by Donald Brown
“Oh, it’s sand,” Jasper said, smiling. “Don’t worry, it won’t bite you.” And with that he focused his attention on the opening in the tunnel again and moved on.
Storm gingerly followed and then turned to see his brother struggling more than he was with this new phenomenon, pausing with each step to observe his feet, engulfed by the sand.
“Be ready to fight the guards on the other side,” Storm reminded Hadrian, who stared at his brother for a moment before nodding. It wasn’t usual for Storm to give the orders.
Jasper only made a snorting sound in front of them.
As the light grew even brighter, Storm instinctively raised his hand to protect his squinting eyes. Just then, Jasper was completely swallowed by the light and disappeared. “Outsider?” Storm called out. “Jasper?” he tried again.
“I am here,” came the faint reply. “Just continue forward.”
Storm took a deep breath and then walked into the unknown. The last thing he heard from behind him in the tunnel was the voice of the Chief of the Lost: “Remember fish!”
As he stepped out of the semi-darkness, he was at last bathed in sunlight, not unlike that one moment he had experienced in Sanctuary. It still did not prepare him in the slightest for this onslaught of rays and he was instantly blinded. He used both of his hands to block the light attacking him from the sky, thinking that he was now fully exposed to be attacked by the guards.
But there were no guards…
“Welcome, boys,” Jasper said. “Welcome to the Desert.”
33
Storm’s vision slowly returned and with one hand still above his brow, palm facing down, his eyes travelled over the wasteland in awe.
The landscape was a vast expanse of… what did Jasper call it? Sand! Everywhere Storm looked he could see the powdery beige texture reflecting in the sun. There was even sand in the air. He could feel it nibble at his fingers and his earlobes in the slight breeze. He also noted with fascination the incredible blue sky.
Suddenly Storm heard a tremendous rumble and he watched in astonishment as a yellow bolt appeared in the distance and just as quickly faded away over the horizon. Hadrian, next to him, was staring at the wasteland in a fright, also squinting against the blazing sun.
“There are no guards,” Storm muttered to himself.
Where are the Outsiders queuing at the tunnel?
He saw Hadrian examining every nook and cranny as if there might be guards or Outsiders hiding behind there. But, there was no one here, except for the three of them.
Had they been lied too? Had Jasper been right all along?
“How can there be no Red Cloaks here?” Hadrian demanded.
“I guess the best prison is one which doesn’t require any guards,” Jasper replied, eying the two’s incredibility.
Storm soon realized that his amazement had made him overlook the fact that it was sweltering hot and that he was already sweating profusely. Feeling his loyalty to Sanctuary being scorched away by the sun, he began to remove his overcoat, but almost immediately felt vulnerable in doing so. There was no choice, however; he clearly couldn’t go on wearing it. Hadrian watched him pull off his coat in bewilderment, as if he was witnessing some sort of sacrilege. He obviously did not do the same, even though it was clear that he was suffering from the staggering heat.
“Yes, those won’t be useful now,” Jasper said, pointing at Storm’s overcoat. “Hand them over, I’ll put them in the bag.”
Storm handed the coat to him while Jasper glowered over Hadrian’s unwillingness to remove his. Perhaps he did not want another fight or perhaps he just didn’t care anymore, because the only thing he said was, “Right.”
After slipping Storm’s coat into his bag, he walked towards some rocks, beside the tunnel exit, where a chocolate brown horse was saddled and tied to a wooden pole. Storm couldn’t believe his eyes. He hadn’t seen a horse in Sanctuary in a very long time. The species had died out shortly after his fourth birthday.
“Hey, girl!” Jasper exclaimed with delight, rubbing the horse’s nose. He reached into a bag on the horse’s back and retrieved an apple, which he promptly handed to her. As the horse chewed it, Jasper loosened her reins and brought her to where Storm and Hadrian were standing.
“This is Jenny,” Jasper said, as the horse stared at them emotionlessly, devouring her apple.
It was definitely the healthiest animal he had ever seen, Storm reckoned, while admiring the strong muscles and the glistening mane, flowing and dancing in the hot breeze.
Jasper gave Jenny a pat on her neck. “She has been with me from a very young age, but she doesn’t have any friends, so I guess you guys will have to walk next to me, until we can find some extra horses somewhere.”
He proceeded to mount his horse, but Hadrian appeared disgruntled by this. “So, are we supposed to walk all the way?” he asked.
Jasper had steered Jenny to face them and was about to respond, when his attention was suddenly drawn to something behind them.
“Get down!” he shouted, gesturing wildly with his arms.
Storm ducked just as a knife came whistling over his head. Quick as a flash, Jasper pulled out his gun and pointed it at the unknown assailant behind him. There followed a bang and then Storm heard a painful grown. He whirled around to see a Peacekeeper kneeling in the sand, bleeding from his mouth. Storm then noticed that Hadrian was struggling desperately with another Peacekeeper who was pushing, shoving and grunting, and it took great effort from Hadrian to keep him from drawing his sword. To Storm, everything felt as if it was happening in slow motion.
Then the young Peacekeeper managed to break free from Hadrian’s grasp. He ripped out his sword and pointed it at Hadrian.
Storm gasped in surprise.
It was Jamie… and his sword, Vengeance.
While Hadrian was staring at the sword, motionless, Jamie whipped his right foot around in one swift strike and kicked Hadrian’s legs out from underneath him. Hadrian collapsed to the ground, crying out in agony as his head collided with a boulder in the mountain wall. Then Jamie advanced upon Storm. He leaped forward and grabbed his weaker prey by the arm, spinning him around before gripping him tightly across the chest.
The sword was now pressing into Storm’s throat and Jamie was standing behind him with his feet wide apart. “We knew that you were working with the Outsiders, Boy-150,” he sneered. “We should have killed you when we had the chance. Did you think you could escape so easily from us, you little worm?”
Storm tried with all his might to break free from the hold, but Jamie was too strong. His sword was almost cutting into Storm’s Adams apple.
“Whoa, tough guy,” Jasper said from where he was still sitting on Jenny’s back. He was now pointing his gun at Jamie’s face with great determination.
“If you shoot, you will kill him too, Outsider!” Jamie shouted, hiding his head behind Storm’s.
Storm figured that Jasper was probably trying to find a clean shot.
“Drop your weapon, or we will kill him!” Jamie continued, pressing the blade of the sword harder into Storm’s throat. The pressure created a minor cut and Storm could feel blood trickling down onto his chest.
“No you won’t,” Jasper replied calmly. “If you wanted to kill him then you would have done so already. You only want to take them back to Sanctuary, don’t you? Why didn’t you kill Hadrian when you had the chance?”
Jamie chose to ignore this. “Drop your gun!” he demanded once more.
Jasper shook his head. “I will do no such thing.”
Suddenly, there was a movement behind them and Storm heard a loud thwack. This was followed by a lot of pain on the back of his head, as Jamie’s forehead crashed into it. Jamie gave a loud groan and then the hold on Storm loosened. He jumped forward, whilst turning around to see Jamie fall to the ground, unconscious. Behind him stood a dazed Hadrian, bleeding from the side of his head, with a log the size of a grown man’s thigh in his hands. He threw the log asid
e and picked up Jamie’s sword before raising it to finish the job.
“No!” Jasper shouted.
Storm whipped around while Hadrian scanned the surroundings, both of them assuming that a new threat had emerged. But there were no other Peacekeepers in sight. Jasper had climbed off the horse and he was now pointing his gun at Hadrian instead of the unconscious Jamie. “Don’t kill him,” he said firmly.
Hadrian and Storm shared a few moments of confusion. The thought of sparing Jamie’s life hadn’t even crossed their minds.
Scratching his head, Hadrian said, “But he tried to kill us.” He was squinting at Jasper in suspicion, as if he knew something they didn’t.
“No he did not,” Jasper replied. “He kicked you down and he threatened, but he would never have killed either of you. He doesn’t have the sense. He’s an order-follower and his orders were to take you two back to Sanctuary
That sounded about right to Storm.
“We should still kill him,” Hadrian insisted, raising the sword once again.
“No! Not in cold blood!” Jasper yelled, now stepping between Hadrian and Jamie, causing Hadrian to stop in mid-air and gaze at Jasper in concern. Then he tried to elbow his way past Jasper, but Jasper thrust him back.
“Step out of the way, Outsider!” Hadrian shouted.
“No,” Jasper responded calmly, yet appearing to be ready for a fight.
As Hadrian and Jasper stood conflicted, Storm was reminded of John’s death and how he had hesitated to kill him. He was also reminded of what had transpired just over an hour ago in Sanctuary, when Hadrian had saved his life.
Why should my life be spared but not Jamie’s?
“Wait, Hadrian!” he called out. “You saved our life, remember, brother. Why can’t you save his life too?”
“Precisely,” Jasper said, seizing on the moment. “Besides, as I’ve told you before: he would never have killed you or your brother. His empty threats were only to scare you into following him back to Sanctuary. Come on, Hadrian, think! Don’t be stupid like the rest of them.”
“This is not right,” Hadrian muttered, shaking his head. “We should not think on this, stop thinking, it is SELFISH!” he added, but he seemed to speaking to himself more than anyone else.
“I would like you to take a deep breath,” Jasper said, “and then consider what you have just said. Because if you look at it from an outsider’s perspective – excuse the pun – it doesn’t make any sense whatsoever. Don’t worry we will bind him and figure out what to do with him. He won’t escape.”
Hadrian stood there, helpless.
It was almost as if he was slowly malfunctioning.
With his fellow Sanctuarians behind him or with a bell sounding, he probably would have killed Jamie right there and then. He did not care about or believe in these arguments. But the pressure from Jasper and Storm in this completely unknown land had made him vulnerable. He could not muster a sound reason why he should actually kill Jamie. He hovered there in indecision, until he finally dropped the sword onto the sand with a soft thud. Then he raised his hands to protect his face from the blistering sun again.
Jasper backed down when he saw that Hadrian had submitted and walked over towards Jenny, rummaging in one of the bags attached to the saddle. He returned to them carrying a long length of rope and started to tie Jamie’s ankles and wrists together.
He struggled for a moment to turn Jamie around so that he could fully bind him and then stopped, peering up at Storm, his face gleaming with perspiration. “Are you going to help me or not?”
“Sorry,” Storm mumbled and then sprang into action, helping to move Jamie onto his stomach so that Jasper could tie him up properly. Storm did not assist in the physical binding itself, however. Not because he didn’t want to, but because he knew he was slightly useless at it. He’d never been good with hands-on work.
Hadrian was still protecting himself from the sun, staring at them from under his hands, but without any focus in his eyes.
Once Jasper had finished securing their prisoner, he told Storm to grab a hold of Jamie’s feet and together they hauled him over to the horse, panting and pausing frequently to wipe the sweat from their brows.
After a five-minute struggle with the dead weight of the unconscious boy, they managed to lift him onto the horse, his body now slumped over the saddle. Jasper then bound Jamie’s hips to the horse as well. “Alright,” he rasped, almost completely out of breath, bent over and covered in sweat. He stood like this for a few moments and then lurched upright again, determined. “Let’s go!”
“Come on, Hadrian!” Storm shouted.
Hadrian turned to gaze at Storm for a moment and Storm grew slightly concerned about his demeanor. But then Hadrian snapped out of it. He picked up Jamie’s sword and wandered over towards them. When he reached them, he started walking forward on his own.
“Wait, Hadrian,” Jasper called after him. “That’s the wrong direction.”
Hadrian stopped and looked at Jasper blankly. It was then that Storm noticed his brother was still bleeding from the side of his head.
Jasper opened a bag on the saddle and retrieved some refined bandages and a tube of ointment. He carefully rubbed the ointment on Hadrian’s injury, which left Hadrian grimacing in pain and regarding Jasper with mistrust. Once the bleeding was under control, Jasper spun a small turban of bandages around Hadrian’s head.
The moment he was finished, Jasper said, “You’ll be right as rain, don’t worry.” Then he placed his hands on his hips and pointed at Jamie on the horse with his chin. “By the way: are you happy? Now we all have to walk.”
This only made Hadrian grunt in reply.
Jasper slapped Jenny on the backside and she started to move forward. The three of them followed at a slow pace.
They were walking on a vague path that was dotted with stones here and there. It seemed like it might have been used a lot many years ago, but had since fallen into disuse, the sand now covering most of the stones.
The party travelled in silence and they did not seem to cover much distance, or at least it didn’t feel like it to Storm, as the terrain around them largely remained the same. He suspected that the event that had just transpired was still on everyone’s mind. Hadrian in front of him was shaking his head continually and he was almost walking diagonally as if veering between going back and moving forward.
After a while, Jasper called them to a halt, by which time Jamie had regained consciousness and was starting to struggle to free himself from the ropes. All three of them ignored him because Jasper had told them nobody could escape his rope techniques and that Jamie would eventually stop trying, which he did.
They drank water from a large canteen Jasper provided and then continued their journey.
Freedom on the outside was somewhat comforting to Storm and he felt happy to be liberated from the burden of Sanctuary, even if he still did not know what hope there was for him on this side. The wind blowing in his face almost felt as if it was nourishing him.
Hadrian, on the other hand, was a shadow of his former self. He seemed utterly dejected. Storm sensed that his status had been impressive in Sanctuary and was now utterly worthless in this strange new world.
They passed almost no fellow travellers on the road as it seemed that no one came to Sanctuary anymore, confirming Jasper’s theory that nobody wanted to go back to the miserable place.
Storm was almost now certain he had been fooled by the teachings of that place.
He glanced at Jamie and saw that he was still breathing. This managed to puncture a bit of Storm’s newfound happiness. Although still a human being, Jamie represented everything he had come to loath and despise.
Storm wondered if it had been the right decision to spare him. Jamie was also bleeding from the head like Hadrian, he noticed, although the injury wasn’t nearly as serious as his brother’s.
Unfortunately.
34
After five hours of travelling, the fun of the e
xpedition had largely worn off and just as Storm started to feel his stomach grumble, Jasper informed them to stop and camp for the night. Both Hadrian and Storm had by now fashioned meager protection from the sun for their noses and ears, using strips of clothing, but their faces were still burnt raw in places.
Jasper smirked at them. “So, how was our first day outside of Sanctuary?”
Hadrian said nothing and Storm mumbled something inaudible, which left Jasper chortling.
Storm only now noticed that the sun had actually moved and was disappearing over the horizon. “It moves?” he asked, pointing at the setting sun with his index finger.
Jasper chuckled again. “Yes, the sun moves. It goes down in the west at night and comes up in the east every morning.”
This baffled Storm. Since it was always overcast in Sanctuary, he had been under the impression that the darkness simply engulfed the sun every night and then released it high up in the air again the next morning. Now, as he watched the sunset, the temperature began to drop significantly with dusk approaching. He scratched his chin and scanned his surroundings.
They were stationed next to a tall stone pillar, standing resolutely in the middle of the vast desert. The ground around the pillar felt harder than the rest of the area and showed indications that there had been previous campers here. Wooden logs and branches lay scattered on the ground, most of them burnt black.
Jasper removed the largest bag from the load on Jenny’s back – ignoring Jamie’s muffled moaning – and walked to a dark patch beside the pillar, where a collection of wood was stacked in a heap. He then returned to the horse and, without warning, knocked Jamie off with both his hands. Jamie fell to the ground with a groan and a puff of dust. While he was struggling to get upright, Jasper shrugged at the expressions of Hadrian and Storm. “Just because we saved his life doesn’t mean we have to treat him well,” he mentioned. “He is still an arrogant bastard who threatened to kill us.” He gagged Jamie’s mouth with a dirty rag and then tied him to the nearest tree with some more rope.
