Eritance - Chapter 31

The hooded figure silently moved through the forest. Normally we wouldn’t have felt that it was our business to check up on what other people were doing in the night, but they had come out of a secret back door from the inn that we worked at. We had never seen someone sneak in or out of the inn before. It was highly suspicious.

Who knows if this person had stolen something or hurt one of the workers. It would be better to follow them to get a better idea of what was going on. We tailed them at a suitable distance paying extra caution to our surroundings so that we wouldn’t accidentally step on a branch or a leaf and alert them to our presence.

We followed the hooded figure for around an hour as they ran through the forest. We were beginning to think that this pursuit was a waste of time, as we were getting further and further away from the village. Tomorrow wasn’t our day off, so the longer we spent chasing the hooded figure, the less time we would have to rest before work tomorrow. It wouldn’t affect me so much due to my increased stamina, but it would have a negative effect on Ciara.

Just as I was about to tell her that we should turn back the figure stopped and walked into a clearing. In the clearing there were two other hooded figures that were there. We decided to watch from the bushes to see what was going on. There was definitely some kind of conspiracy going on here.

What was it though? Were they bandits? Assassins? Thieves? What was the connection between the Blue Sparrow and the hooded figures here?

After some muffled words were exchanged the figure that we had chased through the forest pulled out two large bags. These bags had a faint clinking sound as they were passed from the hands of the hooded figure to one of the others. There was only one thing I could think of that could be in those bags. It had to be the money from the inn.

“Thieves” Ciara gasped. “What should we do?”. “We owe it to Hans to try and get his money back” I said quickly. Just as I was about to jump forward Ciara grabbed my arm. “Don’t be stupid. We don’t even have any weapons. You may be stronger, but there are three of them, and they don’t look like ordinary thieves. We need a strategy to think of this. You can’t always go rushing in to battle” she said admonishing me.

“There’s no time! We have to act now” I said as I darted forward. I came crashing through the brush and rushed towards the figures. One shouted out in surprise as they heard my crashing towards them. I barreled into the one that we had been tailing from the inn and then spun around to face the other two figures.

One stood still and the other pulled out a short sword. I rushed towards the one with the sword and copied a move from Ciara. I jumped forward in to a roll and struck out with my fist as I went by. I figured with my strength I could crush their leg and take them out of the battle, but they were quite nimble. They jumped out of the way with and regained their stance with a flip.

I charged at them again tried to grab them with my strong hands, but they ducked underneath them into a roll. Before completing that roll, they kicked back with their legs and hit me on the back of my knee, this caused my knee to buckle and I stumbled to the ground.

Before I could get up, the stranger was behind with a sword pressed to my throat. I instantly began regretting not listening to Ciara’s idea to plan our attack first. “I see you haven’t gotten any better at fighting” a familiar voice softly spoke. “. Valera?” I asked. As soon as I said it the sword left my throat.

I slowly got up and turned around. I was right, it was Valera. I could see her clearly now that she had taken her hood off. The other figure took their hood off as well, it was Apollos. “What-but why are you two robbing the Blue Sparrow? How can you say you’re a group for justice when you go in and steal money from the people you say you want to liberate?” I asked suspiciously.

“That’s because I wasn’t being robbed” another voice rang out as the third figure sat up with a groan. It was Hans. “What’s going on?” I asked quite shocked. “First, tell your friend she can come out from the bushes and then we’ll explain” Apollos said. With that Ciara awkwardly came forward from the brush, not knowing how they had known she was there.

Apollos then proceeded to explain that they weren’t robbing the Blue Sparrow, but that the Blue Sparrow was one of the many fronts for the underground resistance movement throughout the empire. “There can be know rebellion without funds” he started, “so we run all sorts of different businesses to earn money to support our operations”.

I guess it all made sense. No wonder there was a secret exit from the inn, if the empire found out about the inn’s true purpose, they would definitely try to kill Hans, so having a secret exit wasn’t too far-fetched.

“Since we’re all here together, have you given anymore thought to joining us? We’re always looking for more recruits to help further the cause” Apollos said. “I’m still not interested in getting into your political battles” I said. “As long as I don’t get involved it won’t affect me”. “Oh, but it already has” Hans interjected. “What do you mean it already has?” I asked.

“Didn’t you say that your village had been attacked by an orc chieftain looking for a relic?”