The Rising Sun: Episode 6 by J Hawk Page A

to a
thoughtful gaze for a while. leaving Ion in front of him with his
arms folded in contempt, and Mantra beside him with his hand still
clutching his shoulder.
     
    The sky above dimmed slowly, as the final
lights of the day faded. As the dusk wore through and the night
formed, the mild activity around them was dying down. The people
who’d been outside the huts were receding back to it, lighting
torches within them.
     
    Ion noticed a group of people filing outside
the large black ship near them, where they’d been all along. They
disbanded, all of them spreading out to return to their respective
huts.
     
    “So what’re the watchmen doing?” Vonayz asked
finally.
     
    “We’ve sent them to gather our forces.”
     
    “Yeah, but what’s the plan there, exactly?”
asked Vonayz, and Ion picked up a strange, sharp anticipation in
his tone. He was being, in Ion’s opinion, overly curious all of a
sudden.
     
    He wondered why…
     
    Mantra chuckled softly. “You know we can’t be
giving out all our secrets to outsiders, right?”
     
    “Outsiders?” asked Vonayz, his lips parting
in a grin.
     
    “Sorry, kid,” said Mantra. “But that’s what
you are as of now … unless you decide to join us, of course.”
     
    “Give me one solid reason I should,” said
Vonayz, a mild growl in his tone as he switched his gaze over to
Ion.
     
    Ion had to fight the urge to unsheathe his
sword and run it through Vonayz. But he contented himself with a
tight smile, before turning and gazing across the lands.
     
    “Believe me,” said Mantra, his grip on
Vonayz’s shoulder tightening. “If you refuse my offer … there will
be a time when you will regret it.”
     
    “Believe me,” contradicted Vonayz. “I won’t.”
He wrenched Mantra’s hand off his shoulder, turned and kicked dirt
over to the fire, dousing it.
     
    Ion walked forward and sat behind where
Mantra was. He inwardly felt that this was a lost cause the very
moment he knew who Mantra’s student was. But Mantra apparently had
other notions. Far off from where they were, the setting sun lay
pressed to the horizon, a disc of radiant, glowing red. One of the
cloaked men from the black ship was trotting towards them, making
his way to his hut. And as he neared, Ion caught sight of his face
… Zardin’s blank eyesockets were fixed steadily on Ion, his face
alive with malice as he walked over towards them.
     
    As Ion rose, his tongue bone dry, he realised
that the rest of the cloaked men who’d alighted the large black
ship weren’t spreading out towards their huts … they were spreading
out to surround him and Mantra.
     
    Vonayz turned back to face Ion, a grin
burning on his face. “Sorry to say … I’ve already made my
alliance.”
     
    Mantra paused for a second, and then turned
to face Zardin as his footsteps neared. His calm look was just as
dangerously unfazed as always.
     
    Walking on towards them, Zardin shook his
head and spread his hands in a warm gesture. “What a pleasant
surprise, I must say … for you.”
     
    Mantra turned back to Vonayz, gazing at him
in steady silence. Wounded silence.
     
    Ion’s fear was blotted by the surge of fury
that awoke inside of him. As Mantra stood there, gazing calmly at
his former student, Ion walked forward and unsheathed his
sword.
     
    “I swear do you,” he hissed, locking eyes
with Vonayz. “before the end of this life … I will kill you.”
     
    Vonayz sneered. “Not if I kill you
first.”
     
    He drew his saber and progressed. Approaching
fast from beside them, Zardin shouted to the Xeni closing them all
over: “Kill them!”
     
    “Time to leave,” Mantra said, tugging Ion
from the back. “let’s go, Run!”
     
    With a final, seething glare at Vonayz, Ion
and Mantra turned and took to their heals. The rough, sloping lands
marked no difference to the two of them as they tore across it,
with the Xeni sweeping in towards them from all sides, surrounding
them.
     
    Ion’s hopes