"What about you, Gar?" Anneth asked.
Gared opened his eyes and looked at Anneth.
"What will you do when we get home?" she continued.
With a smile on his face he said, "You don't wanna know."
Then, he looked her up and down and his smile turned into a grin, "Unless, you do?"
"No, she doesn't! Keep your filthy thoughts to yourself." Leina briskly replied.
"Don't be like that, Lei. Not everyone is as prude as you. Wait... Are you jealous?"
"Jealous? Jealous of what, you lazy bum." Leina started hurling insults at Gared.
Anneth was already used to their bickering and didn't find it strange.
All of a sudden, Gared's expression changed.
"Quiet!" he ordered and everyone went silent.
Leina was about to scold him but, then she noticed his serious expression and instead, she asked, "What's wrong?"
"I'm not sure. Don't you think it's too quiet?"
Leina and Anneth focused their attention on their surroundings. Besides the sounds of their carriage and horses, no sound could be heard.
No birds. No animals or monsters fighting in the distance or running from the carriage. Nothing.
"Stop the carriage!" Gared said.
All three of them stepped outside of the carriage and looked around.
They found nothing strange, but Gared's feeling of approaching danger only intensified. He trusted his instincts.
"You two go there," he pointed to the right side of the carriage. "I will take the other side."
Even though their party was relatively newly formed, Leina and Anneth worked very well together.
Leina as an archer and Anneth as a fire mage complimented each other.
Gared was strong enough on his own and worked better alone.
Usually, Leina and Anneth could take care of their enemies and didn't let them get close. If any slipped pass them, their trusted warrior Gared was there to dispatch of them.
However, now they had people to protect and he was forced to split their group. He didn't know what was coming and from where, but he was sure that danger was approaching.
"Get inside the carriage!" Gared shouted on the two people they were hired to protect.
"What's wrong? and what about the horses?" the coachman asked.
"Get inside! And forget about the horses! They don't matter." he snapped at him, feeling anxious.
"If anything happens to me…" Gared heard the merchant mumble before he disappeared inside the carriage and his voice became too quiet to hear.
A few moments later, Leina noticed dust in the distance. Watching it for a while, the dust was quickly getting closer.
"Incoming!" she shouted and after she recognized what was approaching, she added, "Dire wolves. A whole pack."
Gared was about to quickly run to their side because he saw nothing from his position.
As he turned his head, from the corner of his eye he noticed a brief flash of light in the distance.
He immediately knew. A reflection from armor. There was no way that the town's guard would go this far from the town. The only possibility was bandits.
"Don't let them get close! It's an ambush! Bandits are coming!" Gared shouted to let his party members know.
The coachman and merchant inside the carriage went pale.
The dire wolves became visible even to Anneth. She was getting ready to kill the mutts but then she heard Gared's shout.
Anneth quickly adapted. Considering this was an ambush, the dire wolves must have been running from something.
"Fire wall!" she shouted, creating a wall of fire to force the wolves to divert and Leina supported her with her arrows.
The fear of arrows was fresh in the wolves minds and worked just as well as the fire wall in forcing the wolves to change direction. They were running too fast to suddenly stop.
Leina and Anneth's attention was still on the now fleeing dire wolves when suddenly, an arrow struck Anneth's left shoulder, making her wince in pain.
As a mage, her reflexes weren't so sharp as Leina's or Gared's, making her perfect first target.
If it weren't for Leina's quick thinking by pushing her aside, the arrow would hit her chest, not shoulder.
"Be careful!" Leina shouted.
The fire wall obstructed Leina's view and she didn't notice the two archers behind the dire wolves.
Now that she knew about them, she quickly located them, informing Anneth.
Just as the fire wall was erected, the main group of bandits spilled out from behind trees coming at Gared.
The best course of action Gared could think of was to dash forward, not letting them get close.
If they managed to get passed him, Leina and Anneth would face attacks from multiple sides.
Gared moved with his sword in hand, dodging incoming arrows.
'Eight warriors and four archers,' he thought as he moved forward.
"Long sword!" he yelled as he was ten steps away from the approaching bandits.
After two steps he shouted, "Perfect slash!" while cutting horizontally with his sword, still several steps away from his targets.
Five men were cleanly cut in half by his strike.
The 'Long Sword' skill made his sword striking distance two steps further. 'Perfect Slash' made him perform his next strike perfectly, with a perfect form and accuracy.
This two skill combination was great against melee fighters who wouldn't dodge. If they used shields or swords of similar or worse quality than his own sword to block his attack, 'Perfect Slash' would make sure he would cut through it like cutting through paper.
'Perfect Slash' was very demanding and tiring. Pairing that with 'Long Sword', a skill that lasted a limited amount of time, forced him to end the fight quickly.
He hoped to kill them all. However, one of the bandits was outside of his range and the remaining two were just grazed and still able to fight.
He decided to switch targets to the archers. Two stayed motionless, firing arrow after arrow at him. The other two split, going after Leina and Anneth.
When he saw this, he tried to get to the two running men, but he was unable to get pass the barrage from the firing archers.
Thus, he was forced to deal with that annoyance first.
As Gared was killing the two archers, Leina unleashed 'Arrow Volley' on one of the archers that came behind the dire wolves, bathing him in sea of arrows.
'One down,' she thought, while Anneth kept the other one busy, tears welling up in Anneth's eyes from the pain caused by the arrow in her shoulder.
She hurled one fire ball after another toward the archer, hoping to drown him in flames.
After Leina used 'Arrow Volley', Anneth took the chance and instead of fire ball, she used 'Fire Spear'. A skill with piercing ability. It was meant to skewer the bowman.
He didn't lower his guard down just because she had been using only simple spells. When she used her skill, he was ready for it.
Even thou he was prepared, he managed to dodge it only by a hair's breadth.
After nearly avoiding death, he used 'Blinding Arrow', making it explode in front of Leina and Anneth and blinding them for several seconds.
While they were blinded, arrows came from their side.
The two archers that split away from Gared unleashed their attacks, hitting Leina in her arm and leg.
Anneth was shot in her back.
Both of them were finished. They collapsed to the ground, unable to fight.
Gared was still going strong, but fatigue was slowly claiming him.
After getting rid of the archers, the remaining warriors swarmed him and nearly beheaded him. He managed to roll to the side in the nick of time, unable to help his friends.
He was about to unleash one last skill to kill them, when he heard a voice.
"Stop! Or these two will die."
Gared stopped mid motion, swallowing his words because the voice came from the site where Leina and Anneth were.
He saw middle aged man with a bow in one hand and sword in the other, pointing it at Leina and Anneth, who were laying on the ground with arrows stuck in their bodies.
"Drop your sword!"
Gared hesitated. He looked at the horses, thinking that he could somehow use them.
They laid on the ground, dead with several arrows in their bodies. They were the first casualties and first targets of the bandits.
After all, the horses were their only means of escape.
"Drop it or this one dies," the man said, preparing to strike Leina with his sword.
Gared did as he was told, hoping to save their lives.
The bandits started celebrating, not worrying about their dead comrades.
Even though they lost some people, it was easy to fill their ranks with new recruits.
The man who spoke was the bandit leader. He commanded to his men, "Don't let them die. We're gonna have some fun with these two."
"And about you," he looked at Gared and then on his dead underlings. "You will pay for killing them."
"Do with him as you please," he told the three men who were slowly approaching Gared, getting ready to have different kind of fun before the main course.
The leader turned his attention to the carriage, the reason they attacked in the first place.
"Whoever is in the carriage, get out!"
No response.
"I'll give you one last chance. If you don't come out right now, you're gonna beg me to kill you later, wishing you took this chance."
The coachman and the merchant inside were shaking in fear, unable to mutter a word. They wanted to tell him that they were coming. But their lips wouldn't move. Their legs didn't want to obey them.
Seconds passed, no movement.
The bandit leader was about to set the carriage on fire to flash them out, when finally he heard a voice.
"Wait! We're coming out," said the merchant with all the courage he could muster.
The bandit undrew his bow, waiting for them to get off.
In the meantime, Gared was down on the ground. He was protecting himself from all the kicks.
The bandits had their fun and were preparing to kill him.
The merchant and the coachman were almost out of the carriage.
Suddenly, a distant sound could be heard. It was getting closer. Everyone moved their attention toward it.
The dire wolves were coming back, heading straight at them.