Runaway Fiancés | ONC 2023 (Complete)

Thirteen - Marcos

Valencia is busier than I remembered. Bustling with carriages and people meandering to their next engagement. The bright sun nearly blinds me as I step off the train and I'm thrown back to stepping off onto the streets of Madrid. Catalina was right there beside me, then, wearing her barely kept up dress and her mantilla to cover her hair.

But it wasn't even close to enough to obscure her beauty.

I close my eyes and breathe in the salty breeze coming off the ocean.

"Valrocio," Ramiro says from behind me, "Are you alright?"

"I will be," I answer. "As soon as we find Catalina."

"I've enlisted some help in that regard," he says with a smile, staring out into the crowd until his eyes connect with his best friend and neighbour, Adelina Morales, who bounds through the crowd with an enormous smile on her face.

Finally, she makes it across the square and stands before us. "I thought you weren't coming in until the next train," she says to Ramiro, eyes narrowing into a glare while the smile remains permanently affixed to her face. "I almost missed you."

"I sent word as soon as I could."

"No matter, I'm here now." She turns to face me. "It is good to see you again, Marcos."

"It's lovely to see you," I say with a bow. Adelina shakes her head and dips into a curtsey and then pulls me into a hug.

"I'm just so glad to see you," she says finally, pushing me away to arm's length and taking in my attire.

"Why could you possibly be glad to see me? Has he done something?" I tip my head at Ramiro. "Because I can't fix it if I don't know about it."

"He's not done anything," she says, rolling her eyes. "I just thought for sure you'd still be back home getting married. I saw the news and assumed we were too late."

"Saw the news?" Ramiro asks.

"Yeah, it's all over town 'el excelentísimo señor duque de Valrocio is engaged to be married'." She pauses to look up at me, hands on her hips. "Again."

"I didn't agree to either of those so-called engagements," I remind her. "And I'm here, aren't I?"

"You have good points." She links her arm in the one offered by Ramiro and joins us as we walk down the platform and off into the cobbled streets. "But I've had no luck tracking down the young lady you mentioned."

I throw a glare at Ramiro and stop walking. "You had Adelina doing the dirty work for you? Imagine the danger she could have been in! Do you care for her at all."

She rolls her eyes. "I was running around gossiping with the ladies, Marcos. It may not be my preferred use of time but it is hardly dangerous."

Ramiro smirks at me. "See? I kept her safe. We needed someone Catalina would not be frightened by."

That's pretty smart, actually. "But you haven't found her?"

"No, I definitely found her. Exactly as you described her, living with an uncle here in Valencia."

"Then... I'm sorry, I don't understand. If you found her, how have you had no luck tracking her down?"

"Oh, that. I meant this morning. I was hoping to find her again before you got here, to give her some warning."

"You think I need to arrive with a warning?"

"Yes," she says. "Yes, I do. But let us hope your lovely bride-to-be does not agree."

"We are not engaged," I sigh, running low on energy.

"If you say so," she replies, weaving her way through the crowd to the vendor on the corner.