Acropolis

Phillipi

"No, but certainly, it has changed."

Then I knew I needed head back. Then I knew I needed to head forward. Too many directions! Too many instructions! How else was I supposed to know where to go besides Phillipi? The original course? The original plan? Yes, Phillipi!

The sky grew redder in morning when an abrupt hindrance to plans came from one of the guardian messengers of Medora. Kazimir had prepared for the easiest bypass from the town Acacia ran into early in the journey. Already, he was trained in maps and stars and seas and an apprentice to the heavens. He didn't see himself as one to be brought to the highest thrones of heaven, so he never rested but never stopped climbing in studiousness.

Kazimir's plan came—to stop Jason in his stupor and use his own weapons against him—to find the secret alchemy of his narcotic wine.

Andelko didn't want to risk drawing attention to his voice in the dark although the dark wouldn't be ashamed at the sight of him.

"There is something I must tell you, Acacia."

"Oh, no...what is it? Whenever someone says, 'there is something I must tell you' you know what I must tell you?"

"No, but my something is more important." Acacia's eyes implored.

"I wasn't always a pirate. When I was a young lad, I roamed with caravans."

"With sea gypsies?"

"Yes, if that's what you like to call them. I roamed freely amongst the creatures. I despondently obeyed my parents and when I did, I still would go wailing about on the neck of a sea creature. Even in the dark, everything is startin' ta look familiar ta me now, even my memories. I had a wild time, but I craved wilder. I took the wrong turn into the woods and one day...one day...I became a pirate."

"You mean?"

"I've been pirated. Kidnapped. I don't know what you call it, but then I never saw my parents again. I used up all my wits fighting back, gnawing, chewing, spitting, but the threats and lashes were much worse. I'm not sure where I came to—a fortress of whalebone it looks like—but I hope that destination is no longer in the itinerary."

"That town..."

"It's a city, very pretty but once you get to know it, kinda ugly."

"I know it. I know! Not all ugly...its name...Agora?"

For the first time, Andelko's eyes drooped into a hardened sadness.

He is perhaps harder to read than Conrad was.

Acacia had so many questions but instead, Andelko affirmed, "Let's leave."

It was back under the dark coverlets of early dawn.

Acacia was impossible to catch, thought Kazimir, but Jason has already captured her parents and they could help us prevent Jan from ensuing battle, ruling the unicorns, overruling Domain, and no—what will I expect upon return home?

Kazimir had returned to Daphne who waited closely in the bushes when he caught the attention of the legions with the prankish throw of his spear. The legions gladly led him to Daphne who frightfully recruited him for the rescue of Acacia's parents.

Kazimir, led by Daphne, advanced toward Medora's center near midnight. The air became even cooler as the pair opened a latch in the street farthest away from guards and lights. A few lights could be seen between the trees that guarded each side of the stone pavement leading away from the city. It neared a dead-end maybe dead for centuries.

The descent into the cool clay earth was a step to reaching the guard tunnels of Jason's dungeon. Kazimir's sadistic hope was that Jason would find something more challenging and less dispensing than narcotics and stories to distract himself.