Glass Crest

Chapter 6: Torrine | Rowena

The first day actually went pretty great.

Despite the proposition, I tried to act cheerful when Blythe brought it up. Nodding and smiling were easy―Talking was the hard part. I had to pretend I wasn't in love with the person I was talking to.

The road was not a short one. Since there was no direct route from Vale to Torrine, and we didn't want to go straight through Darken Woods, we took the road to Muse, then to Torrine. Although it was a long road, it was better than going alone. We laughed, and I . . . tried not to think about the proposal.

"What would you do if . . . a random guy came up to you and asked you to marry him?" Blythe asked me while on the road to Muse.

"I don't know . . . tell him I'm taken?" We both laughed, but my heart ached a little when I said it.

"Well, we're almost there. Might want to put your hood up. Brayan's looking for you, remember?"

I looked at him. "He's looking for us. You left on the same day I did, remember?"

He smiled triumphantly at me. "Actually, I left on the same day to look for you."

"Wait―What?" I froze.

"It's funny how little it takes to convince someone you're on their side. Just run into the palace, mention your best friend's disappearance, then say you're going to go look for them."

I shoved him. "You little sneak!"

"Just doing my job, ma'am." He said in his best Brayan voice. Then his smiled faded. "I'm sorry, that was rude. He's your fiancé and I didn't mean―"

"Aw, come on!" I said, smirking at him. "Just because I'm . . . marrying him doesn't mean we can't still make fun of him.  Seriously, this doesn't affect our friendship in any way. Make your best Brayan joke. Come on, I want to hear it."

His smile came back. "Princess, you're going to be marrying me, so I expect you don't sneak out of the castle in the middle of the night."

We laughed and talked a lot longer until it got late, and we slept off the side of the road.

We had a good sleep and went on our way to Torrine, our first destination. It's funny how I always dreamed I would travel Umica with Blythe, except not engaged to someone else.  The road was on an incline, as Torrine was on a hill. I used to come here every weekend, my good friend lived here. I remembered it was full of gardens filled with honeysuckle and lemon trees, and you could almost touch the clouds it was so high. Apparently it was filled with scholars and scientists, and the city was where all the protégés went to learn and grow. It sounded like a place I would live, but sadly I had to live in the castle.

"Wait, so what did you say to her again?" I asked, trying to hold back the laughter. Blythe was telling me a funny story about a girl he once met that said she had fallen in love with him.

"I said, 'Oh, you're so beautiful, I'm in love with you too! Meet me at the fountain tomorrow morning to get married!'" And then Blythe burst into laughter with me, although I couldn't help but feel a pang of jealousy, and of empathy, for the girl, because, well, I'd fallen in love with Blythe at first sight and had felt the exact same way.

Up ahead on the road came a small wagon. It looked like a noble wagon, so, like all the other noble wagon we'd pranked, decided that when we passed it, we'd throw a huge bout of flour on it so it looked white.

Blythe casually got out his small bag of flour and we grabbed a small handful, preparing to throw it at the cart. We passed it slowly, the driver looking at us suspiciously, and suddenly made a strange hand sign. Blythe gasped, obviously knowing what it meant, dropped his flour, and protectively pushed me behind him.