White hot fury blinded me. “Give it back,” I demanded.
He was silent for a minute, staring at the necklace now resting in his palm. Finally, he declared a steely, “No.” His haughty tone ensured his death.
“Now,” I insisted.
Ignoring me, he pulled his hood back so he could better inspect the pendants. With a quick turn of his head and flash of teeth, he smiled at me, although it looked all wrong from where I hung. “This is a very rare piece,” he noted. “Wherever did you get it?”
“From the pits of Denamon. It’s cursed. You’d better give it back to me before your hands turn to ash and your manhood melts.”
“What threats,” he grinned. He looked to his fellow bandits. “She’s a feisty one, isn’t she? If she hadn’t walked into your traps, I dare say you might have had a fight on your hands.”
“Give it to me or you’ll regret laughing,” I hissed.
He stared at me for a long while, taking in my upside-down features. Then, seeming to find me lacking in some way, he swept out his foot and kicked my satchel, then Oliver’s, over to his friends. “Take them both,” he ordered. “Who knows what other cursed objects we’ll find inside.”
“I shall hunt you down,” I called after him as they started to walk away. “You shall rue the day you stole something from me!”
Arrick glanced back with a smirk, his hood covering every part of his face but that bloody smile. “That shall be hard to do,” he laughed. “Since more than likely the savage beasts that roam these parts will find you before help does.”
The three men disappeared into the shadows of the forest while Oliver and I hung helplessly in midair. I let out a scream of frustration that followed after them when I couldn’t.
As soon as they were gone, Oliver stopped praying. I turned to him. “Now what?”
But he had already started moving. His rope swung back and forth, creaking in protest, while he lifted his torso up until he could reach into his boot. He managed to grab a small dagger before dropping back down again.
“Wherever did that come from?” I asked. It would have been nice to know he had a plan.
“It didn’t seem prudent before.”
“Prudent?” I couldn’t believe him! “He stole my necklace, Oliver! My satchel! Please explain the definition of prudency to me because clearly I don’t understand it!”
He paused in his strained efforts to cut his legs free from the thick rope holding him aloft. “I could hardly fight off three men with a dagger of this size, while you hung there like a damsel in distress, now could I? Better to let them think they’ve gotten away with something so we can follow after them.”
He had a point.
I hated it when he had a point.
“Fine,” I conceded. “But hurry up!”
He gave me another weary glare before he got to work on his legs once more. In no time he’d cut himself down, landing with a thud on the blanket of leaves and mud below. In another few minutes he’d cut me free and I’d collected myself from the ground. Slower than I would have liked, I worked feeling back into my legs and cleared my head of the dizziness as my blood returned to its natural course.
I leapt to my sword, which the rebels had left behind, and Oliver did the same. The blades appeared weak and poorly made. Which was the intention of the Brothers that fashioned them. And probably the reason the rebels hadn’t bothered to take them.
“This was not how I envisioned our peaceful quest back to your homeland,” he admitted.
“Are you ready, Oliver the Silent?”
He nodded. “Your satchel is necessary. I shall do what I must.”
“Then prepare to get bloody.”
7
Although we had managed to lose ourselves in the maze of the Tellekane Forest, we were not totally inept at tracking. The Brothers had been relentless in our training and our schooling had gone far beyond bookish learning.
The Brotherhood of Silence was proficient in three areas of discipline: Scholarship, self-discipline, and weaponry, with an emphasis on espionage. Heprin was a peaceful country without a national army. Yet, the Brotherhood and their unyielding training ensured that the country was not entirely defenseless.
And even if we hadn’t been proficient in tracking, it wouldn’t have taken long for us to catch up with the three rebels. They were not exactly quiet as they tromped through the woods singing their own praises.
I moved with all the stealth I was capable of as I trailed Oliver closely. His nickname had been earned for a reason. Oliver had the uncanny ability to move without making a sound.
The closer we got to the bandits, the faster my heart beat. My breath quickened, catching every once in a while as I attempted to even it out.
This would be my first real encounter with combat. I had trained since the day Father Garius had taken over my charge. But I had never fought anyone that didn’t have my best interest in mind.
We followed at a safe distance behind the rebels, carefully picking our way closer so we could strike. We moved deeper into the forest, sliding around trees as thick as houses and over snaking roots,
When the temperature dropped enough to pull goose flesh from my skin, I let my nerves ring their warning bells in my head. Had we gone too far? Should we have made our move sooner?
“Psst!”
Oliver glared back at me, but I held my ground with wide eyes. “Enough!” I mouthed. I gave a pointed look at the men laughing at their good fortune in the distance. “We need to finish this,” I whispered. “Now.”
He looked up gauging our surroundings, the thickening fog and the three rebels. He nodded once and we crept closer to our prey.
We slunk between the trees, pressing our backs against the giant trunks before slithering around to swiftly
