THE BEGINNING:CHAPTER XXX:RETURN

Back at the acolyte's hideout, elders of the Magistrum and some of the remaining advocates who weren't picked to join the suicide mission, were growing impatient about the suicide squad's prolonged delay of their anticipated arrival from their kick started warfare against their adversaries whom they believe might have succeeded in annihilating the squad led by Azgaz including Melizar, as his trusted subordinate. Mild distress about their well being were boldly written on the faces of the remnants advocate as well as some of the blunt faces of the senior acolytes who were left behind to be temporarily trained by Tezmon whose leadership wasn't strong enough to erase the apprehensive thoughts from their mind even though they had fully engage themselves in all the repeated combative lessons they unquestionably received from the fourth elder without uttering an ounce of complaint about their speculated intuition which seems to be crippling their morale to keep up the constant training without their familiar teacher especially when they went out of the hideout in fair numbers, during the early hours around four am, to begin their usual morning routine which entails jogging far to the distant mountains until they get to rendezvous point where the leader of the group will end their long journey before heading back to the camp after resting their tired legs and fatigued body. Although the moody atmosphere was sharply present in the hideout, the low ranked acolytes didn't bother too much about their senior comrades including their amiable teacher whose position, the Magistrum had temporarily placed on Marabel, the sixth advocate to continue with the training from where Melizar left off and had fully kept focused during training except for the tattooed female teenager amongst them, who also took a fair share of the apprehension that had descended heavily upon the four corners of the camp as a result of the departure of their teacher and Pennant as well whose presence she had craved for the entire time the squad haven't been seen by the watchman, dwelling in the watchtower, outside the fortress.
The team had just completed their long trotting from the camp immediately after they wearily arrived at the end point on a hilltop near four huge trees where they rested for a while, drinking some sheer amount of water from their hefty furry pouch made of wineskin which they passed to each other and had finished quenching their thirst when one of them caught sight of Bella trotting towards them from an open field in a far distance away from the jungle, heading in the direction below the tall trees on the hill, fully drenched in her own sweet and completely alone without her comrades following behind like they usually do, even their recent teacher was no where to be seen.
He wasn't quite sure if the figure in the distance was the tattooed acolyte whom everyone in the fort knew as a Bantu and tapped his friend sitting next to him to help him figure out the truth while the others including Tezmon were busy taking a nap away from them.
"Collins, what do you make of that person heading towards us?",
The black boy asked.
"Let me see....I'm not quite sure",
"Maybe you can't see properly because of the pale sunlight",
"Probably",
"Then let's wait till he gets closer",
"That would be good idea, Marcus",
Collins said and rested his head back on the tree trunk to resume his nap leaving Marcus to keep on watching until he could lucidly see Bella coming towards them quite oblivious of their hidden presence on top of the hill.
"Hey, Collins. Come and Check this out",
Marcus whispered to his buddy in order not to disturb the others who were still sleeping.
Collins rose up his head from the tree and peered at Bella approaching below the hill after adjusting his head near the open space above the grasses.
"What the heck is she doing out here all alone?",
"Perhaps she might have fallen behind the others",
"I don't think so",
"How do you know that?",
"Those young fellows were still asleep when we left the fort",
"Then she really had the nerve to sneak out of the fort without the knowledge of the watchman",
"She will be in deep trouble if Mavdon hears about this",
"Of course. That's what she'll get for breaking yet another rule",
"Something's not right with her",
"You got that right",
Marcus said as their fixed gaze on the departing acolyte below slowly disappear until she was completely out of sight.
"She has been acting strange lately ever ever since the squad left",
"I'm aware of it too",
"You do?",
"Yes. I have seen her a lot engaging in physical training and she's been defaulting unnecessarily",
"Very true. I saw her once punching those hefty sacks we erected near our training ground inside the fort",
"She's probably not happy because her foster father left with the squad according to Mavdon orders",
"Not entirely",
"Then what is the other reason?",
"Maybe Pennant's the reason for her sudden change of behavior",
Marcus chuckled silently. "I don't see any reason why Pennant will have affected her in any way",
"I believe he's responsible. You see, Marcus, I have seen them together a couple of times in secret when Melizar wasn't in the fort",
"Are you sure about that?",
"Yeah. There's more. I've caught them chattering affectionately in the weapon room and the library twice without them knowing about it",
"If what you are saying is true, then she will be in a whole lot of mess once the Magistrum finds out",
"She might get punished for breaking the Bantu code",
"Maybe expulsion will serve as a punishment in such case",
"But that might happen if the elders knew about it",
"You would snitch on her, won't you?",
"Absolutely not. Because my findings alone isn't sufficient enough to prove her guilty",
"That's true",
"Besides, I don't want to drive a wedge between their friendship",
"Me too",
"I hope they come back to us safe from harms way",
"Our master and our comrades, right?",
"Yep",
The two anxious boys were fully engrossed in their quiet conversation oblivious to the listening ear of their teacher who thankfully didn't fully grasp the entire low chattering except for Collins last statement and rose up from the tree before waking up the sleeping teenagers to get up until he arrive at the two astonished fellows who got up looking anxious at the serious visage of Tezmon.
"Let's head back to the fortress. The sun will rise up any minute now,so form a straight line in twos before marching forward!",
Tezmon exclaimed as his students grudgingly began to obey his orders but he didn't react to their attitude and took the two boys to the back of the long queue.
"What were you two whispering about earlier?",
"Nothing really important, Master",
Marcus rejoined. "Yeah. We just miss our comrades, that's all",
"Alright, you two stay here and follow the line from the back. Let's go, lads!",
Tezmon shrieked as he stepped forward heading to the forefront of the departing boys, leading them back the way they came to the hilltop from the cam while Bella was getting closer to the hideout quite farther ahead of the boys behind her.
An Acolyte Revolution
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