Epilogue
SIX DAYS AFTER…
“Surely those aren’t people, right? Like normal people.” Griff was leaning forward on his horse, squinting in his attempt to get a better look.
“As opposed to…what? Not normal people?” Meiji said from his horse beside Griff, a laugh bloating his words.
Griff clicked his tongue at him. “You know what I mean.”
Draven could hear the taunting smirk in Meiji’s response. “I don’t, though, pup.”
“Please stop calling me that,” Griff groaned.
“Children,” Kiran drawled. “Please play nice.” He turned his attention onto Draven. “What do you want to do?”
From this distance, they looked like tiny blobs. Yet Kiran and Draven had both sensed a sudden presence of strong magic, and when they had traced it, it led them here.
“I think we should ride down and interrogate. Figure out who they are and what the hell they’re doing in Foreigner’s Valley.”
“And if they’re merely lost travelers?” Kiran asked.
“Then Griff can open them a portal nearest their attempted destination.”
“Uh, about that,” Griff muttered, scratching at his cheek and wearing a nervous smile. “I may or may not be drained from yesterday and this morning.”
Draven and Kiran both glanced over at him pointedly.
“And you’re just now choosing to mention that?” Kiran admonished.
Griff shrugged. “Hasn’t been relevant yet.”
Kiran sighed, rolling his eyes up to the sky. Draven merely kept his gaze fixed on the distance. “This changes nothing,” he said. “Come on. Let’s go.”
They lifted the hoods on their traveling cloaks, fell into formation, and rode down the hill, approaching the travelers. After they dismounted, Meiji and Griff remained a few paces behind Draven and Kiran, knowing to let the two of them handle these matters.
A broad man was standing with his chest slightly out, an arm outstretched in an attempt to protect the other person. “Who are you?” he asked.
“Funny,” Draven replied. “We were going to ask you the same question.”
“Forgive me for not answering first, seeing as we are exposed to you and not hiding our faces.”
Truthfully, he had a point. Their traveling party had been the ones to descend upon them. “Alright,” he agreed, slowly lowering the hood from his face.
A girl popped her head out from behind the man, then. Her chest was wrapped in blood-stained bandages, and she wore a curious expression in her eyes.
Her eyes…
They were colored just like an amethyst stone while her hair was a pastel shade of lilac.
Draven went rigid at the sight of her.
You are not a monster.
“You,” he breathed.