NOVEL NEXT Ch 2.14: Departure
Elaina thought about asking whether or not there was time to go back and find a change of clothes, but a carriage cresting over the hill quashed that desire, obviously too late for that now. She shrugged to herself, wondering if she’d be able to borrow anything from one of the other girls. Shirts from Tira and Flora were out for obvious reasons, and pants from Carline would likely be too short.
Does Carline even wear pants? It was a question Elaina hadn’t thought about before, but thinking on it now she wasn’t sure what Carline would wear outside of school. Shirt and pants made sense for Tira, and the sundress certainly fit Flora, but she could see Carline wearing just about anything, from long dresses to pants to skirts. Anything would make sense really, so long as it was somewhat modest. Though immodest would be better…
“Elaina, I think she’s pointing at you,” Tira said, looking off in the distance.
Elaina looked back up, breaking up her thoughts of a less-dressed Carline and trying to find who Tira was talking about. There was only one person, the carriage driver, with dark brown skin, long and flowing curly hair. “Wait, that’s Char!”
Elaina took off in a run, barely remembering that she needed to go slower than she could to not make Char suspicious. “Hey, girl,” the carriage driver said as she pulled up, slowing the carriage and climbing out of the driver’s seat. “Didn’t expect you were the one I’d be ferrying today.”
Elaina crashed into her, perhaps a little too hard, but she grabbed onto the woman and made sure she didn’t get knocked over. “Char!”
“Damn, Elaina, what’re they feeding you?” the woman said as she hugged back. “Or is that just what an Awakening does to you?”
“No, just excited to see you again,” Elaina said as she let go.
“Well,” Tira said, walking up from behind, “this isn’t how you greeted me the first time we met, so I’m assuming you two know each other?”
“I don’t know, she was pretty friendly to me when we were formally introduced for the first time,” Flora said, smirking at Elaina with her eyes.
Elaina did her best to ignore Flora’s comment as she answered Tira. “She drove me here all the way from back home. She’s practically family.”
Char laughed, waving Elaina off. “I’m not that important, just a hired cart.”
Elaina shook her head, still beaming at Char. “You helped a lot, even if it was only for a week. What’re you doing here though? I didn’t think I’d ever see you again!”
“What am I doing here? I live here, girl. In town, anyway. I normally just do local stuff like this, but I’ll take the long haul trips when they come up.”
“Alright, alright,” Tira said, “glad you two are happy, but we do have a schedule to keep.”
Flora groaned, shaking her head. “Do you always have to think about business first?”
“Yes,” Tira responded, glaring at her. “We only have two and a half days for this mission, you know. We’re expected to be on time for class come Firstday.”
“Girl’s right,” Char said, hopping back up on the carriage. “I’m not even taking you all the way out to where you’re going is my understanding, so you four have some walking to do besides. No need in waiting for the sun to get any lower, so hop in the back.” She glanced at Elaina once more. “We can do plenty of talking on the way, just like before.”
“Right!”
The four girls got in the back, Carline and Elaina facing towards the front, Flora and Tira looking back at them, and Elaina introduced the others to Char as the cart rolled along. It was nice, being able to catch up with Char again, remember the encouragement she’d given Elaina on the trip to Endrin. Might not even have even had the nerves to walk through the gate without her…
“By the way,” Char eventually said, “does she still have that habit of embarrassing herself out of her mind at least once a day?” Carline snorted as Tira and Flora also tried to hold back laughter, Elaina herself going a deep shade of red. “Guess that answers my question. You know the day we arrived at school, she dressed herself and had the whole back of her skirt tucked into her underwear? Would’ve walked all the way into the castle if I hadn’t told her, I bet.”
“Char!”
Everyone except Elaina burst into laughter as she bowed her head, doing her best not to think of that morning. Her best wasn’t that good though, and she could only imagine herself actually walking up to Endrin like that, how her first impression to the others would have been if her whole ass had been showing itself.
“Stuff like that doesn’t always happen to me, you know!”
“Could’ve fooled me,” Tira said.
“I distinctly remember something similar happening when I met you after your fencing class,” Flora added.
“Please, you two have seen nothing; I actually live with her!”
A small laugh escaped from Elaina’s mouth, and there was no stopping the chorus that came after, from Char, her friends, and even herself. Maybe it was just Carline’s comment being so out of character as she got caught up in the moment, but even Elaina had to admit some of the situations she got herself into were at least a little funny.
“Okay, okay, I’m a bit of a klutz, big deal.”
“Sweetie, klutz is when you nudge the table when you’re getting up, not when you lose your pants when you’re standing up at breakfast. And yes girls, that actually happened on the trip here.”
They all laughed again, and Elaina was even pretty sure they all believed that was a genuine accident when she told them she’d forgotten her belt that morning. Conversation moved along to less humiliating topics thought, and continued until they finally crested the hill between school and the town.
“Wait,” Elaina said as she looked out the window, “is that…”
“Oh, right,” Char said. “You didn’t get a good view of it when we came in, did you? Well welcome to Castletown!”
A town? This has to be what a city is, right? It wasn’t like Elaina had a great frame of reference being from what she understood to be a small village, but the sprawling expanse of buildings in the valley below was certainly larger than anything she would call a town. She’d seen the tops of some of these buildings as they rode in on the other side of the hills, but she didn’t realize how low those hills went on this side, how the roofs she was looking at weren’t just those of normal buildings, but giant wooden towers, surrounded by a whole valley’s worth of smaller buildings, more buildings than she could even count.
“It’s enormous,” she said, mystified.
“Eh,” Char said, “it’s a town. Nothing like the capital or even the smaller cities.”
Elaina couldn’t even imagine a bigger place. The tallest parts of the castle were still bigger than the tallest towers in Castletown, but overall the school looked tiny in comparison. “I can’t believe this has just been tucked away here the whole time and I didn’t even know.”
“Yeah, I kinda always hated that,” Tira said. “It’s not defensible at all.
“That’s the point though, right?” Carline said. “So it can’t threaten the castle.”
“Pfft! Like anyone would ever try attacking you all,” Char said. “Most people can’t even get through your gate, afterall.”
“I mean, last week—” Elaina started before Tira stepped on her foot, shaking her head.
“Not now,” Tira mouthed.
Elaina was confused, but she did as she was told. What did I do wrong though? She glanced out the window as the rolled down the hill, her mind being overtaken again by thoughts of the countless dwellings below her. She was so enthralled that she almost didn’t notice the sound of singing coming from Flora. She really does have a nice voice, Elaina thought right before her eyes widened in realization.
She’d heard Flora sing that tune before, and from the look of horror on her face Carline knew what the song meant as well. Only Tira was oblivious to the meaning, a look of bewilderment on her face as Flora’s nymph-grin grew, her singing still carrying on as blue sparkles of crystal started to form around her body.