16 Time to Hit the Road

"What are you doing here, Naziza?" Dildan glared at me angrily. "Your tent is somewhere else."

"I have no idea where our tent is," I tell the plain truth. "I stepped away and now I’m a little lost."

"It’s always nothing but problems with you," the brunette started grumbling and led me by the hand toward the correct tent.

Vasmiya and Nufira were already in the tent, getting ready for bed. The girls weren’t very talkative, and I myself was tired from all the emotional ups and downs, so I quickly fell asleep on the provided bed, where, for some reason, all night I dreamt of the gray eyes of the mage and the indecencies he did with the body of the whore, in whose role I already was.

Early in the morning, we jumped up from our places because Kays had rudely burst into our tent, waking us and ordering us to get ready to go.

He seemed somehow angry to me. What had bitten him at this time? He should be well-fed and satisfied; probably the whore didn’t do her job well.

"Why are you yelling like that?" I couldn’t take it and muttered in response to the blond’s shouts, getting out of bed. "There’s clear dissatisfaction on your face."

"And you, I see, know a lot about satisfaction," Kays roared at me, approaching closely. "You probably wanted to be in the place of that whore I fucked yesterday, huh?"

"Well, the world doesn’t revolve around you alone. And dissatisfaction can be about anything. Life, or orders, for example. And you reduced everything to yesterday’s whore. So she really did a poor job if you’re throwing lightning and focusing your attention specifically on that?" I said sarcastically, not hesitating to look into the young man’s angry and incredible eyes, which up close were even deeper and brighter.

"You annoy me."

"Likewise."

"For the especially curious," without taking his eyes off my face, the brunette glanced at my lips for a second, but as if coming to his senses, stepped back from me and addressed the girls. "We have a long and difficult road ahead. Your settlements are relatively close, so you haven’t yet fully appreciated all the pleasures of the journey, ladies. The road to this valley goes through the mountains, and we got here without problems, but just now, the sentries reported to me that they saw wandering gorts. And that means that this year, their migration started much earlier than usual, and getting through the mountains back will not be as smooth as it was to come here."

We sat quietly on our beds, paying attention to his words. From the information received, the girls went pale, and I saw quiet panic on their faces. And there was obviously a reason to panic, since because of these stone giants, Alaya’s relatives had died.

"Therefore, everyone needs to get off their beautiful asses and quickly get ready so we can reach the Shinir caves before dark, where we will be safe and stay for the night. We move out in five minutes," Kays yelled and rushed out of our tent.

Well, there was no time to waste, so we all jumped up and hurriedly started getting ready. Luckily, for the journey, we were provided with more comfortable clothes – fitted, weightless pants and a top, and convenient, light shoes. There was also an extra set of warm clothing, specifically for cold weather and mountains, as well as several sets of underwear and hygiene products. As I understood it, for food we had rations, and the rest would be hunted by the guards themselves.

At the appointed time, we were ready and standing near the tent. The sun had only just begun to rise, and the sentries were already fully equipped and showed us our horses.

Just as I was about to climb onto the horse, someone called out to me. Turning around, I saw Alaya hurrying toward me.

When she reached me, it was clear how hard it was for her emotionally, and her eyes were glistening with tears. After greeting me, she pulled me into a tight hug, and despite her efforts, tears streamed down her beautiful face.

"I couldn’t let you leave without saying goodbye," the woman sniffled, forcing a smile. "I hope we meet again. And I wanted to give you something; I hope it will be useful."

She held out a pendant with a large yellow stone.

"This isn’t an ordinary pendant," Alaya explained. "I recently traded for it with a wandering collector of rarities. Inside is a rare stone that warns of danger. Right now it’s yellow, which means everything is safe. But when it turns bright red, it means a threat is nearby, and you need to be careful."

"Thank you," I managed to whisper, a lump of emotion choking my throat. "We will definitely see each other again. So I won’t say goodbye."