly. “How will I ever repay you for this glorious-”
“You don’t,” Damon said. “So where are you from?”
The clergyman looked at Damon and smiled. “Boudica. I was student at the temple there. Then I was sent as a missionary.”
Damon nodded. “That’s wonderful. How did you come to know the ancient language of Craccia? Only a few know its tongue.”
“I visited Craccia after the war,” the clergyman paused for a moment to catch his breath. Damon waited with surprising patience. “I went to the families in need of guidance and shelter.”
“You picked up their tongue? How long where you there?”
“Three years,” the clergyman said. He seemed to be waiting for some sort of response from Damon, but Damon remained quiet, looking ahead at the mountains.
“What is your name clergyman?”
“Sebastian Dayan, My Lord.”
“Don’t call me your lord or king,” Damon growled under his breath. “It does not suit me.”
“I think it suits you well,” Sebastian said, fumbling with his Book of Amity. “You’re very good at ordering us around.” Perhaps the clergyman had a backbone after all.
Mortimar and the rest of the Adilyte let out a slew of chuckles. Sebastian took a brief moment before realizing what he had just said.
“My King, I did not mean…like the…it’s not what I meant at all,” Sebastian stuttered.
Damon let out a low growl of irritation and quickened his pace so that he was leading in front. Up ahead, beyond the mirage that the sun played on their eyes, Damon finally spotted the passage through the Shyra Mountains. Just beyond that was the Alaha forest.
)
