The next morning, I put on my new yellow dress I had been given along with the dark brown leggings. I pulled on my boots over the leggings, grimacing a bit over how scuffed and worn they looked compared to the new clothing.

If I have enough money left over, I'll look for some new boots today.

I brushed out my hair before braiding it to the side, using a fishtail braid mum had shown me. Since I wasn't going to be doing any sweaty work, I wanted to indulge in a prettier style. Once that was done, I hesitated over the leather arm brace. I probably wouldn't need it. After all, I was just going shopping with Alice, what could go wrong? Still, I felt almost naked without at least one magic circle. With a mental shrug, I strapped the arm brace on, making sure it fitted snugly. I grabbed the bag of coins, the visitor's emblem, my shopping list and the pouch of seeds and stuffed them into my pockets before walking out of the room.

I made my way down to the kitchen, pausing occasionally to greet the maids and manservants already busy with their morning chores. Once I entered the kitchen, I found Alice was already sitting at table. She was chatting with one of the manservants while nursing a steaming cup of tea. She glanced over at me as I got near, mouth turning up into a smile.

"Good morning Miss Rowan," she said happily. The manservant she had been speaking with gave me a polite smile and nod before standing and leaving.

I saw Alice was wearing a pale purple dress that was fitted over her bust, but loose from the waist down. The colour complimented her nicely, and seemed to give her grey eyes an almost lavender hue. I sat in a chair opposite to her, having grabbed a plate of fruit and toast on my way over.

I finished my breakfast quickly, as I could see that Alice was nearly bouncing in her chair with eagerness to get going. When we left the mansion and were walking through the gardens towards the front gate, Alice asked me what supplies I would be getting today.

I pulled the scrap of paper I had written my list on out of my pocket and showed her. "I'll need to get some more seeds to take with me, if I'm in a pinch and need to defend myself they're the best thing to use," I explained to her. "I'll also be getting some Mora herbs so I don't have to deal with my period on the road. Then I also want to get a travel cloak, a dagger, and I want to visit an Artisan to see if they have anything with earth circles on it. The only one I have right now is this arm brace, and I don't want to take just one with me in case it gets damaged."

Alice pondered for a moment, the only sound between us the crunching of gravel under our boots as we walked along the gravel path.

"Alright," she said, handing the list back to me. "It'll be best to leave the dagger and Artisan for last. I know an Artisan who sells weapons as well as circles, but he doesn't open his shop until midday."

"No problem," I told her, giving her a smile. "We'll hit up the markets first then and see what we can find."

We came up to the large wrought iron gate and had the guards posted on the outside let us out. We both showed them our emblems to prove we had permission to be there - Alice's was engraved with the same symbol as mine, but was rectangular rather than round.

"It must be the day for visiting the town," said the guard as he handed back my emblem. "Captain Strykar and a couple of servants have already gone there this morning."

We said farewell to the guards and set off along the cobblestone road that sloped downwards. It was my first time away from the mansion since coming here, and this time I wasn't in a daze from the sudden demon attack and trek to Windscar, so I took the opportunity to look around at the mansions we passed. Being in the Strykar mansion for so long had desensitised me somewhat to the extravagance of these smaller mansions.

Alice told me stories about the families that lived in some of the places we passed. She somehow knew who was sleeping with whom, and who was on the brink of bankruptcy from a gambling addiction. I didn't know half the people she was talking about since my family's farm is fairly isolated from the lives of the nobility. Still, it was a lovely clear morning, and Alice was good at making the stories entertaining.

We passed through the square with the cherry blossom tree growing in its centre. A light breeze ruffled the branches and caused a small shower of pink petals to fall around us. The ground was almost a carpet of pink, the stones cushioned by the flowers. Fancy noble ladies in fine dresses and elaborate hairstyles sat in small groups at the cafes around the square, delicate looking cakes and pastries set on the tables for them to pick through.

The road continued sloping downwards, the buildings gradually becoming more plain as we went. Before long, we had made it to the market. Much as it had been when I first passed through, the square was bustling with activity. Vendors called out about their wares from behind full stalls, children ran about shrieking with laughter while getting underfoot. Women sat at the edge of the fountain in the centre of the square, washing baskets of laundry beneath the glimmering wolf statue. People milled about, wandering from stall to stall, some carrying chickens or leading small herds of livestock along.

"So, what are you planning on looking for first?" Alice asked as we slowed to a stop just inside the entrance to the square.

"First, I'm gonna find some lemons," I replied, scanning all the nearby stalls.

Alice gave me a sideways look. "Lemons? I thought you were wanting seeds."

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

"Yeah I am," I replied, "but the easiest way to find seeds here is by getting the fruit. Ah, there we go."

I spotted the distinctive yellow fruit in a stall not too far from us. Linking my arm through Alice's so we wouldn't get separated, I led her through the crowd and over to the stall. The vendor had quite the variety of fruit piled up for his display. Other than the lemons, I spotted mangoes, oranges, figs, apples, watermelons and more. The man behind the stall gave me a cheerful greeting when we approached.

"I'm curious," Alice said as I handed the man the money for three lemons and a couple of apples. "Why would you need to carry seeds around to defend yourself? Wouldn't it be simpler to use things that are already growing around you?"

The vendor placed my fruit in a rough hessian bag before handing it to me, which I thanked him for. I then turned back to Alice.

"Well, yes I can use the established plants, but they tend to be harder to manipulate," I explained. "If I use magic to grow a plant straight from a seed, I can manipulate it into whatever shape I want with little to no resistance. Plus, most earth magus need to be touching the plant they want to manipulate, unless they're a caster."

We continued to walk along the rows of stalls, taking our time to look over the neatly displayed items. I considered buying more fruit, or possibly visiting a florist to see if they sold anything sturdy, but decided against it. I should be able to collect more seeds during our journey, so it was pointless to spend more money on them.

Maybe I'll come across a stinging tree. Those buggers will hurt for months, so that'd be an ideal defensive plant.

Our next stop was to an herbalist for the Mora herbs. Alice led me to a small shop right next to the market square run by a short old woman. I purchased two months worth of the herb. The trip to the capital would take a little over a week, with the journey to Deadwall Fortress being an additional few days, so I wanted to be sure I had plenty in case we were delayed.

After that, we went to a tailor that was on the street of craftsmen I'd spotted during my ride into Windscar. I was lucky to find a second hand travelling cloak with a hood in a dark brown that was fairly cheap. The tailor even sold me a small knapsack at a discounted rate.

We went back to the market, and I sprung for a few chicken kebabs that were marinated in a sticky sweet sauce for each of us. We sat on the edge of the fountain while we ate, watching the people around the square go about their business.

"Do you think the Artisan you know will be open by now?" I asked, licking the sticky sauce from my fingers.

Alice glanced up at the sky while wiping her hands on her handkerchief. The sun was high in the middle of the sky, with nary a cloud to be seen in the blinding blue.

"Yes, I believe he will be," she replied, standing while brushing out her skirt. "We can go no if you're done here."

I agreed, swiping my mouth with the back of my hand to remove any residual sauce, and followed her through the crowd. She led me down the road towards the cliff face that overlooked the docks below. White seagulls drifted on the winds overhead, occasionally squawking at us.

Before we came to the main road that ran along the cliff which sailors used to cart goods into the warehouses that faced the ocean, Alice turned down a narrower side road that led between the side of two larger buildings. The road was bare of anything except for stone walls for a short distance. Soon we were passing store fronts with boarded up windows, some with doors barely hanging on their hinges.

A pair of drunken men sat slumped against the stairs of one such place, leering at us as we went past. Short alleyways led off to either side, narrow enough to be cast in shadow despite the day being bright. A few women with blank expressions and wearing too-thin dresses lingered at the edges of these alleys, eyes that were smudged with dark makeup following us.

I hurried to stick close to Alice. It felt like the back of my head was being pricked with the weight of hundreds of eyes staring at me, and the skin of my back felt as though something was crawling along it.

"Er, are you sure this is the right place Alice?" I asked, eyes darting either side of me. Each shadow felt as though something would leap out from it.

"Oh yes, don't worry this is definitely the right place," she reassured me. "He likes to keep his shop down here since it's cheaper. His work is of the highest quality though, so I'm certain you won't be disappointed." She was carrying the hessian bag holding my fruit, and switched it to her other hand so she could link arms with me. "Come, it's not much farther."

Alice seemed certain of herself as she led me along. Her head was held high, and her gaze was fixed ahead, not showing any of the nervousness that I was feeling.

I'm sure it's fine.

We passed a couple more dingy alleys when Alice paused, her head flicking to the left.

"This is the one," she said, tugging me down into the narrow alley.

This alley seemed much like the others we had passed, cast into a shadow that seemed to swallow up the light. It was empty of people, instead holding a few stacks of old wooden crates half rotted away with age. The stones under our feet were almost black with grime and mould, small streams of foul smelling water trickling through the gaps and cracks.

I couldn't see any doors or windows along the slimy walls, nothing that would indicate a store was down here.

"Alice, I don't think this is right. I think we should go back.." Alice spun, shifting the hand she had looped over my arm to my shoulder and shoving me hard against the wall, cutting my sentence short. Her other hand was coming down quickly towards my face. I instinctively flinched away, and heard something hard screech along the stone right next to my ear.

I pushed Alice off me, staggering away and almost slipping on the slick ground. She whirled to face me, a dagger gripped tightly in one hand and eyes burning at me with a hatred so white hot I felt like I would shrivel up where I stood.

"What the fuck are you doing?!" I half shouted, my voice echoing a little. I held my hands up in front of me in a feeble attempt to placate her.

She curled her upper lip to bare her teeth in a snarl. "Don't speak to me, abomination," she spat. "You should not exist. You are a stain on this world that needs to be cleansed."

Alice's eyes shifted to something over my shoulder. I heard the scuff of a boot behind me, and moved to see what it was. Something grabbed my left wrist hard enough that I felt my bones creak, and a forearm slipped around my throat before pulling me back against a chest. The arm was tight up against my neck, making breathing difficult. I twisted in the grip, pulling at the arm with my free hand while trying to rip the other fee. Whoever was holding me didn't budge, and the pressure against my throat increased.

Alice stepped closer, adjusting her grip on the dagger.

"Hold her still," she said, and lifted the dagger to strike.