Thanks again for all your kind words and reviews. Here's the next update for you and we're abck with Keyla :-). Hope you like it.
It had been two days since Keyla had left Nasaf. She had her camp outside the city of Azaak, a small Persian outpost in the middle of nowhere, and it was at least another two days before she would reach Alamut. Shanse, the stallion she had stolen from the merchant in Nasaf was everything the man had promised - fast, strong and arduous but he was only a horse and he could not work miracles. She could have forced the poor animal through this night and only allow her and the stallion some rest in the morning but Azaak was the last city she would come across until she reached Alamut and both she and Shanse had been in desperate need for a break.
The decision she had made had told Keyla all to clearly why she had never traveled and never would have done it even if the life she lived would have allowed for such luxuries. It was one of the most awful experiences she had ever gone through in life. She had to admit she had not really prepared for this trip and had left in a hurry but she was sure that no preparation in this world could make this trip any more comfortable or enjoyable. She had no idea how Dastan was able to do this whenever the king send his sons on an endeavor to conquer some foreign country. They had to be traveling for weeks and they were traveling with armor and weapon and hundreds of unwashed men close by. She probably would have been willing to jump of a cliff if she had to go through something like this...
It had clearly shown that Keyla wasn't used to traveling. She had no training in horse back riding, she had no idea how to do it properly and her thighs, back and rear end were hurting like hell. Sleeping on the dusty ground wrapped up in a thin blanket and eating nothing but dried meat and fruit and drinking stale water all day did nothing to lift her mood either. And on top of all that - due to the sturdy leather pants she was wearing and the sweat running down her body - she had some rather painful abrasions on her thighs that had been hurting more and more with every hour passing by on her tip.
By now all Keyla longed for was some real food, a nice long scented bath and some freshly laundered clothes to slip into when she had finsihed her shower. A nice bed and about 12 hours of sleep would have been nice as well... She really wasn't one for a fancy treatment and she had lived in the slums of Nasaf all her life and was used to filth and dirt but nothing in her home could compare with sleeping outside in the dirt, crossing half the empire on horseback and not eating or drinking anything proper in days. She cursed Dastan day in and out because he was her ONLY reason for doing all this.
She had debated staying at one of the hospices in the town of Azaak but had decided against it once she had seen the first one of those just from afar. They were even filthier than sleeping on the plain dirt underneath the sky and they smelled of unwashed people and a lot of other even more disgusting things. Apart from that Keyla had not wanted to risk anyone stealing her things or her horse and neither did she want anyone to find out she was actually a woman... So far having people believe she was a young man had worked out in her favor quite well.
At least she had found a really friendly and helpful apothecary in Azaak who - with a trained eye - had seen what was troubling her without having to ask her about it and had offered her a cream that actually helped soothe the pain and make the awful abrasions on her thighs heal. She had thanked him and had wanted to leave but apparently the man had some sort of soft spot for her. Selling her the cream had not been the only thing he had done for her. He had offered her a job as well.
Keyla still wasn't sure how exactly it had happened but somehow the apothecary had managed to talk her into telling him where she was going and when he had heard that she was on her way to alamut he had been all excited and had asked her to take a few of his goods with her. They were to be delivered to a merchant in Alamut and the apothecary had offered to pay here right there and then. Keyla still couldn't believe it. She had never seen anyone pay anybody for a service in advance but the apothecary had done it.
Of course she had said yes. The apothecary's money was a good cushion for her and it would give her a chance to actually get that nice private room, the bath, the meal and the set of new clothes she wanted once she was in Alamut. The apothecary had described to her how to find the merchant she was now carrying the creams and herbs for and keyla had been even more surprised to hear that this merchant had paid those goods in advance when he had last visited Azaak. She wondered how both those men would have reacted if they had found out she was just a street rat from the slums of Nasaf and a woman on top of that. They probably would have died from shame.
Keyla didn't care though. She actually had debated just taking the money and not delivering the goods that had been given into her care but she couldn't do that. She owed the apothecary in Azaak because of that soothing balm and even though it probably didn't seem like much to him, to her that balm helping her heal meant the world to her. She actually felt like a real businesswoman and merchant. One could almost forget that she was not and she never would be... Even if living an honest life with more money and more luxuries seemed to be actually possible it wasn't worth the trouble. After seeing Dastan and getting back home she was sure she would NEVER travel again.
Azaak was surrounded by a veld that formed into a desert the further one got away from the outpost and closer to the border of the Persian empire. By the next noon she would be in the middle of nowhere and Alamut would be the next city she would see. It would take two days and that was only if she hurried. She had been advised by the people in Azaak that it was best to travel at night. It was less exhausting for both her horse and herself and Keyla had decided to listen to the people. It was early evening now and she had slept for a couple of hours. She would have an early dinner now and afterwards she would start the second part of her journey.
She knew she was still ahead of the royal caravan that would bring the king to Alamut to be there for his youngest son's wedding. She could tell that she was maybe half a day ahead of them because every city she had come through on her way to Alamut had been buzzing with excitement about the fact that the king would make halt in there city and take supplies from them. From now on however it would be hard to tell. The caravan was maybe slower than her but she was sure they knew the route to Alamut better than she did. She just had to be there before the king... which was another reason why she would be traveling at night for the next few days. She could start in the early evening hours and travel until the sun came up again - that meant at least 10 to 12 hours of traveling every night. Hopefully she would be fast enough...
She had no real plan what it was that she wanted to do once she had reached Alamut - apart from the room and the meal and the bath of course. She knew she had to talk to Dastan but she had no idea how or where to find him... Hopefully she would get some information from that merchant the apothecary from Azaak had told her about and that she was carrying goods for now. If he saw a business partner in her, maybe he would be willing to share information with her as well. It was the one thing she needed once she was in Alamut - someone who was willing and able to help her.
She had been thinking about Dastan a lot these past two days, mostly cursing him silently in her mind for having so much power over her mindset that she had been willing to take this journey just so that she could talk to him... She had also wondered dif this marriage was what he had wanted or of he had been forced because of political reasons or because of his loyalty towards his king and his brothers.
It was the one thing Keyla had never learned to understand - Dastan's blind love and loyalty towards the king and the family he had given to Dastan. She could understand he was grateful but still she couldn't make sense of it. It had been her one reason why she had declined his offer to be a part of the palace life - apart from not wanting to end as a servant for the royalty - she had not wanted to have to be grateful. She didn't have much in her life but what little she had was what she and she alone had worked for. It belonged to her and to her only.
She had been told that the princess of Alamut was extraordinarily beautiful but Keyla had heard enough of those stories to know that most of them were grossly exaggerated. But maybe it was true and Dastan was actually happy with the union... She hated to think about it but maybe - just maybe - she had no right to barge in and give him a piece of her mind... But then again she was his friend and her opinion had to count for something... She couldn't remember a single time they had agreed on an important matter though and Keyla was sure this time would be no different... But at least they would have had a chance to talk about it this way...
She willed the thought aside for the moment and got up from the blanket she had been sitting on, a soft groan escaping her lips. Even though she had been sleeping for the past few hours, her whole body still felt stiff and it hurt. But there was no use in feeling sorry for herself. She had to go on. She rolled up the blankets she had used to sleep on and under and placed them on Shanse's back before climbing into the saddle again, gritting her teeth when her injured thighs were pressed against the leather.
"Come on Shanse, it's time for us to go."
She patted the stallion and Shanse fell into a swift trot almost immediately. Keyla turned around in the saddle, looking back at the city of Azaak and was half surprised half fearful when she saw a big dusty cloud appear on the horizon. She knew it was the king's caravan. They would be reaching Azaak by nightfall and she could only hope they would stay the night. If they only stayed here for a quick rest, she would never be in Alamut before the king arrived and she just needed to talk to Dastan before he got married. She wasn't even entirely sure why this was so important to her but she felt she just had to do it.
She turned around again and whispered to Shanse to go quicker. She was glad the stallion seemed to... like her because he always did as she wanted him to without any trouble. Keyla had no experiences with horses or riding and she would have been in a lot of trouble if Shanse had decided to just do whatever he wanted. But they were getting along great and she actually debated keeping him instead of returning him to the merchant in Asaf even though that was what she originally had planned to do.
The sun quickly sank now but Keyla knew how to navigate with the help of the stars. She knew where the north star was and she knew she had to travel to southeast from Azaak to reach Alamut. If she kept a straight path southeast she would reach Alamut in less than two days - that was what the apothecary had told her. Keyla could just hope this was true. She wasn't sure she would be able to stand more than these additional two days on horseback. She was sure her thighs would be worn to the bone if she had t go on like this any longer than another two days...
It soon became cooler out here in the desert and Keyla loosened one of the two blankets that were tied up behind the saddle and drapped it around her shoulders. She was shivering slightly but the cold kept her from falling asleep and that was a good thing. She knew she could trust Shanse but she didn't trust in the stallion completely. She certainly didn't want to fall asleep on horseback and find herself back in azaak the next morning because Shanse had decided to turn back...
It was a cold, long and very dark night but Keyla managed to stay awake and keep her course. She spent fourteen straight hours on horseback until early in the morning on the next day. She rode on until her thighs - burning like fire now - no longer allowed her to go any further and only looked for a shady hide out once the sun had come up. It was already close to noon when she found a small cave that was big enough for both her and Shanse. She checked it first and was glad to find it empty but still Shanse seemed nervous and she needed a while to calm him down and get him to enter the cave.
It wasn't cold inside but at least there was some shade and Keyla drank some of her water before she carefully pulled down the leather pants she was wearing. She hissed when she saw the red flesh on her inner thighs and she took her time to treat it with the balm the apothecary in Azaak had given her. She put the bandages around her thighs like the apothecary had advised her to and left the pants off before she wrapped herself up in a blanket and lay down on the rocky ground. She was dead tired by now and it only took about twenty minutes before she had fallen asleep.
She woke feeling cold and because something was brushing against her face. It was Shanse who was patting his nostril against her face and Keyla had to smile. He was a really intelligent horse. It felt like he knew she had wanted to travel at night and he woke her just in time for sundown. Keyla needed a little while to unwrap herself from the blanket and get up to her feet. She wondered if she would ever stop feeling this stiff and achy... She stretched and yawned before taking some water and dried fruit from the saddle bags. She neither felt like eating nor drinking but did it none the less, knowing she would need the nutrition for the long nightly ride.
She patted Shanse and gently spoke to him while leading him back out of the cave. This time she did not reattach the blanket but just kept it wrapped around her shoulders and pulled herself up into the saddle. Her thighs still hurt but not as bad as they had done this morning and Keyla was positive she would make it through yet another night. She had gotten pretty far last night and she was sure by the next morning Alamut had to be in sight. It couldn't be that far any more... She could just hope the kings' caravan had not surpassed her by now... But she had high hopes they were still behind her. She leaned down to Shanse, whispering to the stallion.
"Let's go, boy. We're almost there. Just one more night..."
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