She repeated what she had heard Evander say, "By Sathoro I am purified," and then turned to hurry after Evander.
She tried her best not to run after him but she moved fast enough the wind was catching the ends of her hair that were not pinned up from Yelena's fingers.
Evander had gotten to the end of the room and was waiting for her in the doorway to the big hall.
"We'll exit the Thoro and wait for Ophelia and Alastair outside," he said. "I imagine you could use some air right now." He smiled at her and then led the way through the tight crowd of people gathering into a jumbled line to be purified.
The air felt wonderful as she stepped out into it and sucked in a deep lungful.
"What was that just now?" Aurora asked Evander.
"What do you mean?"
"What did we stand there and say those things for ?" she asked.
"The Teshan? It is so the holy sankts can purify us with their divine magic. But they've told us it wears off after a day so that's why we must return every morning."
At that moment Ophelia and Alastair came out.
"Shall we go?" Ophelia said.
Evander turned to Aurora. "We are going to go somewhere I don't think you've ever been and I think you will enjoy it."
Aurora nodded and the four of them climbed into the carriage once more. They set off, the carriage bouncing along every stone again and it took them a while before they were heading for the city gates.
"I are we leaving the city?" Aurora asked staring out the window.
"Yes, is that alright?" Ophelia asked. She broke away from the conversation the three of them had been having, the noise filling the carriage's inside.
"Oh, yes, I was just curious," Aurora said quietly and resumed looking out the window. She wasn't paying attention when someone called her name. She turned and found the three of them looking at her.
"I'm sorry?" she said, "I didn't hear you."
"I asked, have you ever been outside the city before?" Alastair asked. She looked at him as he sat lazily slouching against the cushioned purple seat. His long body was taking up a good portion of the leg room where he had his long legs crossed. But it was the ease in his body and shoulders that showed how laid back he was.
"Only a few times. My aunt lives out in one of the towns, so when I was younger I had traveled there with my parents."
"Where are your parents?" Ophelia asked.
"They... passed away last year," she said.
"Oh, I'm sorry. From what, if you don't mind me asking?"
"The Dublayr Fever," she replied and looked out the window.
"The plague?" Ophelia's voice rose high and she seemed to shrink back into the corner of the carriage, though that wasn't far at all.
"You don't have to be afraid. It's been over a year and I was not with them when they passed. I have been living with someone else for six years and I found out that my parents had passed. I hadn't known they'd even been sick."
She didn't see if Ophelia relaxed at all, her attention fixated on the mountains outside. The mountains that belonged to the large land, Ocree. A strange race from what she'd been told of them.
They were red skinned, always heavily muscled and they wore gold in their ears, on their face and other weirdly pierced places. While they were allies, they were also a very dangerous culture. They sacrificed people to their one of their gods. The land rolled outside their windows, rippling like a violent current. A mirror of how its people were.
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Shadows of Iraedes | NanoWrimo 2021
RomanceAurora Bailey has had a hard life, and the horizon is only looking harder. She's finally had enough of her abusive partner and decides to leave him, but finds she can't when he keeps pulling her back, sometimes even physically. After many attempts t...
