Chapter 7! Hope you guys enjoy it! ^^

Chapter 7: Warning

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The first thing Draygor noticed when he entered the room was that the High Priestess was a nervous wreck. He could see she was trying to hide it, but it was obvious that her attempts at calming herself had been in vain. To her credit, she had managed to control her voice long enough to dismiss the attendant.

“L-leave us! I wish to speak to the boy alone.”

As soon as the doors were closed once more, the High Priestess let out an audible sigh of relief. She still had to keep up her image in front of her subordinates, what with her being the spiritual leader of the country’s faith and all. Turning to face her guest, she was taken aback when she found him already staring at her. Chewing on her bottom lip nervously, she returned the favour, sweeping her eyes over him. There didn’t seem to be anything special about the boy, other than the peculiar white scale on his head.

“What do you want, High Priestess? I assume it has something to do with your strange behaviour since the ceremony,” Draygor piped up with an exasperated sigh, breaking the silence and startling Lah’ra from her thoughts.

She began recounting her tale, filling him in on the vision she was shown by the goddess, as well as what she had experienced during the ceremony itself.

“So Mhi’ra told you to find me? Hmm…” Draygor asked, his brow furrowing in thought. “Did she give any further instructions then?”

“Ah! How could I have forgotten!” Lah’ra replied after thinking about it for a moment. “The goddess also showed me the deaths of many people, and you were lying amongst them!”

Her face contorted in horror as she recalled the part of the dream that she had banished to the depths of her mind. If she had been able to find Draygor, then surely the rest of her dream would come true as well!

“I see…” Draygor said, frowning at her words, but otherwise calm.

“How can you be so calm?!” Lah’ra cried out.

The boy was five years old for Mhi’ra’s sake, and this was not how a five year old behaved! She was at her wit’s end; the day had been crazy enough already, and her mind was overloading with information she could not handle.

“Well, you’ll send people to protect me, right? Surely that’s why the goddess instructed you to find me,” he replied, looking at her with expectant eyes.

“W-well… yes…”

“Then there’s nothing to worry about! Now, I’ve really got to get going, my family is waiting for me, and I don’t want to worry them any longer. Thanks for letting me know! I’ll be relying on you in the future, if Mhi’ra sends her regards again.”

With that, Draygor left the room to return home, in the escort of one of Lah’ra’s personal guards, who had been instructed to keep watch on the Mithras household as well.

Lah’ra sat speechless even after the boy had left. She was sure he was right; her guard was surely capable enough to prevent any incidents, like the one in her dream. Draygor had dominated the conversation, and she didn’t know what to think. What five year old kid would have such a domineering presence, especially in front of her, one of the most powerful and influential people in Gar’nashia?

“Who are you, Draygor Mithras?” was her last thought before she fainted, exhausted from the mind blowing events of the past few hours.

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Four hooded figures were seated around a small table in a dark room, their shapes only barely illuminated by the small candle in the centre of the table.

“Is this true, Mouth?” one of the hooded figures spoke up in a deep, gravelly voice.

“Indeed it is, Shield. He Who Takes Life appeared to me himself last night in a dream. He told me to ‘beware the one in white’, and showed me an image of the Ceremony of the First Scale which is to take place tomorrow,” the Mouth reported, her voice clearly feminine in nature.

“Will this ‘white one’ be a threat?” another of the figures asked.

The Mouth replied with a shrug. “I do not know, Axe. Our great god did not deign to give me more information, and it is not our place to ask of Him.”

“Hmph. Stand down for now, Axe. In the first place, we do not know who ‘the one in white’ is. Eye, send one of your men to the temple tomorrow in disguise. Find out who the one we seek is. If possible, take whoever it is in for questioning. We will decide what to do then,” the Shield grunted, turning to the last hooded figure he called the Eye.

“Consider it done,” the Eye nodded in acceptance, his voice a breathy whisper.

The four hooded figures stood to leave, and the one who stood last blew the candle out, returning the room to darkness.

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Draygor was worried, though he did his best not to show it. The fact that Mhi’ra had appeared to the High Priestess herself meant that whatever trouble was to come was something that might inconvenience him greatly. If the vision was to be believed, it would mean that there was a possibility that he would be killed.

His train of thought was derailed by Dhi’na’s tail slapping him on the back. He turned to retaliate, but realised that everyone at the dining table was looking at him in silence.

“Draygor, is everything really okay?” Lhi’ra asked, her voice full of worry.

She had been on the verge of tears when he arrived home, and had fretted over him until he managed to convince her that nothing bad had happened. He gave the simple explanation to those present that the High Priestess had invited him for a small chat in order to get to know the younger generation better. The reason? She had simply chosen him because he had been the last child to receive the blessing, and thus was the only one she remembered clearly, after having blessed so many other children.

“Yeah, I’m fine. Just a little tired from just now, you know? The High Priestess is actually surprisingly chatty, despite her graceful demeanor,” he answered, dismissing her worries with a smile. “I’ll be fine after eating the awesome food that dad has cooked!”

“See, I told you he’s fine, dear. Now, let’s eat before the food gets cold!” Garick laughed, backing up his son with a wink.

Looking around the table as those he held dear tucked into the scrumptious spread of dishes, Draygor was filled with a renewed sense of peace and determination. He wouldn’t tell them about what was to come so they wouldn’t have to worry, but he’d be damned if he allowed himself to be removed from this life without a fight to the death.

-----

The man checked his equipment for the umpteenth time as he waited silently for night to fall. It was still be a few hours before he could take action, but he was patient. His harsh, spartan training had made sure of that. The instructors had even chopped off his horns during the training, but he did not resent them for that. It was a sign of his dedication to the Cult, and he bore it with pride. It was also helpful for covert operations such as this, as the lack of horns made him a smaller profile in the darkness.

The Cult had given him a future when he was sure there was none. He had been a street urchin, orphaned like many others after his parents had been killed by the White Death during the invasion of the Ely. When he and the other children despaired, nearly driven to madness due to starvation and being homeless, the Cult had come to them.

The Cult had given them food and shelter. Indefinitely, they said, with only one condition.

“Give your life to us.”

No one had been willing to return to a life without hope, without a future, and so the children accepted. They were taken away to a hidden location deep within the forests near Mhi’ra’s Light, and they were trained. Some as bloodthirsty warriors, some as mages, and some as spies like him. Many died during the training, but their companions didn’t grieve for them.

“Weaklings,” they had thought within their minds.

Instead, they devoted even more of themselves to the Cult. Those who died would have met their end regardless, if the Cult had not taken them in, and the survivors thanked the Cult for making them strong.

Again, the man checked his equipment, recalling the mission he had been given the day before.

“Find the white one and bring him to us,” the Eye had instructed.

In order to determine the identity of his target, he had disguised himself – complete with fake horns – and infiltrated the temple during the Ceremony of the First Scale. Seeing all the parents with their children had made bitter feelings rise up in his heart. He had never gone through such a lavish ceremony when he had gotten his first scale; no one had been there to take him after all, since his parents were already dead.

The man took great care not to express his emotions, however. His mission was more important. The Cult didn’t tolerate failure, and doled out harsh punishments to those who did. The punishments didn’t scare him however. He would have taken his own life if he failed anyway. The shame of disappointing the Cult who had given him everything would have been too much for him to bear.

“Draygor Mithras!”

He noticed the High Priestess’ reaction when the child had went up the steps to receive the blessing. Perhaps the child was his target. He wondered if anyone else had noticed the abnormality and looked around, but realised that he had been the only one.

“Hah, weaklings,” he thought, mocking them in his mind.

As the boy descended from the predella after receiving the blessing, he spotted something that confirmed his thoughts, and he licked his lips in anticipation.

It was a pure white scale atop the boy’s forehead.

After the ceremony had concluded, he had stuck close to the family, but not close enough to warrant suspicion. The man laughed inwardly when he overheard the temple attendant summon the boy on behalf of the High Priestess. If he’d had any doubts of the boy being his target before, he was a hundred percent sure now.

He’d stuck around the entrance of the temple, hoping to nab his target on the way home, but realised the futility of acting in bright daylight when the boy had appeared with one of the prestigious temple guard. He wasn’t confident enough to take the guard on in a straight fight, so he had merely followed the pair to the boy’s home, formulating a plan in his mind.

The man was pulled back from his thoughts as the moonlight streamed onto his face. It was time.

“The night is my domain,” he thought confidently as he emerged from his hiding spot, dressed in black cloth that fully covered him, with only a small slit at his eyes for him to see.

The temple guard was still around, much to his annoyance. It was an easy feat to avoid detection though. He wasn’t regarded as the best infiltrator second to the Eye for nothing. There were a few detection charms around the house, but they were nothing he couldn’t handle.

Mages who specialised in charms were usually weaker and thus had no place in the Queen’s magick division. They made a living selling their services to households like the one he was in now. It was laughably easy to avoid the charms once one knew their telltale signs. Within minutes, he had made his way to the roof. He planned to enter via a window on the second floor of the house, where he had observed the boy’s room to be.

He had to stop himself from snickering aloud when he spotted an open window. To add the icing on top of the cake, it was the window to his target’s room as well! A quick glance into the room told him that his target was sound asleep. The man hadn’t expected it to be this easy, considering it was a mission that the Eye had personally given to him, and the Eye only gave missions personally when they were of the utmost importance.

“A challenge would have been much more fun…” he mumbled, disappointed at the apparent ease of the mission.

Pushing the thoughts away to focus on the task at hand, he entered through the open window, landing without a sound. He was pleased that his skills seemed to have improved. Past experiences of house infiltrations to assassinate or abduct his targets reminded him to check the room for any unusual areas that could indicate a trap, and he glanced around to do so.

Suddenly, his instincts screamed danger, and he immediately turned to face the bed with wide eyes, nearly tripping from the sudden action.

The boy was sitting up and staring at him.