Chapter 9: Rabbit season

I called to the ladies in the house to come out and assist the slaver with the sliced leg and bring some rawhide to tie up the one that was knocked out. The rest I was sure were dead or almost dead. Kira brought me my scabbard and some bread.

I pointed to the unconscious slaver; "Thanks. Make sure that you tie his wrists and his ankles tightly, if he starts to wake let me know if you haven't finished tying him up yet." I walked over to the slaver with the massive gash across his left leg. He was balled up trying to hold his leg while he was muttering to himself.

As I approached he looked up at me in fear. "I will only ask once; where is the rest of your band holding up?" He mumbled something, and when I went to bend over to hear him better he thrust his dagger at me. Luckily for me, he thrust across his body and didn't wait until he had reach, so his attack fell short. I jumped back, drew my sword and slashed him shallowly across the left arm.

"Would you like to lose a hand next? Now throw the knife away and tell me where they are." I said deadpan. It really didn't feel right to torture the idiot but I wanted to get the people out of the slavers' clutches. "Now, speak before something really bad happens to you."

He paused for a second, so I threatened him with my sword again. That was enough for him to throw away his dagger. "They ... are over by the shore of the lake waiting for us."

"How many slavers and how many captives?"

"Four of us and a gross of them."

"You do know that if I you are lying to me that the little old grandma over there will carve you up and I bet that she can keep you alive for a long time. Are you sure that you have your information correct or is grandma going to have to practice her mule skinning on you?"

"Five." He nearly shouted, "Five of them."

"Better. Now roll over and put your hands behind your back and let her tie you up. Who knows, she might even fix those gashes in your arm and leg so that you don't lose them."

I waited for him to comply and motioned for Kira to come over and tie him up since she was done with the first. I looked around for Grandma Kira and went to her.

"I'm going after the rest of the fuckers; they are near the lake waiting for these idiots to come back. What is the best route to get to the lake from here and will you two be safe from five of these morons if I fail?"

"You can take that trail over there; we use it to go swimming."

"How long on foot if I run?"

"You? About a third of a candlemark."

"How many candlemarks in a day?"

"Ten." She responded with an honest expression for the first time with me, it was one of speculation.

It felt like a twenty four hour day, divided by ten would give me two point four hours and a third of twenty four was eight. Point eight of sixty was forty eight minutes.

"Thanks, I'll be back in a while. Be safe." I grabbed a fistful of dirt and rubbed it into my face and hands on my way to the trail. As soon as I hit the trail I started a mile-eating, controlled pace. I followed the path for a half hour and then stepped off of it. I continued in the same direction but kept a distance from the trail. I felt that I was pretty good at making as little noise as possible as I followed it to the lake.

I didn't need to be as quiet as I was, I could hear the raping of the captives a good distance away. Unfortunately for them I just couldn't rush in and break it up. I had to circle the camp trying to account for everyone. I was getting angrier and angrier before I noticed that I was steaming and kneeled to try to calm down. Letting my emotions take over was a good way to die. It took me a minute or so to come anywhere near calm. I found two on watch, one eating and two obviously in different tents with two different women. There was also a large group of women and children chained and staked to the ground nearby.

Damn, this is going to be messy.

I chose a path from the nearest sentry to the second, drew my sword and dropped my scabbard as I charged through the first startled sentry on my way to the second. The second one must have heard me because he turned to look in my direction before I decapitated him. He was breathing in to yell but I cut it off. I continued circling behind the one that was eating; I saw that he was turning around to look to see what the noise was. I chopped his head off also. His head fell into the fire causing sparks to fly and I didn't even give it a second glance.

OK, maybe I'm not as centered as I thought. I'm pissed at these fuckers.

I boldly tossed aside the flap of the closest tent and thrust into the man that was on top of a crying woman. He flopped on her and I quickly backed out of the tent and went to the next one, opened the flap. This bastard was facing me while he was taking his want from the woman under him. He went to say something when rage boiled through me and I cut his head in half through the eyes. It was pretty gruesome.

Thank Goddess for a magical sword.