Nanowrimo Day 24: Checking In

So this past week I thought was pretty difficult. However, as I finished up Sunday night I found myself sitting at 41,476 words completed. That puts me at just under 9,000 words left to complete this week. The ring is within reach. Unfortunately I didn't get any writing done today. Let's make up for that tomorrow. 

The next morning we were escorted out of the valley and were pushed onto continue our journey to the Eppon. The people of the valley furnished us with some food and some cold weather clothes and then escorted us to the edge of the valley. We were blindfolded during this process, so I honestly could not tell you to this fay how we got in or out of the valley.  Our journey over the next several days was uneventful. The weather was fair in the mountains for the later summer and during this time I got to know our traveling companions a little bit more. We also discussed at length what our plan was regarding entrance to the city and how we would possibly determine what events were planning to unfold here. After much discussion we agreed that we would allow the giant spy and the lord to enter the city ahead of the rest of the group. Since they were natives it would be easier for them to move through the city unseen and the lord and the giant’s contacts could perhaps allow them to setup a meeting with someone of influence or at least turn an ear to see if any news or rumors had come about. 

After they had established that the city was at least not openly hostile and was still allowing foreigners inside we would then move into an inn and spend a day or so getting our bearings. The goal then from here was to take whatever findings we had and take a ferry down the river back to Alech. This would likely take a couple of weeks travel even by boat so our intent was to send a letter to Alech as soon as we made it into the city. With any luck Amenmer will make it back to alech around the same time and he can know of our status. All of this unfortunately depends upon the fact that Amenmer and the white coat were able to make it and weren’t somehow captured on their way there or worse injured or killed in the wilderness. While Amenmer was always one of the better merchants we traveled with he never exactly showed the most adept wilderness skills and I had no notion of what skills, if any the white coat had. 

We arrived on the out eredges of the city on the during the middle of the fourth day since leaving the valley of the XXXX. We made camp about a league outside the city just on the edges of the plain and where the eastern mountain range met. Eppon as opposed to Nevah ws situated in such a way that right at the mouth of the city stretching out for dozens of leagues was a great plain. The plain was mostly green with grasses for a couple of leagues due to the proximity of the XXXX river that started at Eppon. Directly east and north of this location started the northern portion of the great desert. 

We were able to see the city in the distance but were set off the trail where no other travelers would be able to find us by just heading in off of the main road. The giant spy and the lord left a little bit after mid-day and we figured it would take them at least two bells to make it into the city. From there they would need to find an in and if possible figure out if the city was still open. We all agreed that they would return to us by the end of the day tomorrow and report back. If they had not returned then we were to suspect that things had gone bad. As the lord was leaving I handed to him my letter to Amenmer and asked that he send it on the first ship sailing out of the port when they arrived in the city. This way, even if the city was closed or perhaps has turned they would be able to get the letter out without being suspected since they were both mountain natives. He agreed and took the letter from me and they both departed down a small trail out of the mountains out to the main traveling road. 

The remainder of that afternoon crawled on incredibly slowly and we all did not know exactly what to do with ourselves. Banda was sitting off to the side of the campsite with the two women from the desert conversing with them. I noticed over the past couple of days that he has been talking with them quite a bit. Both women now appeared to be much more comfortable with all of us on the whole and often would remove the coverings from their heads and faces when conversing with the three of us. I noticed however that they still seemed to be leery around both the lord and the giant spy. I can only presume it was a result of them being the same race as the king who betrayed us back in Nevah.