The bloody tracks are starting to fade," Kalat said.
They had been walking silently through the forest for over an hour.
"They must have been bandaging their wounds with something," Brax agreed.
"I don't understand. We found signs of a struggle, but no signs of the dead. No dents in the bodies, or marks from dragging the bodies. It doesn't make sense," Kalat shook his head.
"No one died, apparently. Their victim must have injured one of them and then ran away, that's why there were no dead."
As they continued through the forest, a noise reached their ears. They left their horses behind and crept toward the noise, which grew louder with each step.
After a few meters, the forest turned into a small ridge that overlooked almost the entire front of the Mered Valley. They lay down and crawled to the edge of the ridge.
"Well, shit," Kalat thought as he looked down the valley.
"I think we found the main hideout," Brax smiled.
"Man, this isn't a handful of bandits. There must be at least a hundred down there," Kalat gasped in surprise.
Brax carefully scanned the entire area and the enemy camp. The bandits' encampment was cleverly placed, with only one path leading into it, because everywhere else was a river or a rock. It would be difficult to get there unnoticed.
"Look, over there," Kalat pointed to a spot by the rock face.
Brax frowned and put his hand to his face to block the sun from his eyes and see better.
"Damn," he growled in surprise.
He saw wooden cages. Three to be exact. Each one held someone - three prisoners deep in the camp.
"What are we going to do?" Kalat asked.
"We have to free the hostages."
"The two of us? Are you crazy? We have to go back for reinforcements."
"They could be dead by then," Brax growled, instinctively looking for some poorly guarded path to the camp.
"This makes me feel bad," Kalat shook his head.
It was late afternoon, the sun would set in a few hours, and Lina knew she would soon be in the Mered Valley, where she had been headed all along.
She couldn't wait to have her herbs gathered and be able to return home. That much adventure in one day was more than enough.
But if there were still so many bandits around, she would have to look elsewhere for herbs, even if it meant driving a lot further. She wasn't going to push her luck. Next time, she might come across a large group of raiders, and that might not turn out well at all.
She rode for a few more minutes, when the trees began to look familiar. She smiled and patted Rillan on the neck—he whinnied softly and tossed his head.
"We're here, finally," she whispered.
At the beginning of the valley was a forest that looked almost like any other. But Lina saw much more in it than just trees, soil, flowers, bushes, and animals. She loved the place. It was peaceful, undisturbed, and filled with her memories of happier times in both her and her mother's lives. She sighed as she realized those times were gone.
She crouched down as they passed under the branches of the trees. After a while, she saw among them some of the herbs she was looking for.
She jumped off her horse, untied her basket from her saddle, and began to gather. Quickly and deftly, she broke off the stems of the herbs just above the ground and placed them at the bottom of the basket.
The herbs had pointed leaves that formed a star shape and spiraled around the stem.
Even though she was crouched low to the ground, she was still alert, listening for any sound that might signal danger.
Brax and Kalet watched the bandit camp for almost half an hour, trying to come up with a plan to rescue the hostages.
Finally, however, Brax noticed an important detail. At the edge of the camp, where the rock met the river, there was a place well hidden by a piece of rock. They quickly ran down the valley, but still very carefully, and approached the river through the forest. They did not encounter a single guard. They
looked around the place properly. There was indeed enough space on the other side of the river. When it was dark, they could swim across the river and hide behind the rock without anyone seeing them.
So they began to prepare. They brought their horses to the river, but left them well hidden in the forest. Then Brax swam across the river with a rope. He fastened it to a massive stone on the other side, but left it loose so that it would remain hidden below the surface of the river.
Then, using a rope, he pulled his combat gear hidden in a bag to the other side and stowed it behind a pile of rocks on the bank. Everything was ready.
When it was dark, he and Kalat would sneak into the camp and try to free the hostages. They would then swim across the river with the help of the rope, and thanks to the horses, they would be gone before anyone noticed. The gear was there just in case something went wrong. Of course, he had to go into the camp without armor so as not to make any noise.
"Do you think it will work?" Kalat whispered, huddled in the shelter next to Brax.
"It must," he replied, his gaze fixed on the camp.
He firmly hoped that he would not run into Lina among the captives. If she was indeed heading for the valley, she could get into trouble. They could catch her, or kill her. Perhaps she was safe and far away.
Lina continued to gather. She turned to look at Rillan. She saw him standing at the edge of the forest, chewing grass.
"Good boy, stay there," she whispered to him.
The horse shook its head and continued to graze on the grass. Lina got up from the ground and walked further into the forest. She knew that in a moment she would hear the murmur of the river that flowed through the valley and she also knew that she had to be very careful. She knew that the bandits could be nearby, but she did not intend to lose her way and her hard work, nor did she want to disappoint her mother and she did not want to imagine what she would do if she saw someone who could not be helped at home because they did not have the necessary herbs for ointments and potions.
She walked further into the forest and when she looked back, she no longer saw Rillan, but only trees. She was not afraid that he would do something he should not. He was a smart horse. It often seemed to her that the animal had more sense and courage than some of the people in the village she knew.
She slowly approached the place where the river flowed. She looked down at a piece of it flowing below her from the hill. She suspected that if she went down along the river, she would reach the bandit patrol, if not a larger group, in about a hundred meters.
Her goal was to get upstream to the meadow where the herbs she needed most were.
She was just about to turn left, exactly upstream, when she suddenly heard something hit the ground hard behind her. She quickly reached for the hilt of her sword, but before she could pull it out or even turn around, someone roughly grabbed her by the hair close to her head and threw her brutally to the ground.
Lina screamed because her head hit a piece of protruding stone. She felt warm blood immediately begin to rush down her temple. She exhaled and tried to push herself up with her hands so that she could at least turn around. But it was useless.
Suddenly she screamed a second time because someone brutally stamped on her arm and knocked her to the ground. She felt him kneel on her back with one knee and his hand take her hair again.
"Here you are, you bitch," a voice called out to her ear.
Lina felt dizzy and the pain was beginning to dull her senses. Blood from her sleep was dripping into her mouth and she felt as if the man's weight was going to crush her spine.
"It's almost dark," Kalat whispered.
"We'll wait a bit longer. In a few hours, half of them will be drunk or asleep. The fewer of them awake, the better our chances," Brax replied.
"This waiting is killing me. I'm sitting here on some very sharp rocks, you know?"
"Just calm down," Brax insisted.
"I hate waiting before a battle. I'm nervous, I'm starting to shake, and I'm cold. I'm tired, I want to sleep, and I'm hungry. When the action starts, it'll all be fine, I know that, but it's killing me now."
"That's because there's no time to think about these things in combat. We're just trying to stay alive. I used to be just like you. Hot-blooded and impatient," Brax smiled sadly.
"And what happened then?"
"All my friends died and I was left alone," he replied.
He wasn't in the habit of talking much, let alone talking more than his counterpart, but if some of it helped Kalat live a normal life, unlike him, then perhaps it had some benefit.
"You hate mercenaryism, don't you?" Kalat raised an eyebrow.
"Yes and no. I hate it because there's nothing I can fully commit to anymore, nothing I can dedicate my life to. I fight because I know nothing else. As long as I have my hammer, I'll survive. Year after year, I just keep repeating that it's true. Next to a man fighting for his family, my life means nothing. No matter how many enemies I kill, nothing will change… I won't be happier… I won't have more…" he added, realizing that these were Lina's words.
Kalat only listened to him silently. He realized that Brax was no longer speaking to him, but that he was questioning his own life. He felt sorry for him.
What had this mercenary been through to essentially consider himself dead? He didn't want to end up like this. At that moment, Kalat promised himself that when this little quest of theirs was over, he would settle down.
The pain was getting worse and worse. Her head was pounding. Still, she tried hard to think of something that could help her. Not far from her head, she saw a rock that must have crumbled some time ago from the one she had fallen on.
When the bandit saw that she wasn't moving, he turned her onto her back and straddled her chest.
Lina looked at him, wanting to stab him with her eyes.
He held her hands tightly along her head, so she couldn't even move.
"See, you've run out of ideas, haven't you?" he chuckled in her face.
Lina caught a glimpse of his face peeking out from under his hood. His lips were lifted in a mad smile.
The man approached her as if he wanted to kiss her.
"So pretty and so naughty, huh," he said and moved even closer.
Lina felt sick to her stomach, so she spat blood from her sleep that had accumulated in her mouth onto his face.
However, the bandit just grinned and wiped his face on his shoulder.
"You're not over it yet? All the better, our boys will welcome it," he laughed again.
Then he took her hands and grabbed them with one hand. With the other, he pulled out a piece of rope that he had with him and wanted to tie Lina's hands.
The girl seized the opportunity - she kicked her foot up and hit the man in the back, which surprised him and thanks to this she managed to get one of her hands out of his grip. She reached next to her and grabbed a stone that she had noticed earlier.