Bandits Attack

We were resting for the night in hammocks in Eliza’s shop when shouts and ringing alarms roused us from our sleep. Crispin’s eyes shot open. He ran to the window to see flashes of torchlight and members of the Perch Guard rushing around and buckling armour.

“Bandit attack!”

“It’s the Coalition!”

We didn’t need to be told twice. Grabbing our equipment, we rushed outside. From our vantage spot high up in the tree we were able to see clearly what was happening.

Bandits had attacked a convoy of carts just as they were entering the city. The Perch Guard was fighting them on all fronts. Some bandits were within the city walls and others were climbing over the carts outside, looting valuables and gathering them up in their greedy hands.

Crispin and Olive began pushing through the crowd towards the fray. But I had a shortcut available to me that they did not. I spread my wings and glided down to the battlefield, determined to help in any way that I could.

---

I landed in front of the main gate, ready to hold my position against anyone else who might try to enter the city. A lithe Jerbeen bandit approached me, knife glinting in the torchlight. He swung his blade but I didn’t feel it connect.

A burly Raptor wearing Perch Guard armour struggled with a Mapach bandit by the gates and I saw an opportunity to help. I charged forward in a bloodthirsty rage, knocking the bandit off his feet and away from my comrade.

The Raptor looked over at me gratefully and then blanched as I screamed a bloodcurdling cry to the night sky. It had begun.

Crispin and Olive arrived on the scene, hot on my heels.

Crispin began with an impressive display of divine might by summoning a glowing weapon of pure spiritual energy. It took the form of a golden spinning axe and whirred menacingly towards the bandits looting the cart nearest us.

A Vulpin appeared nearby to grab a box of valuables and shout orders to the bandits atop the cart. They nodded and moved faster, dislodging crates and chests as fast as they could.

“You’ll never be half the leader Babson is!” shouted Olive to the Vulpin. Crispin reinforced the message by firing a blast of divine light from his shield.

I knocked one bandit into Crispin’s spinning axe blade, and then suddenly Olive was at my side and wrestling with the Jerbeen that had attacked me earlier.

“He took your money, Plume,” said Olive as she scrabbled at the bandit, but she couldn’t get back my coin purse.

I turned my attention on the thief and screamed a furious cry. In his last moments, the thief offered up the money he had stolen, but his fate was already sealed. I cut him down with my axe and tossed a coin to Olive as my thanks.

Crispin knocked back more of the bandits who were swarming the cart. Olive continued an apparent vendetta against the Vulpin leader by throwing a knife at him across the battlefield.

Suddenly, there was a piercing shriek from behind us and a group of bandits ran terrified from inside the city walls and fled toward the woods. A small Strig flapped in pursuit, feather shaped sword held aloft and golden armour shining brightly in the dim light.

The tide was turning.

In response to the Strig Knight’s shriek, I jumped onto the cart and screamed again. With the moonlight behind me, my rage in full flow, the nearby bandits decided to follow the example of their compatriots and run away.

Olive jumped up beside me and stabbed another Jerbeen bandit before he could escape, and I took advantage of this opportunity to swing my axe and knock him down off the cart.

Crispin killed a Mapach bandit as it tried to get to its feet to run.

“Oh no,” he said, staring down at the corpse before him. A spurt of blood from his latest victim sprayed across his face.

The bandits were at breaking point. Having taken all they could carry from the carts, they turned and ran for the woods, their arms full of the goods they had stolen.

A cry of victory went up from the city folk.

---

As soon as the battle ended, Crispin returned to normal. He said some compassionate words over the bodies of the bandits we had slain and started healing the wounded militia and Perch Guard.

Meanwhile, Olive played a mournful song of her people.

I still felt energised from the fight so I went to the first cart and started to heave it forwards into the city. Others followed my lead and put their shoulders to the cart as well, and soon we had the remains safely within the city walls.

“Oh my!”

A plump Hedge approached us, dressed in a contradictory mix of fashionable merchant silks and an old-fashioned night cap.

“My, my cart!” he stammered. “My precious cargo!”

“We saved what we could,” I said and dusted off my hands.

“Then it could have been oh so much worse,” the Hedge agreed. “You must allow me to express my sincerest gratitude. Perhaps a potion or tincture or two?” He rummaged in one of the remaining chests. “Do you think you might make use of a Potion of Firebreath?”

“Spicy!” said Crispin under his breath.

At that moment, a magnificently dressed captain of the Perch Guard jumped up onto a branch and addressed the crowd.

“This cannot be allowed to continue,” she shouted. “The bandits strike at our home. We must finish this! Who’s with me?”

“Should we join them?” I asked.

Crispin looked thoughtful and decided to perform an augury. An ominous silence fell as the other Humblefolk left us behind. Crispin flattened the grass in front of him and threw the bones high into the sky. In the distance, thunder rumbled.

The bones fell and landed in the shape of a smiling face.

“Yes.”