Page 123 of I Ran Away to Evil 3
Another unicorn approached. She was an older mare with a black coat with four white socks on her hooves and a white star on her forehead. She bowed low, and when her spiral horn touched the road, the offering appeared.
It was a dark-blue unicorn horn with light blue tinting the ridges of the spiral. It shone faintly.
“I accept. Here.” I stepped forward to meet them, bending down to pick up the horn. When it disappeared into my storage, I summoned one of my two phoenix feathers into my palm. Brightstar’s horn glowed, and the feather vanished.
“You need to give it to your fatherbeforethe sun sets, or it will be too late,” I told the unicorn prince. That was when the Guardian of Death would come and lay the unicorn king to rest. “And as a favor tome, tell Carter that Chloe lookedamazingin her wedding dress. His loss.”
Brightstar shifted his weight from left to right, anxious. “I will do as you ask, troll.”
“He won’t shoot the messenger.” I tried to alleviate the unicorn’s concern. Many feared the chosen of Death and treated the man with the utmost respect.
I did not.
I announced ominously, “Now go, before it’s too late!”
Living in a magical realm meant you embraced the dramatic sometimes.
The unicorns did not have to be told twice; they kicked off, racing back into the forest through the field of flowers that stretched out north of my bridge. With this unicorn horn, I’d almost collected every treasure from season two. And season two was at an end.
I sighed; there were three other bridge notifications.
I popped out to intercept a little lizardkin boy carrying a hurt flying pig near Kith Bog, and then a merchant caravan on their way to Drendil.
I chose the same easy riddle for both.
“What can I see below my feet
But also way up high?
A single piece rough in my palm,
Where many blot the sky?”
Surprising no one, the boy got the riddle, and the merchant just tossed me a small bag of copper. I would’ve accepted a few different answers: rock, stone, dirt, earth, or anything of the like. The boy said that dirt becomes a mountain, so I let him go on his merry way.
The assassins weren’t going anywhere, so I decided to leave them for later. I would’ve felt bad for abandoning Julian for so long, but he’d invited himself, and the bridges were a welcome distraction from the duke of the North. I was hiding it well, but there was only so much I could put up with from my handsome travel companion before I started to get a bit …feral.
Calm, Gerda. You got this.
I popped back into the kitchen; he was still sitting there.
“Are you all done?” Julian asked, undisturbed that I’d left him for almost half an hour sitting alone in my tiny cottage.
“Technically, no. I’m ignoring the assassins for now,” I informed him, sitting and picking up my cold tea.
“Will you leave them there?” he asked.
“No.” I sighed and shook my head. “They are high enough in level that they’re costing me an exorbitant sum every time they cross my bridge.”
“Then why wait?”
“It might take a while to handle them all. Bridge troll etiquette means I can’t just throw them into the river and walk away. Ihaveto issue a riddle.” I explained, adding further, “And since they’re looking for trouble I’ll actually have to activate my abilities—some of which can’t be undone until the mana runs out or the riddle is answered.”
Julian frowned, but nodded, seeing my point.
“So I thought we could finish our tea, I’ll send you back to Fell, andthenI’ll go deal with the assassins.” Unfortunately, I didn’t capture the bridge in Fell, I simply walked across it, which meant I couldn’t connect the cottage to it and let Julian leave at his leisure through the front door.
“How often do you toll bridges in a day?” he asked, leaning on the table.
