Despite its isolation from the rest of Soleil, Riviera was still one of the four cardinal cities, so it had quite a bit of money flowing through it. And all the that money could be seen in its infrastructure. Its roads were lined with cobblestone, gutters, and swept daily by dedicated city cleaners.
The roads were separated into two types. Regular roads were meant for people to walk on foot, and wheel roads were, as the name suggested, meant for carriages, carts, or other types of drawn locomotion.
Valery's carriages cut across the city at exceptional speeds. Each carriage had a black rune inscribed upon it that granted it access to priority wheel roads that were meant only for nobles and those on official business. Here, since there was so little traffic, the mystical arions could run at near their full speed, not needing to worry about trampling over slower horses.
Valery had decided to make two stops.
I'm going to be leaving for a series of flights soon, so I'll be writing up a stockpile to release over the next couple of days. However, I may not be around to respond to reader questions or comments :(