The Throwback Mountains

[Kadakism]

"And you could choke to death on a bone in the meat you are eating," Rowan pointed out, her mouth moving faster than her brain could tell her that maybe that wasn't the best thing to say. She gave a shrug, leaning back in her seat.

"As well, if these high way men are stalking the roads around this town, then you may very well encounter them regardless of if you are looking for them or not."

[Max!!]

"No, I'm not crazy. I'm confident in my abilities. No one's gonna die if you stick to a well thought out plan," he said calmly. He stuffed a piece of meat into his mouth then offered some to Rowan.

"I've said it once and I'll say it again. I'm a dragon. Don't just blindly check your human standards onto me."

[ladyhawkca]

"Choking on a bone is not quite the same thing," Freya pointed out as she eyed both Axindr and Rowan, very sure that at this very moment she was the only sane person sitting at the table which was, to be honest, a surreal thing. Usually, Freya was considered the weird, loose cannon.

Taking a deep breath to steady herself, Freya looked at Axindr very suspiciously. "What type of "well thought out" plan did you have in mind? Cause if you are planning on using me as bait, and that fails, I swear, witch's honor, that I will summon up Seren's ghost and hunt you down." she warned, naming a ghost famous for its supposed vengefulness.

[Max!!]

"Well yeah I was gonna load you up with some of my stuff and send you down the road. A lone woman with valuable looking junk heading down the road is easy pickings. They'd want you alive so they could sell you off to some slave market. While they were all distracted I swoop in and instill fear in their hearts with uh her as my backup."

Axindr said matter of factly. "But if you can summon spirits and stuff why not do that to them? And why would you summon a vengeful spirit when you could just be a vengeful spirit haunting me yourself? Not that I'd let you die."

[Kadakism]

Rowan took the meat without hesitation, biting into it hungrily. She hadn't eaten that day, and was understandably hungry. Wait, did he say he was a dragon? She eyed him warily, unsure. He certainly looked like a dragon doing a poor job at impersonating a man. But that just raised more questions than it answered.

She considered the predicament and what both of them had suggested, taking her time while she swallowed her food. "I could be the distraction. I have no real talent for fighting, but I can run and I have spent most of my life carrying heavy objects so that would not be an issue for me."

[ladyhawkca]

Freya was not surprised in the least that that was Axindr's plan and just sighed as she sat back in her chair and looked at Rowan, unsure whether she wanted someone with zero fighting skills to be the bait either.

"I could do that, but summoning spirits or demons is not just a spur of the moment thing," Freya admitted begrudgingly.

"I would need to prepare it first so it would be a trap that they walked into or that I sprung on them when they are like sleeping," she explained as she presented them with the problem of having her summon demons or ghosts on the highwaymen.

[Max!!]

"I'm not sure how smart that would be. Ideally we should be as fast as they would be when we do strike. There's only three of us too. Everyone's gonna have to be efficient, and threatening."

Axindr thought to himself for a moment. "Or you both be bait, and I just drop out of the sky, no one ever expects that."

[Kadakism]

"I don't know what is best," Rowan admitted. She had never been in a fight. Never been allowed to hunt back in her original village. And relegated to just whatever task was best for keeping herself and her mother afloat.

"But if you both have skills that make you better than me in a fight, then you should be the ones to set up the ambush rather than only one of us."

[ladyhawkca]

Freya just sighed reluctantly as she gave in. "I guess we will both be bait then," she stated not too happy about being a lure for bandits. However, since neither Rowan nor herself were "efficient nor threatening", she knew they had little choice.

"I guess you are in charge, Axindr," she said as she pushed her food away from her, her appetite totally gone now.

[Max!!]

Axindr nodded, "Yep it sure looks like it. It'll be fine just trust me."

Maybe he was being too confident, he had a good feeling about this though. At the very least they'd stop giving him those looks when he mentioned that he was a dragon. He took Freya's food and began eating it when it was clear she was done with it. He wasn't going to let any of the food they ordered go to waste.

"Either way, the money's good so..."

[Kadakism]

The Next Day

It was early; by Rowan's estimate about an hour before sunrise. She had slept surprisingly well after taking a few minutes to talk to the hearth in the inn. Sleeping outside had also been fine, there was a nice bale of hay near the stables where no one bothered her.

But now she was tightening the straps of the packs that Axindr had given her to carry. She didn't know how far she and Freya would have to walk before the highwaymen decided to come and attack, but she wasn't very concerned about it either way.

"I am ready when you are. You aren't too sleepy, are you? We need to stay alert."

[ladyhawkca]

Freya had also slept well... though in truth she had passed out the moment she laid her head down. She could have actually slept anywhere that evening that was how tired she had been.

"I'll be fine, not too worry," Freya reassured Rowan as the witch tied back her long hair and then pulled on her cape after she had spent a good ten minutes rebandaging her arm with clean bandages.

"Axindr said to meet him outside near the entrance to the town when we were ready," Freya said as she picked up the bundles Axindr had left behind for her and followed Rowan outside to the street.

[Max!!]

Axindr was waiting exactly where he said he would be. Leaning up against a tree, eating an apple as he waited for his partners to show up. No particularly long amount of time had passed when they finally showed. He was looking energetic.

"Oh there you two are!" he tossed the girls a couple of apples. "You remember the plan right? Just keep walking out this way until they show. I'll be airborne, but watching everything. So don't worry."

[Kadakism]

Rowan caught her apple in both hands, running her thumb across the surface gratefully and giving Axindr a nod. "Good morning. I am not worried, really."

And it was true. Amazingly, even though she was about to do something pretty stupid and dangerous, Rowan didn't feel a sense of real fear or anxiety. Or maybe she did, but it wasn't putting her off so much that she wanted to back out.

"I suppose we'll see you when we get attacked then. Have a good flight, ser Dragon." She took a bite out of the offered apple and turned to Freya, waiting to follow her lead.

[ladyhawkca]

Freya was not so chipper or confident about their plan. She had been on the road long enough to know how dangerous highwaymen could be, and what might happen to her or Rowan if their plan failed.

"Thanks, and yes, we do," Freya said as she also caught the apple tossed at her, but with one hand. Her other was firmly attached to her walking stick.

"I hope to the gods above and below that you know what you are doing, Ax," Freya stated as she then looked at Rowan and gestured to the girl with a nod that they should get a move on.

"Remember, if I die I'll haunt you to the ends of time!" the witch called out as they left the town gates.

[Kadakism]

Though she wouldn't have called herself nervous as they ventured out of town, Rowan felt a kind of apprehension building inside her every minute of walking they spent moving away from town. Sure, she was worried about the highwaymen. She had every reason to be. She had an inkling of what might happen to her if they got hold of her. But strangely, she wasn't afraid of any of that.

Still, that tightness built in her chest and she wasn't sure what to do with it. So she decided to talk.

"Axindr says you are being pursued. That must be stressful. I have never been pursued before. Well that isn't quite true. There was once a panther. Back home, I was tending the fields and it came near. Probably because the winter was particularly harsh and its usual prey was hard to come by. The man guarding the fields was too slow, so I ended up with this."

As she walked, Rowan hopped on one leg for a moment to pull up her pant leg. There were three parallel scars running diagonal on the back of her calf, faded over the years but still visible.

"I couldn't walk for three months, and mother had to take over my work in the fields for me."

Somewhere ahead, a different kind of predator waited. One baring knives and clubs rather than fangs and claws.

[ladyhawkca]

Freya just looked sideways as Rowan talked. Part of her was thankful for the girl's incessant chatter, it kept her from obsessing too much about the highwaymen that were their target. Unfortunately, though it didn't stop Freya from worrying about what could happen if Axindr failed, or quite simply did not show.

"That looks like it was really painful," Freya said, referring to Rowan's scars. "We have lots of panthers were I lived too, as well as jackals, elephants, crocodiles, snakes, and spiders," she said matter-of-factly.

"And yes, I am, or was, being pursued," Freya admitted as she looked around them nervously as they walked, trying to look for any signs of them being followed. 

"I asked one question too many and allowed others to know I was travelling alone," she confessed with a frown.

[Kadakism]

"We had snakes too. And wolves. But the wolves weren't as brave as the panthers. And the panthers weren't as brave as the boars." The boars had always scared Rowan the most. Their eyes looked dead, like they already knew when they were going to die and were just waiting for that time.

"It hurt quite a bit. Burned with fever for days. But I survived."

She had been lucky. The claws hadn't gone deep enough to cripple her. It had taken years to get back to where she could run again, and some days the scars ached quite a bit. But, as she had said, she had survived.

Up ahead something rustled. Rowan slowed down, her hand falling to the dagger on her belt as she scanned the tree line on either side of the road. A squirrel darted out from the bushes, running halfway across the road before stopping and bounding back the direction it had come from. Curious little creature.

Rowan stopped and laughed, looking over at Freya to share in the absurdity of beings o tense about a squirrel. Unknown to her however, the highwaymen were nearby, their stalking being the cause for the squirrel's exodus from the bushes in the first place.

[ladyhawkca]

Unfortunately, Freya wasn't smiling or laughing when Rowan looked at her. She had gone pale and she was now scared. Call it intuition or whatever fancy name you wanted, Freya suddenly had a nagging sense that something bad was about to happen.

"Please.. keep your dagger handy, Rowan, just in case," Freya said quietly so that only her companion could hear her.

Glancing once again at the patch of forest where the squirrel had darted from suspiciously, Freya could hear her heart as it pounded in her chest. It looked like nothing was amiss, but also everything was quiet now... and wasn't it always the calmest before a storm?

"Let's keep walking," she urged as her grip on her stick tightened. "I think we are being followed."

[Max!!]

Up above the girls...

Axindr was flying high above, out of reasonable sight for most people. Then again most people never bothered to look up. He could see everything from up on high. That did include the fact that someone was definitely following them. It was probably their targets. He also noted a fairly recent camp a little ways away in a clearing as well.

These guys had no idea what was about to hit em. Still, he wished Freya would have a little more faith in his abilities. As he thought about it more though, she'd learn very soon.