Honoured (NaNoWriMo18)

iii. a long journey

 If Jun had been smart, she would have stopped and asked someone where the training camp actually was.

After she left home, she had taken off south, remembering that the army was gathering in Jinsu. It wasn't until she had walked for a few hours and her legs felt like they were about to crumple beneath her did she realize she didn't know exactly where in Jinsu.

She hadn't been thinking about how she was going to get there. She had only been thinking about getting as far away from Samcho as she could, before someone recognized her. Now, she regretted not bringing a map.

Her fingers grazed against the scroll in her sash, itching to pull it out and check for a map. She had already checked through the scroll seven times, but none of the scratches seemed remotely map-like. Perhaps this was all just a joke by the Emperor, and he didn't actually say where they were supposed to gather.

The sound of hooves against the dirt road pulled Jun out of her thoughts just in time for her to move to the side of the road. This was becoming a common occurrence now that the sun was up. Many riders passed her by, the majority of them wearing training gear like herself, or sometimes even actual armor.

As this new rider passed her by and she caught sight of the familiar outfit, Jun let out a breath of relief. As long as she kept running into others that were enlisted, she was going the right way.

Perhaps she should have brought a horse as well.

As if a reminder, her toes throbbed in pain again.

A quick break wouldn't hurt.

Jun forced her heavy legs to change paths, until she was just off the side of the road. Her pack fell to the ground, quickly followed by her own body. The grass was spiky, and the ground hard, but she wouldn't have been able to tell the difference if it were a pile of feathers instead.

She lost count of how long she laid there for, before she finally brought herself into a sitting position. Her body protested, but she knew she would have to get up sooner or later. Grabbing her pack, she pulled out a small piece of bread before going back to the road.

The day dragged on, along with Jun's feet. Already, the sun was setting, and she was ready for sleep to overtake her. When was the last time she had slept?

She had walked all throughout the last night, which meant that it was the night before when she had got any rest.

Oh, she longed for her bed. Or even a mat. A pillow would really be nice.

She narrowed her eyes at the empty fields before her, wishing for a pillow to appear out of thin air. It took three long heartbeats for her to decide that it would never happen.

The next town was still a long way ahead of her. She would have to sleep outside tonight, then.

And so she did for the next three nights.

The small bits of bread that she had packed in a rush was the only thing that she ate, and her feet grew numb to the aches and pains of travel. Often, she found herself daydreaming about her mother's soup and forced herself to remember exactly why it was that she was going through with this in the first place before she turned around and ran back home.

By now, her parents would have given up on trying to look for her. Would they be mourning her already?

She found that she didn't want to know the answer to that.

It wasn't until midday on the fourth day of walking that her spirits lifted.

Jun had stopped for another break off the side of the road. A chunk of bread was stuffed into her mouth as she wrapped her feet, dried with blood, with the bit of cloth that she had carefully packaged the loaf in.