In Love, Never Say Never (Ashton Fuller and Scarlett Stovall) novel Chapter 643

Nora turned to me and queried, “Scarlett, if we indeed get to go home this time around, what would you want to do most of all?”

What did I want? That question lingered in my mind as I continued trudging forward, deep in thought.

There wasn’t any food I was especially craving. After a moment’s pause, I concluded, “I want to see the person I miss most, give him a hug, and apologize to him face-to-face.”

Nora seemed taken by surprise. Then she curiously pressed, “Is it somebody you’re in love with?”

I gave her a faint smile but declined to reply.

Night had fallen when we finally reached saw signs of human life. The village we’d arrived at was located in quite a rural area of the mountains, and perhaps due to its inaccessibility, there didn’t seem to be many inhabitants around.

From the number of lamps we’d counted shining in the dark, there were probably thirty to forty households scattered throughout the village.

“Let’s find a place to hunker down for the night,” Nora suggested, already making her way towards the door of the nearest cottage.

“Woof! Woof!” A dog suddenly rushed out into the yard and began sounding the alert at our sudden intrusion.

We clung to each other, terrified. Fortunately, the dog was leashed to a rope. It strained against its tether, barking continuously.

The owner of the cottage had evidently heard the ruckus. Out stepped a middle-aged man with tan, weathered skin.

He spoke, but none of us understood what he was trying to say. After a while, Tabitha gasped. “We might have unknowingly crossed the border into Venria!”

We all froze. The arduous journey we’d made, crossing peak after peak, hadn’t brought us any closer to home. We’d even gone so far that we were in another country altogether.

The man’s foreign tongue threw us all into disarray. Upon seeing our confused faces, the owner of the cottage seemed to further mistake our intentions. He waved his axe at us threateningly in a bid to chase us off his property.

Fortunately, a young woman, approximately sixteen years of age, ran out of the cottage just then. She tugged at the man’s sleeve.

The young woman urgently conferred with the man for a while. He then grew noticeably calmer and lowered the axe in his hand.

The man then turned toward us and gestured. Uncomprehendingly, Tabitha made a few hesitant motions with her hands in return, trying to convey our goodwill.

We couldn’t tell if he understood. He did, however, let us into his home eventually.

The cottage we entered was a dismal sight and stripped down within. Its clay walls were caked with soot, doubtless from the fire that was burning in its hearth.

A filament lamp hung from the ceiling, the sort that farming villages would have used decades ago. The lamp burned dimly at a bare fifty watts, probably to save on electricity costs. Shadows filled the entire cottage.

There were some bowls and utensils in a neat stack in a corner. The roof of the cottage was, in fact, a tent stitched together out of gunny sacks. There was dust everywhere. It turned to grime at damp spots where rainwater had seeped in.