Vengeance's End
Chapter 1
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They fled from the capital just before dawn, taking nothing but their weapons and the clothes on their backs and Ryu's dependable horse with them. Since then they've been riding and walking by turns all day long, and soon the sun will set again, but neither of them has even suggested that they stop and rest for more than an hour at a time.
The very same royal guard which Nina trusted to guard her and her parents and always protect her will now chase Ryu down relentlessly, motivated by fear and hate just as much as by their orders.
Nina doesn't know how anyone found out about them, or how Ryu's secret came to light. They'd been so careful, Ryu more than anything else. In public they wouldn't even look at each other for too long. Nina would never even speak Ryu's name, and Ryu would only call Nina her highness. And Ryu had been protecting his own secret since he'd been just a child, always on his guard. Never ever laying claim to the heritage from his ancestors. Never even speaking of it. The one thing he had left from his parents, a precious Dragon Tear put in a necklace, he'd kept locked up and hidden in a chest beneath his bed and never worn.
But it doesn't matter how they found out. What matters is getting out of Wyndia before their pursuers can catch up to them. Everything else has to be secondary to survival.
Night falls and darkness envelops the land. Nina and Ryu agree once again that it's too risky for Nina to light the tip of her staff with magic, and so they continue travelling in darkness.
They follow the road into a patch of woods, where the only light comes from glimpses of the moon through the branches above them. The trees press in close on both sides of the road and Nina's nearly afraid that she'd lose sight of Ryu, weren't it that he's leading the horse by the reins.
She's come too close to losing Ryu already, comes ever closer the longer they're on the run.
Eventually the forest gets less dense and Nina starts to see some sort of light in the distance. It doesn't look like sunrise. "Is that a town?" she asks out loud.
"Might be," says Ryu. He sounds so tired. "Probably."
"We need to get something to eat," says Nina. Ryu's been insisting that Nina gets first crack at their rations every time they stop to eat which is stupid. Foolhardy and dumb. But sweet.
Ryu's always so sweet. How anyone could ever look at him and think that he's a monster is just-
"We can hunt in the woods," says Ryu.
"Have you seen any animals around here?" asks Nina rhetorically. "I still have some zenny left in my pouch. And I won't take long – just in and out to buy something."
As they talk they've been coming closer and closer to the village, and the distant glow is enough for Nina too see Ryu's face by. His expression's worried, but more than that, tired. His blue hair looks nearly black in the darkness and his eyes look sunken in the shadows cast by the hood of his cloak, his face pale and washed-out.
"Alright," he finally says. "Be careful."
Nina slides out of the saddle and lands on the ground next to Ryu, ignoring how she wobbles at first. "I will," she then says, checking that the pouch with her money is still attached to her belt. "Wait here for me."
"Always," says Ryu simply.
Nina reaches up and cups his cheek with her hand, and for a moment they only look at each other. Finally, Ryu leans down and kisses her, just for a few seconds, and after that Nina buries her head in Ryu's shoulder as Ryu wraps his arms around her waist. They cling to each other, standing there in the darkness at the edge of an unknown forest, completely alone. Far away from everything Nina's ever known.
But eventually Nina has to let go, and step back. "I love you," she tells Ryu, and gathers enough strength to smile at him before leaving.
The town is honestly more of a village, and Nina counts herself lucky that a fire's still burning outside the tavern at this hour. The tavern's an old log cabin, and on the inside there's another fire burning in the hearth. At the few tables scattered inside the hall sit only an old couple and a group of travellers in cloaks, and Nina pays them no mind as she goes up to the bar where an old man's sitting and dozing.
"Good evening," Nina says. "I'd like to buy some food, if you sell that sort of thing."
"We might," says the old man, who sits up and peers at her. "Say, you look like I've seen you before, girl. What's yer name?"
"Oh, I'm nobody special," says Nina, ignoring how hard her heart's suddenly pounding. "How much for some bread?"
But another of the guests suddenly comes up to the counter behind Nina. One of the cloaked travellers. Nina glances at them out of the corner of her eye, catching just a glimpse of gleaming steel hanging at their belt.
Reflexively, Nina feels after her own staff – but finds nothing but air.
Her heart skips a beat.
No. No, no, she must've forgotten it, strapped to the saddlebags of Ryu's stallion, oh how could she be so careless? So stupid?
The traveller suddenly grabs Nina by the wrist, and she spins around and wrenches it away from him. The hood of his cloak's fallen back and now she recognises him – he's one of the guards from back home, one of the newer recruits. His red hair's shorn short and he looks surprised to see her, then jubilant. "Your highness!" he exclaims. "I thought I recognised your voice… oh, thank goodness! We all feared the dragon had slain you already."
Her pulse thunders in her ears but Nina tries to paste on a smile. "I'm quite alright, thank you. Were you out looking for me?"
For Ryu.
"Yes," says the guard, and now the rest of his squad mates have gotten up as well to flock around Nina. "His majesty sent the whole royal guard out to look for your highness and that terrible dragon. Now that we've found you, we should bring you back to Winlan at once!"
"You can't," says Nina. "I can't return just yet."
The guard looks at her uncomprehendingly. "But why, your highness? Your parents are beside themselves with worry!"
"I can't," Nina repeats. "Please, return to the castle and tell them I can't come home yet."
Maybe never. But Nina's trying not to think about that.
"Your highness…" says the red-haired guard helplessly, but one of his squad mates shoves him out of the way. His hair's brown and his face is weathered; he must be the captain.
"Our orders were to bring you back, your highness," he says grimly. "And we will do it whether you like it or not."
Nina clenches her fists, cursing the guards she once had relied on. "Never," she vows, and then she runs.
The guards, taken by surprise, let her slip past them and run all the way to the door before lunging after her. The captain yells orders to his men as Nina rushes out onto the village road, away from the fire and into the darkness. She hears yells echo after her as she sprints into the woods, but then Ryu's there and Nina grabs onto him, trying to calm her breathing. "They recognised me," she tells him. "Give me my staff, we'll have to leave."
Ryu curses under his breath then starts fumbling with the saddlebags, soon pressing her staff into Nina's hand. Then he climbs up into the saddle and holds a hand down for Nina, who quickly heaves herself up to sit behind Ryu, holding on tight to his waist as Ryu nudges his horse first into walking and then into a trot. It's too dark to gallop and too dangerous to summon forth a light, so Ryu turns the horse around and steers them back along the road they came with.
Nina hides her face against Ryu's back, listening to the horse's footsteps and the distant shouts.
"I'm sorry," she whispers.
She doesn't know whether Ryu hears it or not.
By sunrise they've left the forest behind and are heading towards eastern Wyndia. As they approach a river, they can see from a distance how a group of guards are blocking off the bridge, so they're forced to travel alongside the river instead. They make camp at noon in a small grove of trees right by the river, the horse lying down exhausted on the ground while Nina and Ryu curl up together next to him.
When Nina wakes up the sun's moved and is again going down, and she wakes Ryu.
"We have to leave central Wyndia," he says. "We'll have to find a place where the river's shallow enough to wade across."
Ryu catches a couple of fishes first, and Nina quickly fries them with a burst of fire magic. They eat hastily. After, they pack up again and rouse the horse and start to slowly make their way down along the river's shore. Finally, the river's become so thinly spread across the flat plain that they can wade across, and Nina goes ahead with their stuff while Ryu gently coaxes his horse across the river.
On the other side, more forests await them, and mountains, but at the very least eastern Wyndia is known to be more sparsely populated than the rest of the kingdom. If they can sneak across the border to Rhapala…
More things to worry about when they get there.
Night starts to fall again and they dare to use the road once more, travelling by cover of darkness. Apart from a few gooeys of various kinds – and the animated slimes are easily dealt with – they don't run into any monsters either. Inside of another deep forest they make camp again to let the horse rest, and Nina and Ryu sleep again for a few hours. Exhaustion makes time pass slow and sticky, and in Nina's memory roads travelled are blurring together with forests and rivers they've passed. Everything looks the same. Nina's perpetually tired, perpetually hungry, and constantly almost too keyed up to fall asleep.
Ryu sleeps like a log whenever they make camp but always quickly drags himself back to awareness when Nina shakes him awake, never complaining. His hair's matted to his head with filth from the road, and Nina assumes she can't look much better herself. The wings her ancestors had weren't passed down to her, and for once Nina's glad for it – it'd be hell to take care of them while on the run like this.
Another dawn, and after Ryu's skinned and prepared the one rabbit Nina managed to catch, and after they've sat down and eaten – wolfing down the food without speaking – Ryu speaks up again. His voice has grown rougher over the time they've been fleeing, and he swallows audibly before saying, "I'm sorry for everything, Nina." What sort of confession is this? "I'm sorry for making you flee with me, and having to live like this-"
"You didn't," says Nina. "I insisted to come with you, remember?"
"Then I'm sorry they found out," says Ryu listlessly. "I don't know how they did – maybe someone betrayed us – but the fallout shouldn't have fallen on you, too."
"Ryu…"
"It's all my fault. I should've known better." He closes his eyes, head bowed where he sits in front of their fire (already put out, even with the light of dawn they don't want to risk it). As if the whole weight of the world and all their combined sins are on his shoulders alone.
"Then are you sorry for loving me?" demands Nina, hating to see him like that. She stands up. "I should've known better too. As crown princess of Wyndia, I should've known my parents would never let me marry a guard. But what's done is done, Ryu." She takes a deep breath. "And I'll never regret the time I spent with you. So please don't blame yourself."
"Nina…" Ryu looks up at her with pain in his eyes. Then he sighs. "You're right. The worst has already happened." He stands up and takes Nina's hands. "But I love you, and I always will, and I'll never regret that."
That's unusually verbose of Ryu. If Nina hadn't been worried for him before, this would've tipped the scales.
But Nina's been scared and worried ever since they first fled from the castle.
Nina squeezes his hands in hers, tries to smile at him. "There. Now, let's get back on the road."
It's another hot summer's day, just like the weather's been like all week, and they travel through the forest until they reach another road. Riding on the road is a patrol of guards, and Nina and Ryu quickly retreat back into the woods after spotting them. They turn around and start going in a different direction, and when they emerge from the forest again they find themselves standing in the open courtyard of a huge tower.
"This isn't a Wyndian outpost, is it?" asks Ryu.
"I don't think so," is Nina's best answer. Neither of them has heard of there being a Wyndian fortress out here, anyway, and as a princess and a guard one of them ought to have if there really was one. The thought of food or shelter is therefore enough to compel Nina to dare knock on the door.
Nobody comes, but the door turns out to be unlocked. Nina and Ryu share a glance, and then Ryu ties his horse to a bit of fence nearby, they take their bags and weapons, and finally they venture inside the tower.
There are monsters in there, it turns out. Lizards and some sort of strange, animated dolls – it must be magic holding them together, and if Nina had the time she would've liked to study the spell used. They climb higher inside the tower, finding empty libraries, halls full of monsters and junk, and doors which you need magic for to open. They don't find any people, however, not until they've climbed quite a few floors.
The first thing they hear is a booming sound like something huge collapsing, and Nina and Ryu glance at each before cautiously approaching the door from which the noise had come. The door's halfway open and they stop to glance inside before entering, and there on the floor of a messy library (or is it a workshop?) sits a Grassrunner clanswoman, talking to an animated sprout. The woman's dressed in a long blue robe, equally long red hair braided down her back, and with a pointy blue hat to top off her ensemble. The sprout – somehow alive, and sentient it looks like – is a pink bulb framed by soft green leaves, and the bulb's got a face with almost human features.
"Hello?" says Nina warily.
"You've learned to talk?" the woman exclaims, eagerly leaning closer to the sprout.
"No, I'm talking!" Nina steps forward, and the woman finally looks up at them. "What is this place? And who are you?"
"I'm Momo," says the woman, looking at them with no recognition in her eyes whatsoever. Despite her strange clothes, her face looks rather young. She adjusts her glasses, stands up and brushes down her robe, and then she turns to Nina again and says proudly, "And this is my father's wizard tower!"
"You're a wizard?" asks Nina. There are many mages in the world – Nina among them – but Momo's strange even compared to some others Nina's met.
"My father was," says Momo. "I just took over his job. Oh, and this is Peco." She nods at the sprout, who's staring up at them and squinting. "I haven't had a visitor in ages," Momo muses out loud. "So, who might you be?"
She cocks her head and looks at them, waiting.
Ryu and Nina share a long look, and then Nina offers, "My name is Nina."
Still no recognition.
"And this is Ryu," Nina adds. "We're on the run, because Ryu's been framed by someone in Winlan for something he didn't do."
"Something, huh," says Momo. She looks at Ryu.
Finally, Ryu sighs. "I've been accused of Dragon clan ancestry," he admits. Nina's hand goes to rest on her staff, just in case, and they wait and watch Momo's face carefully.
"Dragon clan…" mumbles Momo absently. "The light Dragons were said to be phenomenal at magic, but I don't suppose that applies to you?"
"No, miss," says Ryu hesitantly. "Nina's better at magic than I."
"Shame," says Momo. A moment passes. "Oh!" she then says, as if remembering something. "If you're on the run, you can stay here. I don't mind. Do you mind, Peco?"
The sprout says nothing.
Nina bows. "Thank you, Momo, Peco." She smiles, giddy with relief. "I don't know how we'll ever repay you."
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