A month had passed on our road to the capital, Lusaria, the roads were mostly calm as we passed great plains ripe with grass, trees, and vegetation of all sorts.
The vastness of this world surprised me the most. We traversed seemingly endless plains, occasionally stumbling upon small villages where Mr. Prescott and my father would restock our food rations and supplies. In the evenings, with the assistance of Tessa and Rowan, we'd set up a campsite for the night.
It turned out that Tessa and Rowan were a young couple, eager to tie the knot and settle down.
"This is our last adventure," Rowan said as we gathered around the campfire.
"Yep, Rowan proposed not too long ago, hehe," Tessa added with a playful chuckle, snuggling against her fiancé. Turning to my parents, she inquired, "How did you two meet?"
Diana scoffed, saying, "Well, he was the one who approached me first. He kept hovering around the Guild Hall where I worked and eventually fell for me."
"I think it was the other way around," Renbrandt quipped.
With a playful grin, Diana retorted, "Whatever you say, but you're the one who could never leave me alone until you asked if I wanted to have lunch."
"Well I was just hungry," he replied.
"Forget what he says, he's just stubborn," Diana joked.
Changing the topic, my father asked Mr. Prescott, "What about you? Is there a lucky Misses in your life?"
"There was," he said, sipping on his tea. "I mostly go on journeys to pass the time. My children are much older now so I come back to them with little gifts for my nieces and nephews, hoho."
"I'm sorry…About your wife I mean," Renbrandt said.
Mr. Prescott scoffed, "There's nothing to be sorry about, ha! That woman was the bane of my existence, yet she was also the light of my life in a way, haha." He laughed.
The evening continued with everyone exchanging pleasantries and little bits and pieces of their life. Before long, our journey would start again as we packed up the camp site.
***
Another month drifted by and we were now 2 months into our journey, but something was different. My mother began experiencing nausea and morning sickness, causing her to spend most of her time inside the wagon resting, rather than enjoying the outdoors with my father as she usually would. Then, one night, once everyone was gathered around the campfire again, she dropped the bombshell – she was pregnant.
"Eh?!" I exclaimed, my surprise evident. 'When did they find the time?' I said inwardly. With the chaotic roads, the only time for such matters would be when everyone was asleep at night. "EH?" I blurted out again, shock written all over my face.
"See, Rowan. I told you!" Tessa declared to her man.
"You were right," Rowan admitted, rolling his eyes. He had just lost a bet with her. "Congratulations, you two," he offered to my parents.
"Thank you," they both replied.
The idea of having a sibling hadn't quite sunk in yet. The thought of having someone I could call a sister once again, or perhaps a brother, was thrilling… Nevertheless I was excited to have another person I could call family.
But a lingering question puzzled me: would they be a vampire, human, or some blend of both? How did the mixing of genes between races work exactly? Until recently, I believed I was just human, but maybe I was a vampire all along? I wasn't sure.
***
And then another month elapsed, and we found ourselves at Rivenhold Pass, a range of mountains that served as a gateway ensuring seamless journey to the capital once crossed, however Mr. Prescott, Tessa, and Rowan seemed a little anxious.
The air seemed to grow frigid the higher we followed the path that led through the mountains. Our horses that pulled the wagons seemed to grow slower, and the icy winds bit at us.
"What's wrong?" My father asked Tessa, who kept watch on the road.
"This place isn't safe," she warned. "Bandits frequent the area, monsters too…"
"We have to hurry," Mr. Prescott urged, pulling on his reins to make his wagon go faster.
Doing the same, my father said "Hya!" Making our horse keep pace with Mr. Prescott's.
***
As we continued riding through the mountains, following the path, we came upon an open flat area, away from the cold, made of rock and stone and after a while Mr. Prescott came to a stop. Standing at the front of his wagon, he turned around to ask my dad a question.
"What do you think about resting here, it seems saf–" he began, but his sentence was cut short as an arrow came flying towards him, its whistle slicing through the air. Yet, before it could find its mark, Rowan swiftly blocked it with his sword.
Mr. Prescott's eyes widened in shock, and a tense silence hung through the air. The peacefulness of the mountain pass was shattered as figures emerged from the ridge of the mountain.
A large, imposing man led the group, likely the leader of the bandits that had just ambushed us. There were about six or seven bandits in total, from what I could see from inside the wagon.
The leader, broad shouldered and menacing, grinned maliciously as he looked at our group. His voice echoed through the mountains as he spoke. "Well, well, well what do we have here? Travellers seeking refuge? Merchants? You've chosen the wrong day to be passing by."
Tessa, gripping her bow tightly, whispered to my father from the back of Mr. Prescott's wagon, "I told you this place wasn't safe."
The bandit leader continued, "Hand over everything and maybe we'll let you pass unharmed," he said, licking the blade of his curved sword.
Stepping forward, Rowan began to speak, "We do not have anything of value, we're simple people making our way back to our hometown, just please let us pass" Rowan tried to reason with them.
The bandit leader looked at him sceptically before snapping his fingers, then a whistling noise sliced through the air, hitting Rowan on the right shoulder. It was an arrow, and whoever shot it was quite skilled.
"Rowan!" Tessa shouted, panic visible on her face.
"If you have nothing to give, then the next best thing we can take from you is yourselves," the bandit leader said, jumping down from the mountain ridge.
Renbrandt grabbed his sword and got off the wagon. "Protect your mother, Darian," he said.
I nodded. "Yes." But I was worried, I had never seen my father, could he even fight at all?
My worries came to an end as he came face to face with the leader of the bandits before quickly slashing his sword.
The bandit leader screamed, my father had narrowly missed his neck and instead had given him a long gash across the chest, but it wasn't deep enough.
Screaming for the help of his comrades, the bandit leader stepped back as the other bandits stepped down except for the last two.
"Rowan, are you able to fight?" My father asked.
"Yes, I can," he replied. "Mr. Prescott, stay inside the wagon and don't leave it no matter what happens." He instructed the merchant. "Tessa, provide support."
"Yes!" She affirmed, getting her bow and arrow ready to fire.
***