Chapter 23

The carriage driver hesitated on what to do. He really didn't want to inconvenience his passengers, as that was completely against his policy, and so he was torn between quietly following the guards' instruction or making a complaint to them about their unnecessary and time-consuming security inspections. But, when he noticed that the stern faces of the two guards became a whole lot sterner, due to his hesitation and he saw one of the guard's gripping onto the hilt of his sheathed sword so tightly, that green veins were popping out from the back of his hand, the guy panicked and came to a conclusion pretty quickly. He headed straight for the passenger side of the carriage, as he fumbled unsteadily with his bunch of keys.

Unlike the trio in the carriage, the carriage driver was simply an ordinary man, who had no idea of the predicament the town of Fleming was in. He didn't know what he was getting himself into, or more specifically, you could say, what he was driving himself into. Zedd really made sure of this naivety. When she was going over the mission with her nephews in the carriage, she communicated with a hushed tone and also made sure her nephews did the same as well, so as to not garner the attention of the carriage driver to their conversation.

There was no way she would have been able to hire him or anybody else for that matter, if she had just blatantly told him the truth, that he would be driving a carriage into a town, taken over and controlled by vicious bandits. She, sure as hell, couldn't also let him find out the truth, during the smooth duration of the journey. She wasn't sure how he would have reacted to the whole thing; He might have decided to turn the carriage around and throw a tantrum by saying he wasn't going into a dangerous area like that, out of fear for his life or he might have decided to cowardly flee and abandon them to navigate the carriage all on their lonesome. Either way was bad news for the trio, as neither of them knew how to ride a horse properly, much less talk about driving a carriage and looking for another carriage driver would be a complete waste of time and would ultimately, slow down the journey.

So, even if it was kind of cruel, not letting the carriage driver on the information about what he was getting himself into, it was a completely, appropriate necessity.

And so, right now, to the poor fellow, he believed that this two men inspecting the carriage for dangerous items and instructing him sternly to open up the door of passenger side of the carriage, were actually guards just doing their jobs and he didn't have a single clue to bail him out and inform him, that this two were actually part of a vicious bandit group, whom have no regard whatsoever for the value and sanctity of human lives.