Forty Days Behind

Elara's leather boots crunched through the arid wasteland, the gritty terrain offering no reprieve from her long journey. The sun, a harsh sentinel in the sky, beat down relentlessly. Her robe, though white and cotton-light, did little to shield her from the heat, and the long staff in her right hand grew heavier with each step.

Her mind, however, was set on the temple of Lumis.

Forty-five days of heading east. Forty-five days of relentless walk right in the middle of nowhere. Forty-five days, and she saw nothing more than dry soil and harsh death. What a crazy idea, placing a temple far into the desert! Not even the scorpions and the buzzards ventured that far. Of course, when the temple was first build two millennia before, things were different. A lot different. There was order, and order was in everything.

Elara halted and looked around — the ancient route to Anctarel should have been nearby.

«Lumis is on the way to the lost citadel of Anctarel», was the only intel the new Prior gave her. They weren’t even sure if Anctarel really existed. It could have easily been a fairy tale told to the novices and the pupils at the Castrum. Elara had lots of reasons to doubt the ancient tales, especially after the recent disappearance of the old Prior. The new one made things differently. Nothing wrong with that. But the new Prior’s friendship with the Royal Guard was no secret, and Elara felt the end of the autonomy of the Order to be near. Elara suspected the new Prior assigned her the job to keep her away from the Castrum. But without any proof, she had had no way to refuse the call, she had to leave.

Elara pinned the staff on the ground, watched as the white birch wood wobbled a couple of times. When she was sure it wouldn’t fall on the ground, she looked away and focused on her right hand: a slight movement, a slow lazy circle. As always, a smirk of amusement colored her grey lips: humans thought the secret was in the movement. But movement was only the first step. The real secret was in the fingers. Fingers and focus, of course. Elara’s long training had been over for centuries, she knew each muscle position to perfection without even thinking about it. She closed her blood-red eyes and focused her mind. Out of nowhere a few sparkles appeared, populating that same circle that her index finger had traced just a moment before. Some of the sparkles were of a bright orange, as though they were ready to catch fire. Others had a more brownish tinge, as rich and thick as dark honey.

Elara positioned her hand parallel to the ground, with the palm towards the sky. The sparkles collapsed to the center of the circle. A moment later they moved to form a shape. A flask made of amber light shone bright and orange over her palm. She moved her hand up and, as pulled by invisible strings, the amber flask moved up as well. Satisfied, Elara tilted her head back right under the glowing flask. Her hood slid back, revealing long white strings of hair and a pale long ash grey face. A bony long index moved in circle and one single droplet of water poured down from the flask right over Elara’s dried lips.

She let the drop sip into the thin layer of grey skin, then shushed the flask away like it was an annoying bug. The flask disappeared with no sound into a host of sparkles that ruffled around for a couple of moments before fading into nothingness but Elara didn’t paid attention to it, too busy looking around at the never ending stretch of dry desert that didn’t seem to vary no matter which direction she watched — forty-five days to the east, she should have reached the ancient route already.

If it indeed exists, she thought with a flame of anger in her blood-red eyes. She could not wash away the feeling of having been cheated into a purposeless quest.

Elara recalled the old drawings she was showed at the Castrum: lush green valleys peppered here and there by lively blue rivers, creme flat buildings at each side of a stone cobbled road. Of course, she didn’t expect to find any of that after millennia of abandonment. Still, she had hoped for some ruins, just as a confirmation that she was on the right path. The road to Anctarel, after all, was one of the main road across the old Empire, it was easy to assume that its remains would be scattered all over the desert.

Instead, nothing!, she gritted her teeth. She lost count of all the scout teams The Castrum sent through the centuries. None of those came back successful.

At least they came back, she murmured gloomy, her smooth face suddenly appeared as old as the millennial desert.

She looked past her shoulders, wondering whether to start the journey back. She had performed her task after all: she looked for the missing scout team and found nothing, probably already dead and buried under layers and layers of scorching sand. There was nothing more she could do.

Then she saw the little spark on the horizon, far to her right. Like a little light reflected by a mirror. It flashed on, then off. Then on again. The light kept appearing and disappearing, in an apparent random pattern.

Maybe I simply was on the wrong path, after all, she thought with a new spark of curiosity. Her eyes glowed bright red as she snatched her staff back from the ground and venture towards the flashing light, any doubt replaced by the need to learn more.