Page 7 of Enchanted Kingdom
“Jorah,” she said breathlessly. “You look amazing!”
She was wearing a stunning light pink gown that Flora had also designed. “You do as well. We clean up pretty nice for Nerede women, don’t we?”
She nodded before looking out the window. “How long do you think it’ll take to get to the castle?”
I shrugged. “A few hours.”
“Do you think there will be any more of us in this carriage?”
I shook my head. “I think we are it from Nerede. Or at least we are the only two in Nerede Flora had gowns for.”
The horses began pulling the carriage, jerking me forward for a moment, and then we were on our way. I scooted over closer to the window opposite the door to the carriage. It felt so weird riding and gliding over these streets. This was my home; normally I was walking them.
After five or ten minutes, I got used to the rocking of the carriage. The horses were able to carry us smoothly. And though there were lots of people walking about, all of them knew to stay out of the way of the royal carriage, so we were able to keep slowly moving as we made our way to the wall.
“I can’t wait to see the rest of the kingdom,” Ivy whispered.
I smiled my agreement. I wanted to see it, yes. But seeing how the others faired in comparison to Nerede might be a tough pill to swallow. Perhaps it was better not knowing. Perhaps it was better living in our little bubble.
The ride was smooth enough that I toyed with possibly sleeping for a little while. I hadn’t slept much at all the night before, worried about how the day would go. Then again, I wasn’t sure I would be sleeping much at all until this was all over.
Ivy and I continued quietly chatting as we drove the winding streets of Nerede, as if both of us were anticipating the moment we made it beyond the first wall. The moment we became two of the few that got to see above the walls of their own level of Wylan.
The horses slowed down twenty minutes later, and Ivy and I both immediately peeked out the windows. I could see the wall towering upwards what had to be forty or fifty feet. I had been to the wall just one other time before. My father had been getting off wall duty around the winter holiday and Mother and I had missed him dearly, so we came to walk him home.
There was a clicking noise as they opened the massive doors to the wall for us to enter. I lurched forward again as the horses got back into motion, and in twenty strides, we were officially out of Nerede and into Rallis. Off of dirt roads and onto stone paved streets.
Ivy looked at me and I at her, neither of us needing to put words to this moment. Or knowing the correct ones to say.
We had gone where very few Nerede people ever had.Above the wall.
* * *
The streetsof Rallis weren’t as dusty as Nerede, which made total sense since they weren’t dirt. Those were my first thoughts as the carriage continued onward. We were barely on the other side of the wall, but already the difference was clear. I wondered if I stuck my head out in the fresh air if I could still faintly smell the sea the farther we went on cracked pavement.
We passed a row of houses that weren’t all that much bigger than the ones in Nerede, but again, they somehow seemed cleaner. Or newer. Perhaps it was just the lack of dirt and dust.
“It’s not that different,” Ivy said quietly, afraid our guards would hear us comparing.
Ten minutes more, we slowed down for a moment, and I noticed there was another carriage before us. We had apparently met up with another woman or two heading for the ball.
Though I knew the streets of Nerede wound through the sector, I for some reason wondered if once we were in Rallis or Savaryn, the roads would be more direct up the mountain. Steeper. But they were the same way, just more of a distance between the bends in the roads.
After meeting up with yet another carriage, we turned one such bend in a road to find some larger houses. And as we looked at the large sized lots, I noticed there were yards made of grass, like baby meadows tucked in around the homes. And it looked... so unlike the hustle and bustle of Nerede.
At one such house, I saw a little boy playing outside. He waved at the first few carriages before his mother led him inside. They had been the only two people we had seen in the last five minutes of driving onward.
“It’s so quiet,” Ivy whispered later as we slowed down in approach of the next wall.
The only sounds were the horses’ hooves as they continued ushering the row of carriages onward. It was a relaxing enough cadence, and I was just sure without it I would have already been driven mad. “I don’t like it,” I admitted quietly. “The houses and the space are pretty, but I mean the lack of noise. How do these people even sleep at night?”
My question went unanswered as the clicking noise of the wall doors was again heard.
“Ready for Savaryn?” I asked her.
Ivy shrugged. “I’m not sure. Ready or not, I suppose.”
The horses began slowly moving forward, carrying us into the next level. I wondered if the horses would need to stop or drink or if they were doing okay. But apparently they were, because we kept moving onward, toward the castle that surely loomed above us.
