The Unicorn's Forest

Beth could have kissed the city as they walked through the gates. It had been three weeks of walking through this world. While she wasn't unused to walking so much, she couldn't help but feel like reaching the city where they had been heading was an achievement because of how much she had started feeling like she was going to strangle the others who had been walking with her.

Though, she couldn't help but wonder if the growing anxiety over the possibility that Charlie was in this city, or had been, was part of the problem. While she'd like to think that her friends, including Feon and Hesha, were just being a pain, she couldn't help but wonder if the reason they were heading to this city in the first place was affecting them as well.

"So, what do you think we should do?" Wes asked as they moved to the side of the street to avoid a wagon that was being pulled by a mule getting ready to leave the city. "I mean, we don't know where to even start looking to see if Charlie was even here."

Beth nodded, having already thought of a few possibilities. "Well, since we know what the rumor was about, we can at least ask around about that. I mean, I'm sure we won't be the only ones asking about that rumor. But if all of us ask about that, it might hurt us in the end."

"What do you mean?" Ralph asked, sounding rather offended, as if she had accused him of something. Which made her wonder if he had done something since he usually only got this way when he was trying to 'establish' his innocence about whatever he'd done.

"Just that if you guys find out what you can about earning us some money, then we'll have that much more if we need to buy Charlie at whatever slave auction she might be at, or from whoever has bought her if she was already sold," Beth answered simply. While she could go on about Ralph's suspicious behavior, she really didn't want to deal with it. It wasn't anything she really wanted to deal with right now anyway.

"Where do you want to meet up?" Wes asked. "I mean, it's only the middle of the day, and we haven't gotten a place to stay yet. If we don't set up a place to meet, who's to say if we'll find each other quickly towards the end of the day."

"What if you used your magic to talk with each other?" Hesha asked quietly.

Beth glanced at the girl. They'd been teaching her to use her magic, and she'd been starting to pick up on using her magic to talk with them, but Beth had a feeling she didn't have enough caution with using her magic just yet. Also, while there wasn't anyone passing really close to them, Beth couldn't help but worry about what others might hear of their conversation.

"If we do that it could draw attention to us," she said patiently. She wasn't sure if that was true or not, but she was at least confident that it sounded good, if nothing else. "Even if no one takes notice now, later on they might . Which could create more problems for us later on."

Hesha didn't look happy about Beth's response, but she didn't say anything in response. She merely looked down at the ground in a dejected manner, like she was a kicked puppy.

"Cheer up," Ralph said, cheerfully. "You're still going to be the one to tell us how well we do. Uh, I mean, once we're able to get our 'act' set up."

Beth wasn't sure how serious Ralph was, but Hesha seemed to accept what she was told. Beth hoped that would be the case, although she wasn't really sure what Ralph even meant about how well they did. She figured it should be self-evident how the people in this city would react to the music when they heard it.

"Anyway," Beth said, not wanting to get into that. She knew she'd have enough trouble with what she was going to do. "I'll go back to the gate and ask to see what I can learn about that rumor. Though, for a meeting place, what if we pick this spot? I mean, we can meet up when the sun's going down."

"If you do that before you get an inn, you might have a harder time finding a room for us to stay," Feon remarked. "Mother said that the later in the day you visit an inn, the less likely you'll have to be able to get a room. That if we're fine with sleeping in the common room, then it doesn't matter."

"Wait, what're you talking about?" Ralph asked, sounding like he'd just been told that their plans were going to fail. "Don't inns always have rooms?"

Feon and Hesha looked at Ralph like he was talking nonsense. Which while Beth was wondering the same thing, he was willing to accept that this world did things just a little differently from what they expected.

"Ralph," Wes said, sounding more of a mediator at the moment to keep things from escalating into a problem. "I'm sure there's still plenty of things in this world that we're not going to understand right away. So let's just take things as they go, okay?"

Ralph glanced at Wes before looking back at the girls. "Fine. How about this, We'll do what we can to secure a room for us to stay, then later you two can meet up with Beth here and lead her to the room. Would that work?"

Feon nodded. "It should."

Hesha looked at Beth. "You said when the sun's going down, right?"

Beth nodded, unable to keep from smiling in amusement. She wasn't sure what she found so funny about this, but she was at least happy that she wasn't laughing or even giggling about it.

"Yeah, when the sun's going down would be a good time. If I find what we came to learn and I have time left over, I'll wander around. If I come across you guys then, we won't need to worry about meeting up then."

"See you later then," Wes said, as Beth turned to leave.

"See you then," Beth acknowledged before turning to head back towards the gate they'd just passed through.

She heard the others call out their farewells and she felt happy about that. Part of her felt like she was moving through a dream with how they were so close to getting started on finding out if that rumor was about Charlie or not.

As she neared the guards at the gate, she heard them talking among themselves. At first she didn't think much of it, since she could understand getting bored just standing there all day. However, after a moment, she had a feeling she wasn't going to like what they were talking about.

"Not many men like those who passed a minute ago," one of the guards was saying.

"You like them more feminine?" a second guard asked.

"Nah, but they still looked good either way," the first answered. "If nothing else, I wish I could just reach out and squeeze the ass of one of them. I bet it'd feel much different than the ass of any other man."

"Maybe, but unless they're gonna be someone I'd like to take to bed, I'd be just fine looking at them," the second replied. Then after a moment added with a laugh, "Although, I wouldn't mind it if they didn't have a dress on, either."

"Dream all you want, but unless they're slaves, you know full well that it wouldn't be proper for them to go around naked," a third guard chimed in. "They might as well be one of the prostitutes in one of the brothels if they did that."

Beth felt like she was walking into a boy's locker room with the kind of conversation she was unfortunately having to listen to. Even as she came into view, they didn't stop talking about it. Though, a fourth guard who hadn't said anything that Beth was aware of approached her, since she was clearly heading straight for them.

"What do you need?" the guard asked, her eyes looking Beth over suspiciously.

"I heard a rumor about a slave girl who cured the plague," Beth started, not seeing a reason to beat around the bush, but stopped when the guard held up a hand.

"That slave has already been shipped out of here. You're more than a little late on that."

Beth nodded, not surprised that the girl in question had already moved on somewhere else. "I'm not surprised, but that's not completely why I'm asking about that rumor," Beth answered. "I was hoping you'd be able to direct me to whoever was overseeing her when that incident occurred."

The woman put a hand on the sword at her hip, looking like she was trying to be casual about it, but Beth was able to see the subtle threat behind her movements.

"What is it about that rumor that interests you so much?"

"Well, my friends and I got separated from another of our friends and we knew that she'd do something just like that if she was there," Beth explained, not sure if what she was saying would be believed or not. After all, she felt like some information about Charlie would be best to not have shared with these people. At least at this time, if at all.

"So you think the girl in that rumor might be your friend?"

Beth nodded. "We would like to at least see if she is. All we need to do to be sure if see her. If this girl isn't our friend, we're sure we'll be able to tell just by looking at her. If she is, then we can look at what we can do to resolve the situation she's in."

The guard nodded in sympathy, her hand leaving her sword. "I understand. The person you'll want to talk with is at the south gate. Just ask to speak with the customs officer. She's the one who knows the most about what happened," the guard said.

"Thank you," Beth said, nodding at her. Part of her wondered if she should bow or something, but when the guard smiled and nodded back, she felt like that was enough in this world.

Beth wasn't sure which gate this was, but she had a feeling she knew how she'd be able to find the south gate. Along the side of the wall, as close as she could remain to it. Though she didn't plan on walking around outside the city, just in case some of the guards got suspicious about why she was taking that route to begin with. She had a feeling that the buildings would primarily go along with the wall, which would then allow her to find the next gate over. If it wasn't the south gate, then she'd just keep going until she found it.

As Beth walked along, the back streets were filled with much of what she had expected. Some places were shadier than others, and Beth was confident that many eyes were watching her as she walked along, though no one tried anything. She wasn't sure if it was because they had a bad feeling about doing something like that or if they were worried that she might try something.

Regardless of any reason, she made it to the next gate without problem. Although, it did take less time than she had thought it would, the sun had hardly started to descend from its zenith. She wasn't sure if that meant it was that much closer or if the entire city was smaller than she had thought. She just hoped that this was the gate she was looking for.

While she dreaded hearing what the guards at this gate were talking about, she was relieved to not hear a 'locker room' type conversation. The kind that would make her wish she was in a locker room, simply so she could take a shower.

However, while she didn't have to listen to any of that, finding a guard was another matter. There weren't any to be seen, though the portcullis was down. Beth wasn't sure if that was so they could take a break or just because they were lazy. Possibly even because they didn't have the personnel to cover this gate as well.

Regardless of the reason, Beth knocked on the door to the guardhouse, hoping she could at least speak with someone so she could know if this gate was the south gate or not. She wouldn't be happy if she went to the next gate over only to find that this was in fact the south gate.

She wasn't sure how long she'd need to wait, but was pleasantly surprised when the door opened a minute after she knocked.

"What is it?" a grumpy woman asked. The woman looked like she hadn't bathed in days, if not longer, and had an odor about her that made Beth glad she hadn't eaten in the last hour.

"Uh, I was wondering if this was the south gate," she said as pleasantly as she could. She'd like to use a few choice words to express her opinion about this location, but kept those to herself. She really didn't need to try to create problems where she didn't have them.

"What do you think?" the woman snapped, almost looking like it should be written somewhere around the gate.

Which as far as Beth knew, it could be. Since it wasn't like she'd bothered learning the written language of the language spoken in this world just yet.

"I'm sorry, but I really have no idea," she said, hoping that she could at lay out her case before this woman and see if she'd be helpful. If nothing else, she figured she could try to play on this woman's sympathies. If she had any, that is. "I'm not from this city, so I really don't know which gate is which. I was merely told that I should speak to the customs officer at the south gate. That they might be able to tell me what I had been asking about."

The woman sighed, like she was missing a show or something inside the guardhouse. "No, this isn't the south gate," she snapped. "Don't bother me again."

With that, the door was slammed in Beth's face. Beth wasn't sure if that was really a good thing or not. As while she didn't get any information about where the south gate was, aside from that this gate wasn't it, she didn't have to deal with that woman anymore. Or at least, not right now.

Beth sighed as she turned to continue on her way to wherever the south gate was. While she would have thought that this would have been the south gate, primarily because she'd assumed that she had come in on the west side of the city, she couldn't say that there wouldn't be other gates in between them. Especially since she really didn't know how the people in this world thought in general.

As she started walking along the streets again, Beth suddenly felt like she was being followed. She couldn't see anything from any reflective surfaces she saw, but it wasn't like she had trained herself to see those. Or at least what she had always assumed characters in movies had done when it was shown how they could use a mirror that reflected another mirror's image of a red car that was otherwise out of sight of the character.

She had a feeling that whatever was going on in that guardhouse was related to whoever was following her. The timing was just too close otherwise. Especially since she doubted that she'd have picked this tail from before then or somehow just as she continues on along the streets.

She forced herself to keep her pace the same as it had been rather than breaking into a run like part of her was screaming she should be doing. She had a feeling that even if she could run across the city in a blink of an eye, that her tail would be able to follow her regardless of anything else.

Then there was how her tail seemed to keep the same amount of distance from her as she walked. She wasn't sure if that was a good sign or not, but it did help her settle her nerves. As it meant that whatever this was about wasn't just because she showed up at that guardhouse right then.

Beth did her best to put it out of her mind, since she really didn't want any problems to deal with right now other than the ones she had already had on her plate.