Abaddon's Eve by Rachel Starr Thomson

Author:Rachel Starr Thomson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: romance, prophecy, prophet, desert, christian fantasy, shepherd, rachel starr thomson, trader
Publisher: Rachel Starr Thomson

Chapter 10

Alack knew the moment he stepped beyond the boundaries of where he had ever been as a shepherd. Herdsmen roamed far and wide with their flocks and herds, always seeking pasture and shelter and water, and periods of drought would push them farther out than normal. But this far he had never come, and nor had his father before him, nor his father before him.

They were pushing to the far western edge of the Sacred Land.

He missed his sheep. This trek was long and mostly unvarying, the only real interest having to do with when and how Alack would manage to find supper, or whether they would do without it. Kol Abaddon rarely spoke; something was raging behind his eyes that was even more intense and tempestuous than normal. Alack suspected it was the message he had to give to the king of the Westland, but he did not know, as Kol Abaddon did not tell him. There was little difference, in fact, between traveling alone and traveling with the prophet, except that the prophet seemed to have miraculously little need for either rest or water, and Alack suffered for lack of both. He tried not to complain.

He wished he knew whether he were conducting himself well. It was so hard to tell, and he had no example of a good prophet’s disciple to measure himself against. “See to your duties,” his father had always told him—it was Naam’s principal philosophy in life—so Alack put his mind and strength to scrounging up food as often as he could. It was the only duty he could make out, other than trying to keep his eyes and ears open for the Great God.

But then, it seemed visions would find him rather than the other way around. So he didn’t know how to measure himself in that respect either.

Kol Abaddon began walking before the sun was completely up and often did not stop until it had set again and cast darkness over the desert. Before then, Alack could see a growing agitation coming over him as the day gave way to evening and shadows crept closer. There had not been any howling episode since this journey began, but he suspected the torment was always right there, ready to seize on the man who called himself the Voice of Destruction.

As they lay down to sleep between a natural ring of boulders in the darkness, somewhere Alack suspected was nearly the exact border of the Sacred Land, he stared up at the stars and remembered his first meeting with Kol Abaddon.

Flora Infortunatia had been wrong. The prophet was not a man after all.

Alack wondered if he would lose all semblance of humanity too. He wondered if knowing the Great God did that to you.

He should ask, he thought.

Not that the God had answered his last question.

He wondered why he had thought it was so important to come out here and follow the prophet—more important than anything.

But even wondering, he knew he would never go back.

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