How the Emperor trapped a Witch

Chapter Eighteen: Town

We arrived at town and found a group of people waiting for us. One person waves and leaves the group; turning out to be Captain Kimbra. 

"Celestia!" She displayed a rare smile as she drew close. "Your alright!"  Her curls were braided and tied together with a cord, a completely different hairstyle from the last time I had seen her.

"Of course." I smiled back, glancing over at the people behind her. "But I'm sorry it took so long, Captain Kimbra. It's only been a few days for me."

"You can just call me Kimbra. I am no longer in charge here." Kimbra raises an eyebrow while her smile faded when she and Alaric shared a look. "Let me introduce you to the others." She quickly coughs and gestures behind her.

She points out to each person but I wasn't really listening due to Alaric coming besides me and brushed his arm against mine. I had promised not to overreact at his presence which was causing me to tense up a little with each light brush of our arms. 

"Celestia!" I was focusing so hard on the tickling sensation that I didn't realize that Kimbra was speaking to me again.

"It's nice to meet all of you." I quickly smiled and nodded at each of them, figuring that I would learn their names later. I made eye contact with a young woman, her long fiery red hair framing her face and hourglass shaped body who glares then rolls her eyes at me. 

I didn't get a chance to question her reaction before I was pulled along Alaric's pace as he continued on into town. Kimbra and the rest of the group followed behind us as he headed towards the town hall.  

Alaric opens the door for me and gestures for me to enter. This was the first time I was entering this building, mostly since it was only open for festivals and important events. The floors were dark oak wood with a vaulted ceiling as decorative carved wood framed the white walls.  After I was finished staring, I walked over to Alaric and Kimbra as they spoke to the mayor.

"Hello Miss Celestia." The mayor politely smiles at me and adjusts his leather vest. "I haven't seen you in a long time."

 It took me a moment to realize that he was feeling nervous, my hood had fallen down earlier so there was nothing that was suppressing my 'bewitchment'. "I'm glad to see you doing well, Mayor Don. How is your wife?" I ask as I tried to discreetly pull my hood back up into it's place.

"She's doing well, we had our first child..." Mayor Don continued talking, getting back to normal after I had hid my face. I watched how happy he was talking about her and felt a little pain in my chest. 

Being a Witch meant that I would continue to outlive everyone; I have already gone through the pain of watching friends slowly age and perish: even Alaric would not be an exception. Eventually, everyone I know here will leave me.

"Are you okay Tia?" Alaric seems to notice that something was up as melancholy thoughts swirled in my head.

"Everything is fine." I quickly grab those thoughts and threw them into a corner, I will have to deal them later. "Alaric, you didn't tell me why we had to come into town."

Alaric convinced me to go to town, but didn't actually give me a reason. I had thought it would be better to leave the house that seemed increasingly small with his presence so I jumped at his suggestion. 

"Well, I had a request come in to deal with some monsters in the area." He says as we followed Mayor Don into another room and sat down the long table at it's center. "We accepted it and needed to hear the details."

Alaric had told me mostly everything about the past five years; If I remember everything correctly from the novel, Alaric should completely know his identity as the Emperor and was in the final stages before his coronation. But again, he was also supposed to of met his soulmate already and fell in love with her- which seems to not of happened yet.

So I officially know that he is an adventurer and has been traveling around the world for the past five years. 

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I found myself sitting in front of Alaric on top of Star as we rode through the forest. Mayor Don had given us reports about the unusual movements of the monsters of the forest and our main job was to investigate what was causing them to move closer to human settlements. 

For some reason, Alaric was bringing me along as well but I was happy to see Star. Alaric had taken him from the town stables after I had left and took care of him. I patted Star's grey neck as we continued on the trail.

We were heading for a small village where we were supposed to meet up with another group before beginning our investigation. At the pace we are going, we should be there just before dusk.

Time flew as sunlight dipped below the trees and we arrived at the village. The villagers welcomed us whole-heartedly when we arrived, their faces clearly worn out and stressed from the monster attacks. 

The next morning, we set out early and left Star & the other horses in the villagers care as we entered the forest.