Restart Again: Volume 2 by Adam Scott (best adventure books to read .TXT) 📗

safe,” she said with a relieved laugh. “I couldn’t sleep at all last night, I was so worried!”

Lia patted her back. “I’m glad you’re safe too, Marin.”

Marin withdrew her arms and spun to watch as Val pushed the Strategist into the back of our wagon. “So that’s him? That’s...the guy?”

“Yeah, that’s the guy,” I answered. “He’s the one behind all the awful things you’ve had to go through lately. We’re taking him back to Yoria so he can stand trial for everything he’s done.”

She growled at him under her breath. “Good. Serves him right.” The frown on her face suddenly dissolved into an excited smile. “So, when are we leaving?”

“Uhm…” I trailed off, looking to Lia for support. Finding her with the same confused expression that I wore, I continued. “We’re leaving for Yoria as soon as possible, but...are you, uhh, also going somewhere?”

“I’m going with you!” she answered energetically. “Like I said, I couldn’t sleep last night, so I packed up all of my stuff instead. It wasn’t hard; my entire stock has been sold out for days, so aside from a few personal items I barely had anything to pack at all!”

“But what about your shop?” Lia asked. “Wasn’t that the whole reason you stayed in Attetsia to begin with?”

Marin let out an exasperated sigh. “Attetsia is the worst! If I had known how awful everything would be before I moved down here, I would never have set up this shop in the first place!” She clapped her hands. “I’m moving back in with my parents in Yoria. If things are going to get better here, I’m sure somebody will want to buy my shop. It’s in a great neighborhood!” Her eyes widened with sudden surprise, and she spun away from us. “That reminds me, I have to go back and…” she trailed off as she walked away from us, still talking to herself as she went.

I vigorously rubbed my face as a wave of fatigue washed over me. “I’m not sure I’d have the energy to keep up with her on my best day.”

Lia laughed, nodding with agreement as she took my hand in hers. We stood together in the middle of the road and watched Marin skip circles around her older sister, pestering Val in an effort to gain her undivided attention. After everything we had gone through together, it was comforting to see Val’s steely face warmed by a genuine, loving smile.

“It’s really over, isn’t it?” Lia asked softly. “I know it’s only been a few days, but it feels like we started our trip here from Yoria months ago.”

“It’s really over,” I agreed. “We take one last wagon ride, collect our reward from the King, and then…” I trailed off and looked down at my boots, “I’m not sure what comes next. I convinced myself so thoroughly that I’d never make it here. I didn’t bother to seriously consider the future, because I thought I’d lose it.”

“Well, you’d better start thinking about it soon. You owe me a lot of adventures,” she teased. “I’m thinking...somewhere far away.” She gave my hand a gentle squeeze as she pulled me forward, and we walked to our awaiting wagon together.

The future, huh? What do I even want for my future? I considered the idea for a moment, but the answer came to me immediately when I looked over to Lia’s smiling face. No. Not my future. Our future.

***

17. OUR FUTURE

The first two days of our trip back to Yoria passed me by in a haze. I was unconscious more often than not, asleep in the back of Marin’s wagon, only occasionally waking up to sate my abnormally powerful appetite. Lia sat on the driver’s bench beside Marin, but moved back into the small yet comfortable covered wagon whenever I woke up. My lack of energy worried her, but I found the experience greatly preferable to the last time my mana reserves had run dry: lying comatose in the Corell family basement for three days.

Our cart traveled closely behind Val’s, which had been mostly emptied to make adequate space for transporting the Strategist. His hands and feet had been rebound in heavier manacles for the trip, which further locked him in place via heavy steel loops built into the wagon’s frame. The cloth gag over his mouth had been likewise replaced with a leather half-mask that linked into his wrist guards. Based on his appearance alone, it would be easy to mistake the man for the most dangerous warrior ever taken prisoner, instead of the brilliant yet defenseless tactician he truly was.

A combination of cold, clear weather and empty roads made for quick travel across the countryside. After ensuring that nobody had followed us out of the city limits on our first morning of travel, I had fallen asleep almost immediately. My next memory came at sunset, when I awoke to find the outer walls of the city-state illuminated with a fading, orange light. Lia disembarked from the wagon and entered the guardhouse to open the gate, returning to us with a foul look on her face when we had passed through to the other side; apparently, the wall had remained abandoned during our stay in the city, including the corpses inside, which were two days further decomposed than when we had found them before.

Our travelling routine was extremely efficient, mostly due to Val’s strict scheduling and our forced adherence to it: break camp before dawn, travel until midday, one short break to relieve bodily functions, travel until it was too dark for the horses to continue, make camp, sleep, repeat. Most of my waking hours in the wagon were filled with consistent annoyed comments from Marin about her older sister’s stringent rules, despite Lia’s best efforts to justify the urgency of our mission. The pettiness of her complaints was strangely comforting to me; the trivial nature of her “not enough bathroom breaks” grievances reminded me that we were no longer in mortal danger, a fact