The Tragedy of Renya

3.3 Followed by Two

The sun was already setting when Erica got out of her panicked mood and realised she’d have to make a plan.

Leaving the region by ship was not going to work out. So she would either have to wait until the war between Talassi and Nerva was over, which would likely not be within the month. Or she’d have to leave the region by land, which meant she’d have to find a way of travel to Viusi. And this was exactly where her knowledge of the region ended. All she knew for sure about Tusiaga was that it was the largest port in the region, if not the entire continent, and that it had a larger-than-normal amount of Wyndri appearances. She wondered for a moment if this was how people felt if they travelled to the other end of the world.

She should just give up, she thought as she sat down on a wooden bench that was on the side of a road, she should give up and return home. Hope that her future husband would let her continue the research into Wyndri. Knowing him though, there was no chance he’d even allow it. Too dangerous, too much a waste of time. There was no way he’d allow her, and he had ways of making her listen.

Erica dove into an alley when she heard the noise of hooves on the gravel roads. She immediately scolded herself for being so jumpy; there was no reason he’d have followed her. And even if he had, that didn’t mean these hooves belonged to his horse. A few moments later the horse and its rider came past. Erica looked behind the corner to see what she’d jumped away for.

She’d been right to jump away, she realised. On the horse, a pure black steed, sat her fiancé. He stopped his horse and asked if anyone had seen a girl with long blonde hair, medium build, short legs, who had come from Ostia. Erica shivered and ran into the alley. There was no way she could stay here now, she realised. He’d keep looking for her until he found her. And if he decided to involve money and give whoever found her a reward… she was doomed. She ran through a maze of roads and alleys and streets and at at least one moment she knew she could see a shadow disappearing into one of the other roads. She shivered and immediately took another road. Whenever she ran into a large street she immediately crossed it and disappeared as quickly as possible. At more than one of these moments she nearly got seen by her fiancé, she knew that for sure.

But by some sort of miracle she reached the edge of the city without getting caught. There was only one thing she could do at this point; she had to head for Viusi and find a way out of the region through the south. She looked at the sun. The road to Viusi would be south-west. She followed the edge of the city for a while until she found it. A large paved road that was almost completely empty at this time of day. The sun would set soon. Erica knew she didn’t have time to waste in this city though; odds of her getting captured while it was night were too great. So she stepped onto the road and started walking towards the south. Towards the City of Arts, Viusi.