Reader Beware

Chapter 29

                    Rika was definitely putting riding all night down on her ever-growing lists of experiences she never wanted to have again. Not only was she tired, but her butt and legs were sore, she was fairly certain she stank of horse. Of course, the others were in the same boat. Except for Ahisu. Rika was pretty sure he’d fallen asleep behind her at some point. At least, his head had fallen forward, so that his hair had tickled the back of her neck a couple of times. Thankfully, their horse seemed quite happy to follow Damek and Elthia’s, only straying a bit towards grass early on.

            Despite their fears, and Shetton’s increasing comments about the possibilities of pursuit, Rika suspected he only started doing it because he knew they were on edge, the saw no one on their ride. Not until the sun rose. But by then, they had joined up with a main road, one that was taking them straight to the capital, according to Damek.

            They weren’t the only ones heading in the same direction. As the sun slowly rose, so too, did the number of people they saw. The first few people they passed looked to be farmers, Rika thought. With weathered faces, often red from the sun, driving carts heaped with vegetables and fruit, she couldn’t see what else they could be.

            As the sun got high enough that it no longer had the sky dyed pink and orange, they saw people on foot. One man, with his bulging backpack that had several dried roots and plants hanging from it, Rika thought might be a wandering peddler. The woman carrying the lut on her back she thought had to be a minstrel or a bard. The one in the elaborate blue and gold robes she thought might have been a mage or a priest. The person in the hooded cloak with a bow slung over one shoulder she had no idea what was. All she knew, was that everyone was heading in the same direction.

            It wasn’t until they escaped the forest that Rika caught her first glimpse of the capital. The end of the forest road came out on a little rise, the land spreading out below them dotted with fields filled with green and yellow, more farms, Rika guessed. The road snaked through the valley, before rising back up again, until it hit the mountains. Nestled against the mountains, like a chick huddled into its mother, was the capital.

            Walls of an orangey-brown rose out of the ground in a circle, capturing the road as it approached the rocky peaks. Roofs could be seen poking above it, the only building that could be seen clearly even from the distance, was what Rika assumed was the castle. She couldn’t imagine what else would have that many towers and an extra set of walls, done in the same stone as the first layer.

            Like an overflowing bowl, buildings were pressed against the city’s walls, moving out mostly along the road, before fading away into the farms and fields they were now riding through. Despite her tiredness and soreness, Rika couldn’t help but grin. This was what she’d always pictured seeing when reading her books. This was a real city.

            The sight of the place seemed to rouse the others. At least, Damek moved his horse closer to Rika and Ahisu’s, nodding at them. “We should be inside the walls within an hour, two at most. We’ll see about finding an inn first. Then I can take the horses and sell them. We won’t need them once we get there.”

            Rika opened her mouth to protest, they’d made way better time riding than they had walking, but a look from her blue-haired friend cut her off. It wasn’t until she heard Ahisu’s faint hiss of “Trace” that she realized why keeping their mounts was a bad idea. She winced. “That sounds good.”

            “After that, I vote we all take a nice long nap. I am not overly fond of travelling as long as we have without a proper sleep.”

            “I agree,” Elthia said, the circles under her eyes testament to her exhaustion.

            Rika nodded. She knew once her initial excitement over being in the capital wore off, she’d find her head snapping forward as she dozed off. It had certainly happened in class enough times.

            The rest of the ride up to the city was boring, even by Rika’s standards. The only things she saw were fields, houses, and the occasional distant figure working in the fields. Every so often she’d see a cow or a sheep, and once a dog, but overall, the fields were just filled with plants, waving gently in the breeze. Hardly the kind of thing one usually read about in books. And for good reason, as far as she was concerned.

            Only when they got to the outlying buildings of the city did she start paying close attention again. And even had she fallen asleep on the horse, a feat she hoped she never had to master, she’d have still woken up when they reached that area. The stink alone would have done it. Obviously, there was a reason these buildings were outside the walls.

While trying to breathe through her mouth, Rika looked around, trying to figure out what was making the stench. Beside one of the buildings she saw racks of what looked like leather, but other than that, she had no clues as to what these places did. She was glad when they reached the walls, dismounting and leading their horses up to the guards, who studied everyone who approached.

Thankfully, their uniforms were a dark red. She didn’t think she’d have been able to walk by them calmly if they’d been yellow. Or even blue. But the guards waved them through, with only a cursory glance. Their eyes, the same as the soldiers at Saimore, were really focused on the carts and wagons that rumbled up to them.

Walking under the thick walls, Rika heaved a silent sigh of relief when they reached the street and saw the crowds of people moving before her. Anyone looking for her was going to have one heck of a time finding her in this, even if they knew where to look.