They left at first light with three knights behind them, ones who Darion barely knew and did not know their names.
But they seemed alright and competent.
The morning was cold and still. Percvale's streets were mostly empty at this hour, a few early risers watching the small group ride out through the gate. They looked curious but not enough to ask questions.
Darion rode without speaking for the first stretch, letting the town fall behind them and the road open up ahead. The three knights kept a respectful distance. Garren rode beside him.
The road out of Percvale was in the same shape as everything else in Percvale. It existed. You could ride on it. That was about it.
The surface was uneven where the ground had shifted under it and never been fixed, the edges overgrown. Weeds pushed through the packed earth in places. A section of low stone wall that had once marked the road's edge had collapsed and nobody had bothered to do anything about it.
