Lunchtime read: Exile and the Kingdom

Another story set in the desert with the sun beating down and dry salty lips and skin in abundance along with plenty of brutality and death. There is a certain double-edged meaning to this tale with an eager missionary getting it wrong but in so doing highlighting the power of the evil that he is trying to fight.

The Renegade
You are introduced to a divided world with the Arabs being targeted by Christians as a source of conversion but one willing missionary goes out and heads into the heartlands of their religious beliefs and is rewarded with having his tongue cut out, a dose of torture and ends up with his beliefs being so overhauled that he turns against his fellow missionaries. He waits for the next missionary to come out to the town and kills him but the result is the Arabs are attacked by the French soldiers and they come looking for the renegade and kill him slowly in revenge for the trouble he has exposed them to.

More tomorrow…