Vallen: The Marking (Vallen series #1)

Chapter 5

We drove out of the woods, into a clearing. The sight took my breath away. Woodville castle was built in the centre of a large isle. It was built on a slight hill and peeked out over the surrounding town.

"The town is called Welkis." She said. "Fully made out of Vallens. No humans allowed." She laughed as we approached the long bridge that would allow us to get over the water. It must have been at least fifty meters long, with two gates. The closest gate to us was closed while the other one was wide open. The bridge itself was heavily decorated with golden statues every few metres.

Mrs Borm parked the car at the side of the road, she grabbed a folder from the backseat and signed me to also get out.

"There are no cars in the city." She explained as we walked up to the gate. "The city was built long ago, there are only a few roads wide enough for two cars to pass each other. Besides, not a lot of Vallens even own a car."

The gate was guarded by two extremely buff looking men. They were both holding a long, golden spear and had on proper old fashioned armor. They also didn't have any hair on their heads, but they did have a thick beard.

"Who do you bring back today, Fernacia?" The left one asked. Though his voice was heavy, and he altogether looked very intimidating, he didn't look on guard with Mrs Borm. She smiled and pushed me forward a bit.

"Eira Lovell." She answered for me. "She has been on the list since last week I believe."

The other man retrieved a small, folded piece of paper from his pocket. It only took him a few seconds before he nodded at his fellow guard, who went and opened the gate.

"The year will start tomorrow." He said to us. "She was the last."

The gate itself was, much like the spears, entirely made out of gold. There were only two other colours on it: the red of the rubies they had put near the top and a few places where the gold had started to wither, showing the black paint underneath.

The gates clearly did not open very often, it involved a lot of creaking and scraping over the cobblestone bridge, probably damaging both the bridge and the gate. Mrs Borm waved goodbye to the guards and we started our walk over the long bridge.

It was a windy day. We could hear the waves splashing below the bridge. There was no point in trying to talk to Mrs Borm, I doubt she could hear anything I said. The bridge was absolutely beautiful though. The statues had a lot of details engraved into them, especially their faces. It almost looked like there was still a person inside, and they just threw liquid gold over their them.

My nerves were starting to get the better of me. In the distance, I could see people walking. I could see Vallens walking. The list the guard held at the gate was very short. Only a few other people would know what it's like to live amongst humans. The rest of them would just know us as the assholes that try to hurt their friends. What if they all hate me?

The gates at the other side of the bridge were identical to the first one. Except these were just left open. There were two guards, but they didn't look at us. They just looked into the town, trusting that the other two did their jobs correctly. They wore the same thing as the other guards, and also had identical spears. Mrs Borm greeted them with a small nod but seemed eager to walk by them quickly.

The town's main road was indeed small, a truck wouldn't be able to fit through it. But what I was most focused on were the people. There were hundreds of Vallens, walking around in the open. They were laughing, smiling and arguing with each other. Most of them even wore short sleeves, showing off their impressive tattoos. 

Their clothes were a bit funny. Some of them looked like they walked straight out of some old oil painting, while others wore more Viking like clothes. Yet everything had a modern twist on it. They didn't look like they had just jumped in a time machine. They just looked terribly confused about fashion.

The houses and stores we passed looked positively ancient. There was a florist whose store was entirely covered with vine and flowers, only the door and the small sign that said 'Floros flowers' remained visible. We passed stores, pubs, inns, restaurants and apothecaries. I wish we would have stopped and looked at some more, but Mrs Brom kept a steady pace.

It took us a good thirty minutes of walking before we reached the castle. The number of people we saw had significantly decreased and the roads were now so small that we could barely walk side to side.

It had started to get darker. The moon slowly made its way into the night sky. My eyes were focused solely on my feet. I realized that I would have to make a shining good impression if people were willing to forget that I was brought up by humans, not Vallens. The people in the street were already staring at us because of our clothing. If I would fall flat on my face everyone would definitely remember that.

All of the streets were made either out of cobblestone or dirt. As we got closer and closer to the castle the cobblestone path stopped, and we were now only walking on the dirt roads.

All of a sudden, I could see where I was walking again. I looked around and saw that the streetlight, which previously had been off, now had a fire merrily dancing within. There was no light bulb or anything. Just a flame that had erupted out of nowhere.

"Some Vallens have the gift of fire." Mrs Borm explained to me when I pointed it out to her. "They light these up every night."

"Without actually being near it?" I asked. No one had been around us for the past ten minutes.

"One of the more powerful ones teaches at the castle." She said. "He handles all the lights around the property."

Right, a fire controlling teacher. That class will surely be calming.

The castle was enormous, it didn't matter where in the town you were standing, you could always see it. It had many towers and by the looks of it also quite a few courtyards. The outside didn't look very welcoming, the first few metres of brick were covered in moss and ivy, only the towers seemed to be too high for it to go. The bricks the castle was made out of strongly resembled the worn down cobblestone in the streets. 

Years and years of rain and wind had done a number on it, but the castle was apparently still strong enough to stand. The doors were enormous, painted in a dark red colour. Obviously they wouldn't be able to open the door all the time, so instead they had cut out a small door in the large one, which was thankfully open.

The inside was the exact contrary of the outside. It looked warm and welcoming. I hadn't noticed how cold it was outside until I was greeted by a large fireplace in the welcoming hall. The warmth seemed to burn away my nerves, actually making me feel much calmer, even though there were already a few students here.