The moon soared high above Markus' head as he and Stella rode their borrowed mounts through the Merkona Swamp. Easily, the two Isle Monitors climbed over twisting roots, fallen logs, and jutting boulders while avoiding the deep, swirling pools of water that filled the Swamp. Markus kept his head turning in every direction as he searched for creatures that might be attempting to attack them, or, more worryingly, signs of someone making the swamp their home.
"My ass hurts," Stella complained, breaking the silence. "Can't we walk the rest of the way now?"
"No," Markus said, shortly. "Now be quiet, please. We don't want to alert whoever or whatever we're looking for."
"Like the two gigantic lizards won't do that already," she muttered under her breath.
Continuing in silence, they moved through the swamp for several minutes more when their mounts stopped, both of them scenting the air and ground in front of them curiously.
"What's up guys?" Markus asked, dismounting Garun, the larger Isle Monitor. "What did you find?"
"Can I get off too?" Stella asked.
"Will you get back on without complaining?" Markus answered her as he knelt beside the spot where the two reptiles were putting all their attention. There, in the soft, mossy ground, was a grouping for footprints. Small and thin, they reminded him of children's footprints.
"Okay guys," he said to the two lizards, "we need you to follow these tracks as best you can. Do you understand me?"
With a shaking motion of his body, Garun seemed to answer him before moving his torso closer to Markus so he could remount more easily.
"What did they find?" Stella asked as he swung himself into the saddle with a light groan.
"Footprints," Markus answered her. "They looked like they either came from children or small races like Halflings and Gnomes. I asked them to follow them as best they can but I don't know how old they are."
"Well, they've got something at least," she told him, gesturing to Naroo as she turned a particular direction and began to lead the way.
"We should catch up to them," Markus told Garun as he settled himself into the saddle. "Before they leave us behind.
With natural grace, the two Isle Monitors moved through the swamp quickly, stopping every so often to examine the ground and scent the air before continuing. Eventually, Markus and Stella pulled them to a halt and dismounted the two reptiles carefully and quietly.
"I am never riding something again," Stella swore as she massaged her thighs. "That was terrible and I need to visit a spa now."
"Quiet," Markus hissed as he crouched down and approached the log they were hiding behind to peer at the procession moving past them through the Swamp. "Guess they've got the kids from the new village. Now we just need to carefully and quietly follow them back to their camp to free the rest of them."
"We can't take who knows how many kids out of this place without a lot of help," Stella protested. "We're better off tying up the people that did this, if we don't kill them right away, and then one of us goes back to the city or wherever the Army's making camp and leads them back here."
"Okay, we'll do that," Markus agreed as they watched the last guards in the line move past them, herding the oddly quiet children through the Swamp. "Since you're smaller, I think it's best if you try to get closer so that we don't lose them. I'll lead Garun and Naroo after you."
"Just don't make too much noise," she told him. "I wanted to be a thief, so I studied up on stealth stuff, but that's no reason that I won't be caught if you make a huge racket and draw their attention as we're going."
"Hurry," he urged her. "We don't want to lose them."
"I won't," Stella assured him, moving in the direction the children and their captors had disappeared to with practiced movements and careful study of the area. Markus waited for her to move ahead of him before he turned back to the Isle Monitors and spoke to them.
"Okay guys, I need you to be quiet and follow Stella and I for a bit. Hopefully it won't be long and then we can all get back home," he told them, gathering their reins in his hands and setting off after his much smaller partner.
Leading two massive reptiles through a swamp without making noise wasn't easy, and Markus winced and cringed at every snapped twig, splashed puddle, and kicked rock as the noises seemed to echo loudly in the almost unnatural silence that filled the Swamp. Eventually, he managed to see a figure standing in front of a tree waiting for him.
"They've stopped," Stella's voice reached him. "Looks like a big camp. They have tents set up on platforms, cages hanging from trees, and more guards than I would have expected from a bunch of bandits."
"Show me," Markus said as he tied their mounts to a tree to wait for them to finish their scouting and other tasks.
Carefully following Stella's lead, Markus moved with her along the ground as she led him to peer over a fallen log toward the dark camp that showed quite a bit of movement as the children were put into cages and then suspended above the ground far enough to hurt themselves if they fell. Mounds and peaks made themselves visible in the moon's broken light as shadows, their uniformity marking them as the tents Stella had mentioned. As the children's captors moved through the camp, it was obvious to Markus that they had been here for a long time judging by their familiarity with the placements of platforms, stones, logs, and the occasional crate or two that dotted the camp. Moving back and forth with organized chaos, the captors went about their work quickly and before long the children were all suspended from cages above the Swamp's intermittent ground and pools of water.
As Stella had told him, the camp was also watched by several guards. Three he could make out in the moonlight on platforms built against trees and rising several meters into the air. Another four moved through the camp, checking under the platforms and in the deeper pools for intruders or lazier members of their camp. Standing at a distance from them all were four more looking out into the swamp's midnight gloom, searching for potential attackers.
"Eleven guards?" he hissed at Stella incredulously. "This isn't some group of bandits. Who or whatever this is, they're organized and they've been here for a while. I bet the crates down there have food in them, otherwise there might have been reports that people were being robbed on the road for food or there would have been signs of people hunting. These people didn't want to be found but they've been here the whole time."
"There's something bigger than just missing kids going on here," the Halfling agreed. "Think we can take them or should we wait until we have more backup?"
"I want the backup," he answered immediately. "There's just one problem with that. If those guards see them coming, there's no guarantee that they won't kill the kids or something. I say we try to take out the higher up guards and then make our way through the camp, killing everyone else after they've gone to sleep."
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"So we're waiting and then we're going?" Stella confirmed.
"That's the plan," Markus said. "Can you get through their line and take out the guards in the trees after they calm down in a few hours?"
"I can try," she admitted. "My stealth isn't higher than lesser rank so I'll probably be caught."
"Are you willing to risk this?" he asked.
"For a bunch of kids in cages?" she responded. "Absolutely."
"Good, then we're waiting for a bit and then we're going," Markus nodded.
Together, the two waited impatiently for the camp's activity to die down, crouching and laying on the Swamp's floor. Finally, as Markus's eyes began to droop nearly an hour later, they watched as most of the movement within the camp died down as everyone but the guards, who had changed shifts, went to sleep.
"Now?" Stella asked.
"Wait another half hour," Markus told her. "No one's asleep yet and if we go now then we'll have several awake and fully armed people to deal with."
"Just don't fall asleep," Stella told him. "I'd hate to be found out because you snore."
"I'll splash some water on my face," he told her with a smile as they settled down to wait for another thirty minutes.
After several long, stretching minutes that the two spent in silence, each of them trying not to fall asleep or shift loudly in the quiet night, the thirty minute wait passed and Stella made her way slowly and carefully into the camp, skirting the sentry's sightlines as she approached the first of the suspended guards.
Silently, she did her best impression of a ghost as she ascended the ladder on the tree, praying that she hadn't been seen as she stepped carefully behind the crouching guard. With quick movements, she clamped her hand over his mouth and jammed her dagger into the man's throat before tearing it forward the way her father had taught her from his time in the Marines.
"Sorry," she whispered to the man as she lowered him onto the wooden platform and hoped that they hadn't made too much noise. Leaving the now dead man behind, she made her way to the next platform and again repeated the maneuver as she assassinated the second platform sentry. Twice more, she approached platforms and silently killed the men watching from them. The platforms cleared, she made her way carefully through the camp and back to Markus.
"It's done," she said. "There were four of them and I got them all."
"Thanks," he whispered to her. "Now, let's get through this and take care of the rest of them."
"I'll guide you so you don't get seen," she told him, leading the way into the camp as they avoided the eight remaining sentries.
Moving carefully after his shorter companion, Markus entered the camp and together they made their way carefully through several of the tents, silently and quickly ending the lives of the sleeping men within them. After they had moved through more than three-quarters of the camp, one of the roving sentries discovered the dead body of the man within one of the tents and, shouting, alerted the remainder of the camp.
The four sentries at the edges of the camp moved inward at the commotion as the still sleeping men pushed their ways out of their tents, blinking sleep from their eyes. Markus and Stella took the confusion for their advantage and quickly down four more men before they were discovered by a more awake man who shouted and alerted the rest of the camp's remaining denizens to their location.
"Stay close to me," Markus told Stella as he raised his shield and prepared to meet the charge of the eight sentries.
"I'll try to thin out the others," she told him before disappearing around a large tree.
"That's not what I said," Markus complained to himself as the first sentry crashed into his shield, nearly knocking both of them to the ground.
As the sentry tried to set his footing, Markus stabbed outward with his sword and felt it pierce the man's chain shirt armor to enter his chest, killing the man immediately with a lucky strike to the heart.
"One down," Markus muttered to himself as he prepared to meet the two other sentries that were approaching him, blades at the ready.
Following their dead companion's lead, one of the sentries ran into Markus in an attempt to knock him down and put his shield out of place. With a grunt, Markus held his ground and threw the other man to the ground with his shield before having to desperately move it back into place to avoid being stabbed by the second sentry's sword as he thrust it at his stomach. Feeling the thud of impact as much as he heard it, Markus kicked out at the man's knee as hard as he could and sent the man crying to the ground as the first one rose again and the rest caught up to them.
Blocking, kicking, and stabbing, Markus desperately held his ground as he felt his limbs and chest grow hotter and hotter and the attackers continued to try to make their way through his defenses. Grateful for the tree he'd managed to put his back to, Markus traded blows with the seven men, as he did so, he noticed that there was only one more man out of armor standing and he fell quickly as he began to whip his head around desperately in search of something. As the last man lost his life to his companion, Markus grinned to himself and redoubled his efforts, going on the attack against the seven sentries left.
With a heavy bash from his shield he opened distance between himself and the men before lunging at one of them and stabbing deeply into the man's gut. With a vicious yank that tore open his opponent's stomach, Markus continued his course against the men, aiming for the next closest one. This one he crashed into, shield first, and threw to the ground before crushing his throat with a heavy stomp of his foot. Feeling the wet snap of the man's neck through his foot, Markus cast aside his revulsion and turned to another of the men. With a roar, he charged him and slipped around his side, aiming for the man behind him. Catching the other man by surprise, Markus impaled the man on his sword and continued forward, breaking the loose encirclement the four other sentries had made around him. Kicking the impaled man from his sword, Markus turned to face the remaining sentries and finally spoke to them.
"You're the only ones left alive," he told them. "Surrender or we'll finish the job."
The four men examined the camp, now with their dead comrades dotting the paths, before turning to each other and sharing a series of nods. With battlecries, they charged Markus.
"Of course," he muttered to himself, setting his shield to receive their charge. "Let's try to keep one of them alive, Stella!"
Before he could hear an answer, the first sentry crashed into him with enough force to send him flying back and falling to the ground. Before Markus could stand up, he heard the other three approaching him and he desperately rolled away from them, springing to his feet and facing them as they followed after him, swinging their swords. Before they could reach him, Stella sprang from behind them and crashed into one of the sentries' backs while thrusting her dagger into the neck of a second one. As his partner choked one of them to unconsciousness, Markus charged the third sentry and locked swords with the man.
"You can still surrender," Markus told the man he now realized was an Orc. "I don't want to keep killing all of you!"
With a roar, the Orc thrust his head forward and caught Markus in the nose with his forehead, breaking it with an audible crunch. Ignoring the blood now squirting from his nose and the pain of shattered cartilage, Markus swung his shield arm around and cracked it into the Orc's temple, dropping the man with a heavy blow that he knew shattered the skull and killed the man.
Gasping from the exertion the fight had demanded, Markus turned to face where he had left the last man and watched as Stella finished knocking the man out with another choke-hold.
"Is that it?" he asked, his voice changing with his broken nose.
"I think so," Stella said. "I think we did alright, but let's never go through something like this without backup, yeah?"
"Sounds good to me," Markus agreed. "Do you want to get the kids down or do you want to find the salamanders?"
"Let's do both together," his Halfling companion said tiredly. "I don't think I can lead the lizards as well as you can and I don't think the kids would be happy to see a guy with a broken nose and covered in blood instead of a cute little Halfling like me."
"You're covered in blood too," Markus protested as he sheathed his sword and examined his ruined wooden shield.
Laughing, Stella led him toward the edge of camp and they retrieved their mounts before removing the children from the cages.
"What's in these bags?" Markus muttered to himself as dawn broke on the horizon and he finally examined the saddlebags that they'd been given.
"Check it out," Stella suggested as she comforted some of the crying children.
Emptying the bags, Markus found a group of cylinders with a note pinned to them.
These are Magic Flares that will last for two hours. When you've found the camp the captors are taking the children too, send one up and wait for us. Do not engage.
Major Albricht
"Stella, you're not going to believe this," he said, holding one of the flares up.
"What is it?" she asked.
"We might be in trouble," he said, activating the flare and sending a purple ball of light into the sky above their heads. "But all's well that ends well right?"