The Sword Bearer

Chapter 19

The only thing that kept us going was the provisions. We hadn’t passed a single lake or even a small well. There weren’t any trees because of the lack of water. We couldn’t be back in the desert. We had walked in the opposite direction for a long time. We walked more and more and I felt the ground starting to get harder under our feet. I looked down to see a hard layer of hardened dirt. It was obvious. We were in the desert again. I took a hard piece off the ground. The moisture was still close to the surface but the trees were disappearing fast and I knew it would be very down under the ground. Cracks were already forming in the hard ground. I dug my heel into the ground and felt the caked dirt crack under my foot quite easily. We didn’t have enough water to pass through the desert I thought, unless this one was smaller than the one we had encountered before. I asked Daren for the map so he pulled in out of his bag. He kneeled down and so did I next to him. He spread the map out hiding the edges so it would roll up again. I saw to my surprise this was the same desert that we had been in except it was a thin piece of land that moved outward from the desert. I didn’t understand how the climate could just stretch out for so long in a different direction. We had enough water and food for two days and the stretch seemed about a three-day walk. I welcomed the challenge smiling and I saw the same expression on Daren’s face.

I didn’t eat or drink while we rested in the shade before we had to set off into the constant sun for two or three days. If we didn’t make it by the second day I didn’t think we would make it. It didn’t seem so bad since we had traveled longer distances but the time we had was so little to cross such an expanse. After an hour of shade I looked at Daren. He took that as my signal that I was ready. We both stood up and smiled at each other. “You ready?” he breathed. His voice sounded unnaturally loud in the quiet landscape. “As Ill ever be” I said. My voice echoed in my ears menacingly. With that we started walking toward the desert. We started off slow. I didn’t want to waste all of my energy at the beginning. The first hours were the worst. The trees had provided us a protection from the sun. The heat bore on us never stopping. I didn’t touch my bag even though I was in less than an hour. I wasn’t going to be the first one to drink. I would wait till Daren did so I didn’t seem weak. He showed signs that he was thirsty. He panted constantly and stopped a few times. After an hour of avoiding the bottle I finally broke. It had been two hours under the constant watch of the sun. I took a small sip, just enough to wet my throat. As the water ran down my gullet I let out a groan of relief. Daren seemed relived too and after a few minutes he too drank a sip.

Even after the first time when we had almost dehydrated ourselves we were both determined to drink last. The next time Daren was the first one to brake. I drank only a few minutes after him. I gave him a small smirk and he gave me a glare in return but I knew it was playful. It wasn’t good to make our bodies wait for water for so long but it also helped us conserve enough water so that we wouldn’t run out before we reached the other end. That night I though I saw some shadows on the horizon. If we could see it now would we be able to reach it before the end of tomorrow? We decided that we would go on that night even though we were quite tired. We weren’t going to take our chances against not reaching there in time and perishing in the desert. Anyway if we made it to the other side we would have a lot of time to rest. Daren was sure the woman knew nothing about how big this desert was. When I looked at the map again while walking again I almost tripped as I realized something. Nothing was mapped beyond the desert. I traced the line that made it look like land ended there and there was nothing beyond it. I knew that couldn’t be. There was something there, wasn’t there? If there wasn’t what were we going to reach. When I pointed this out to Daren his eyes sparkled. “I’ve always wanted to know what was beyond the reach of the mapmakers and now I’m going to find out,” he said with a small smile. His sense of a good adventure never ceased to amaze me.

Only when the sun rose and the heat started to beat on us again did I realize that I hadn’t drank much in the night. The sun was dehydrating us way too fast. The uneven shadows on the horizon got bigger and bigger as we walked closer to the other side of the desert. I knew we would definitely get there before the end of the day. I shook my bottle to check how much water was left and to my dismay it only had enough for a few more hours. If we walked faster we would have to drink more water but if we went slow and took time we would run out of water. I decided that running was the better option. We would either make it or we wouldn’t but that depended on whether we could endure without water for longer than we already were. I pointed all that I had thought about to Daren. His bottle had a little more than mine to my embarrassment but still not enough. We started to run and for a while I didn’t feel any strain but after about half an hour my exertion took its toil. I started panting and I thought about taking a sip of my water but I refrained from it. If I did I didn’t think we would be able to make it. I tried to make myself forget about my parched throat but it wasn’t working. I started to swallow my own spit but it only made my throat even drier. After two hours of constant running, sweat was running down my face in streams and i could hear my heart beating fast. We stopped by unspoken consent and sat down. I couldn’t drink from my water yet. After my heart calmed down a little bit we started again but after an hour I broke and drank a small sip.

That small sip triggered the thirst to be even more massive. I could hardly stop myself from drinking all my water. I stopped my self before I could drink anymore but I felt immediately better after my throat wasn’t so dry. Daren had taken a small sip too after he had seen me take out my bottle. He seemed relived too. His shoulders slouched a little bit inward and he sighed in relief. I felt something lift off of me. I realized the reason I wasn’t giving up. It wanted to stay alive but another reason was that I didn’t want Daren to die. It had kept bothering me at the back of my mind. We started to run again and after two hours we took a small sip. The shadows took the shape of trees now. I smiled we were close to our destination but we weren’t going to make it before nightfall. When I took a sip now I only drank half of what I usually did. I was still very thirsty after but I had to make it with enough water. I didn’t know how long it would take us to find a lake on the other side. The map had showed to sign of a lake but there could be one where it got cut off. That hope drove me to go faster.

In the dark night I could hardly see anything. I had slowed my past not sure in which direction we were going. The stars light wasn’t enough to guide us. I tripped over something once. I felt a small trickle of blood on my knees. I wiped it off with my fingers feeling the dark liquid on my fingers. I rubbed it off on the ground and stood up. We continued after that. I didn’t let my bloodied knees come in the way. I ignored the small pinpricks of pain. It was probably only a few hours after midnight when Daren held me back. The world was still dark in these early hours of night. He pulled me somewhere but then I felt the air get denser as we entered an enclosed space. I sat down after we moved a few feet into the space. It was a little colder in here. The air was a little moist. I leaned against a ragged surface and feel asleep there, where I could feel Daren’s presence next to me. I woke up staring at a rock like wall. I tried to squirm back but I was only successful in hurting my back against another rough wall behind me. Soon memories from the night flowed back to me. I looked up to see that the rock wall extended there. Then it hit me. We had taken refuge in a cave that night. Daren was still asleep when I looked at him. His head slightly faced me. He looked so peaceful like nothing had happened. I rummaged around for my water skin to sate the hunger in my throat. I couldn’t find it. Maybe we had lost it last night in the dark. I leaned back on the wall waiting for Daren to wake up.

I fell into a light sleep while I waited. After a while I was roused by sounds coming from outside of the cave. I looked over to Daren but to my surprise he wasn’t there. I tried to figure out what I should do. I couldn’t see him anywhere in the cave and the noises outside were getting louder. I slowly started to crawl out of the cave. I would try and find Daren as soon as I was outside. When I went outside the sounds had stopped and there was nothing there. Daren was crouched at a stream, holding our water skins in it. I walked over to him and sat next to him. He smiled at me but neither of us broke the silence for a long while. After the skins were full we screwed the tops back on. Daren stood up then pulled me up. We leaned against the outer wall of the cave. The first thing I did when we were comfortably sitting was drinking a lot of water from the water skin. Then I surveyed our surroundings. Something seemed different. There was a fair amount of trees and the stream seemed out of place. I looked over at the way we came and started to walk there. After walking a few feet I peered between some trees to see the desert. We had made it. We had finally made it across the desert.

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Sorry if its short but I just felt like I needed to update

My reads went up so much so thank you all of you guys who took the time to read :)

This chapter is dedicated to XxcutieliciousxX because she is an awesome and dedicated reader :D plus i love her so much and she is also my cousin :)