was supposed to she would have known that, but still, what if she had taken a header into the fire? She stood, feeling stiff, and started on breakfast.
“Morning, Sash,” Legon said, coming out of the tent.
“Good morning. How did you sleep?”
“Meh. Had another one. I don’t know why they affect me more when you’re not there.”
“I have a soothing personality.” She turned and gave him a warm but fake smile.
He laughed. “Yeah that’s it.”
As the day wore on they drew closer to Salez. Soon they could see a dark haze over the next hill, indicating that the city would be just on the other side. Arkin’s training had filled the last few weeks, but some of the most important training was how to protect their minds. Magic users and Dragons could read thoughts, but if you knew what you were doing you could block them out.
“Remember, there are going to be many people at the gate, so if they do have someone checking thoughts they’ll only be looking for obvious things like aggression. In light of that, keep your thoughts focused on the mundane, understand?” Arkin warned.
“But what if one tries to go deeper?” Kovos asked with a little nervousness in his voice.
“You won’t know if they do, but if it looks like someone is paying a little too much attention to you, clear your head. If that doesn’t work then try to hurt yourself.”
“Do what?” Kovos asked.
“Fall off your horse or something like that. Anything that will agitate the people around you and more important, your mind”
“Don’t worry. I’m sure I’ll fall off my horse anyway, so I wouldn’t be too worried about it,” Keither said with a chuckle.
They headed east and came over the top of the hill. When they crested the top, Legon felt his stomach drop. In front of them was the largest city he had ever seen. Salez was beyond huge. The smoke from thousands of chimneys formed a dark haze floating above the city. The harsh smoke made him want to sneeze. The city was built on two hills that were separated by the Kayloose running between them. Farms surrounded the city, which was encircled by a towering stone wall. From the hilltop vantage Legon could see that the wall even spanned the river, which passed though grates built in along the bottom. Towers were spaced evenly along the massive wall. Behind them was slate roof after slate roof.
Further up, he could see other walls with towers indicating where the city had once ended. He counted five of these inner walls, but only the largest outer wall connected both hills. The city rose from the horizon like two mountains, each topped with a fortress. The fortress on the north hill was large but nothing compared to the fortress topping the south. The building had tiers, giving each new level the ability to shoot over the first. He could see nine towers along the first wall just from where he was sitting. It looked like the city walls and fortresses were made of whitewashed granite, making the city bright, but also giving it a striped appearance because of the slate roofs. Legon saw splashes of red, blue, green, and orange everywhere, but from a distance the granite and slate dominated.
“Arkin, how many people do you think live there?” Legon asked.
“Oh I don’t know, around two hundred and fifty thousand. But keep in mind, Salez is not the largest city.”
“You mean there’s ones bigger than this?” Sasha asked amazed.
“Much larger, yes. Now when we get into town, I will go talk to my contact here and find out if he knows anything. You lot will go to the Claw Foot Inn and wait for me. If it looks like we’ve been compromised we need to leave fast, got it?”
Legon wasn’t happy about this part of the plan. After all, he was the one in need of answers, but at the same time the order to arrest him came from the Queen in the capital. Salez seemed like a good place to find those answers. Still, he needed to take Arkin’s lead on this. After all, the man had been living in the middle of the empire as a spy for years.
“Ok, we’ll take your lead,” replied Legon. As he spoke, they saw a large orange creature fly from the north fortress. Far-reaching bat-like wings pushed its long body through the air effortlessly. It flew northeast away from them. A chill ran down Legon’s spine as he