"GET UP!" a voice seemed to yell, it was very far away from the sleeping boy. Faint, though it was, Jason slowly opened his eyes, determining that it wasn't just part of his dream. Shock rushed into him as he found his father kicking his armor violently; what had gotten him in such a tissy? "You need to learn not to sleep so late! It's nearly midday!" Andre yelled as he gave Jason's side one last hard kick that Jason managed to feel through the hard metal.
"It's what?" Jason asked dumbly, not too sure what his father was talking about; poor Jason had been on the road for three days straight and he needed sleep, though he had no doubt that his father had stayed up all night. "Midday!?" Jason exclaimed as he jumped to his feet, wildly looking for the leather back that he had brought with him which contained what he would need for the trip.
"Yes, midday! And I have your stuff ready to go. Now that we lost more than half a day of travelling, we must make haste. The next time you EVER sleep that long, I'll leave you. I expect you up in the morning at the crack of dawn!" Andre demanded viciously, extremely disappointed at his sons laziness, surprised that the young lad had ever passed his knight training, what was the guard thinking by training them to be so lazy! Andre, himself, has gone a tenday without sleep several times in a row with only maybe a few hours of sleep inbetween stops. That was when he was on patrol around the borders of Daein, when there was need of such endurance.
"Yes, father," Jason grumbled as he got up. Before he knew what had happened, he doubled over in pain, his cold hands grasping at his sore cheek.
"What was that, boy!? If I ever hear you talk to me with such disgrace again, it'll be more than my fist in your face! You will address me by 'sir' from here on out!" Andre demanded, clearly not in the mood for his sons disrespectful ways, and determined to shape him up into an even greater knight than he once was.
Jason, truly frightened by his father's strength, only nodded, his shock showing in his eyes. He had known his father was strong, but strong enough to take down a fully armored knight with one swing? At that moment Jason knew that if he was willing to slug his own son for such an act, that he would not hold back the next time Jason crossed him the wrong way. He was no longer his only son among two daughters that are Andre's by birth; he was a soldier being trained for battle and the worst conditions, and as such, he should treat his father like the worlds finest general. No doubt he probably was at one point!
"Come, we must make the spring in two hours, if we are to keep in head of schedule! Now move, soldier!" Andre said, taking Jason by the shoulder and throwing him out of the cave with one hand. "March! And I want to see you pick up those knobby knees of yours! We'll have you the strongest knight in the land by the time this is over!" Andre yelled as Jason started to march off sluggishly.
Sure enough the young knight picked up his knees and began to march at top speed. They were going to have move faster than that to make it in the time Andre wanted, but Jason guessed that Andre was wanting to get there as fast as he could and if Jason was moving as fast as he could, his father wouldn't be furious that they made it there an hour later than what he wanted.
Sure enough, in two hours and a half of hard marching, at least in Jason's case, they were at the spring. Filling up several cantines, Andre handed each one to his son; when all was said and done Jason had 20 large waterskins.
"Now take off your armor," Andre instructed as he broke off a rather large peice of bark from a near by tree that was about 5 times as broad as the already broad man. Jason hesitated only a second, he wasn't sure what his father was getting at, but he dared not disobey him again. Stripping himself of the hot armor, Jason was left with nothing but his light chain mail armor that protect him incase something did pass through his splint armor.
Jason felt like he was going to day, the long days that he had spent walking with the armor had nearly killed him, he needed more rest and more water than what he had been given. Now this rushed march had taken more than he could possibly bare, more than what was humanly possible; he needed to rest for a good day and a half before he would be fit to move on.
"Clean yourself off, this will be your only bath until we get across the desert. Now that we made it 3 tendays before I had expected, we can take it easy," Andre said with a shrug as if it didn't matter. "You're sweating more than I have done in a long while. You look like you're about to die."
"A MONTH! You pushed me that hard!?" Jason yelled in shock. "But...but...but...!" Jason went to complain.
"What? You really thought that we would cross all those miles if we hadn't moved at that pace? I'm more experienced at judging time than you think, my boy. Now I said wash off, and put your armor on that peice of bark," Andre said as he pointed to the wood he had chopped off, it was fashioned into a sled by the way he tore it off of the tree. "We will not be moving through the desert by day. It is far to hot for you to move with your armor on. Instead you will take it off and sleep during the day. However, you will put it on at night and we will trudge on. I have marked points of rest, if we don't make it to those points during the cool hours of the night, we will surely have a rough time. Those marks indicate caves and other natural and man made ruins that we can use as shelter from the sun."
"How far are we from the Grann desert?" Jason asked as he hopped into the cool water to wash off, thankful for how cold the water seemed.
"Only a few minutes at most. We are on a small incline; down it the grass will thin and you will see the desert," Andre informed his son as he drew some lines on the map to chart out his desired course. "There's something I want to investigate at the first stop. We will move the first day by daylight. You will move with your armor on so you will appreciate the need not to have your armor on."
Jason felt like saying 'as if I don't already' but then he held that comment to himself, knowing that he would be punished and Andre wouldn't be saying that if he didn't think that Jason has learned what it was like to be hot in armor. "What's at the first stop? And why so much water?" Jason asked as he dried himself off, figuring those were good sensible questions.
"There have been reports that Daein wyvern riders are in that area; chased by pegasus knights. They seemed to have been carrying a hostage. I want to see what or who it was if the person or thing is still living. The water is for the tenday trip that we must take without another spring. It'll take a tenday since we must move slowly. If this person is still alive, we will do a search and rescue mission. If the wyvern riders are still alive, we must go in and rescue the person anyway, he or she might be in dire circumstances!" Andre told the boy in a matter of fact tone. "But for now we rest for a day or two. I am tired, and you must still be exhausted. We will take chase when we are in top condition. I will also start you on a training routine so that you may get as strong as me!"
