Chapter 31: The river

They had been travelling for almost three days, and Koth was in a bad mood. By all their calculations, they should have reached the river this morning, or at lunchtime at the latest. There was no river in sight, not even the sound of running water. This could mean one of three things, and none of them were good. Something could have gone wrong when Irin created the magical map, which would be really bad, rendering all their plans useless. They could have gone off course, which worried Koth a lot. During the first night, it had been dark. What if they had accidentally ended up on the wrong road? The fact that they were going in the right direction spoke against this; they were moving south, and each day the spring was more noticeable. The snow was almost gone, and the night-time temperatures were no longer freezing. If they hadn't taken the wrong route, there was the possibility of someone tampering with them. There were spells that could cause situations like this, spells which slowed down the target but let them think they were moving at normal speed. Koth had done tests to see if they were affected by something like it, but he couldn't find any proof.

In the afternoon, they found a small pond a little way into the woods. They decided to stop there for the night, as it would give them welcome access to water. Since the snow was gone, they needed to find water sources, as they didn't have the capacity to carry large amounts with them.

"We should have been at the river by now," Irin said as they sat eating the cold food. The food wasn't bad, but Koth missed the cooked meals they had shared in the house.

"We should have," he agreed.

"So why haven't we?" she asked.

"I don't know." It was hard for him to say the words, but he was as lost as she was.

"What if we put the map down on one of our blankets and then do a locator spell on it?" she suggested. Koth looked at her and almost smiled.

"That is a good idea, little one," he said, getting up from his blanket. He made sure it was as flat as possible and didn't have dirt on it. Irin got the sack of flour and poured it on the blanket. The map formed as they watched. Irin called on her goddess for the tracer magic. She was more adept at that kind of magic than Koth was, so he sat back, keeping one eye on the map and the other on their surroundings. A small sprout appeared on the map.

"That is where we are," Irin said. Koth looked at it. They were further south than he had thought.

"There is no road there," he pointed out. The place on the map was far south of the road they thought they had been travelling on. It looked like they were in the middle of nowhere. Koth looked in the direction of the road they had been travelling on. He was just making it out in the dusk.

"Well, that's true. Maybe we should have gone with a more local map," Irin said.

"What do you mean?" he asked.

"On a map this size showing the entire country, details will be lost. If we had chosen to only make a map of, let's say, the north-west part of the country, we could have got more details," she explained. Koth cursed himself for not thinking of it.

"You think we got sidetracked onto a road that is too small to show on the map?"

"Yeah, it's the only good explanation I can think of," she agreed.

"We were lucky it was taking us in the correct direction," he huffed.

"Or unlucky. If it had deviated from our planned course, we would have noticed the mistake earlier," she said.

"The big question is: what do we do now?Do we keep following the road?"

"I think so. If we try and go for the one we originally planned to use, we will be going in the wrong direction, and it looks like we will get to the river further north than if we stay on this one," Irin thought out loud.

"Good points, but we don't know where this road leads; it can take us further astray. And if we are being tracked, they will be confused if we double back," he said.

"Which gets us back to where we started: what do we do?"

"I think you had it right the first time; we continue on this road. We will monitor so we are moving in the right direction and hope it will mean we get to where we want to go sooner than expected."

"Do you think we are being followed? We haven't seen any indication of it," Irin asked him.

"No, we haven't, but then we haven't really stopped to find out. If we really want to know, we could create false tracks and hide, see if anyone is coming, or set a magical trap and stay within its range," Koth answered. They had been trying to outrun any pursuers, which made them focus on moving forward.

"No. I don't think it's worth it," Irin said. "Not when we really don't know what we are facing. If we were sure we could take them down, I would say we should do it, but we don't know that. I don't want us to risk ending up in a fight we can't win." Koth agreed. It was the safest option to just keep going as they had. Now that they knew where they were, they could press on, and hopefully they would get to the river tomorrow.

The next day started as all of their days had since they had been on the run. Koth heated tea, and Irin packed their blankets. As they set off, Koth had an uneasy feeling in his gut. He had no idea why, but his life on the streets had taught him to listen to his instincts. The forest became sparser, and at lunchtime, they could see how the road led into a grassy area. Irin happily pointed out the first tentative green buds on the trees to Koth, and the grass in front of them was shifting in lighter green. They hadn't been riding in the grassy landscape for long when they went up a hill and then looked out over more grass and the river.

"Finally!" Irin said with a big exhale.

"We made the right decision to keep going," Koth agreed. They both saw that the road they were travelling on seemed to take the same route as the river for a while, then it snaked off towards the lake and crossed a bridge.

"Do we stay on this side, or do we cross over?" Irin asked.

"I don't know. I think we stay on this side. As long as we keep to the river, we don't need a road," Koth said. They rode on, but despite the good news, Koth still had the feeling something was wrong. He knew he was being paranoid, but he would rather be paranoid and alive than trusting and dead, especially when he needed to look out for Irin as well. He used one of the spell circles on his arm and put up a barrier around them. It wouldn't stop a serious attack, but it would make sure they didn't end up with a dagger in their backs. They followed the road until it turned to cross the bridge. There, they let the horses walk off it and onto the grass field.

"I bet that in a couple of weeks, these fields will have spring flowers in them," Irin said. Koth had noticed how much she enjoyed the shifting of the seasons. To her, every season seemed to have something she loved about it. Koth was just about to answer her when something hit the shield that covered Irin's left side.