Behind the Ogra-Ki, the lean bandit sneaks towards him with his rusty sword upraised… but he’s forgotten the Summer-mage now standing behind him.

The healer may be an old man with a wispy beard, but he swings the gnarled staff like someone as young as the bandit and cracks it alongside the young man’s knee. The bandit yowls and drops his sword, falling to the ground then staggering back up as the healer delivers his next blow to the young bandit’s backside. 

“Bad child,” the old man yells, his hair shining like polished gold in the sun as the bandit grabs his backside and yowls again. I wait for the old man to wield his power, but all he does is crack the young bandit across his backside a second time. “Bad child,” he yells again and raises his staff for another blow.

The bandit squalls and staggers away, holding his arse with one hand as he calls out over his shoulder, “I’m sorry, Grandfather,” the young bandit looking at the old man and not where he’s going as he calls out again, “I’m sorry, Grandfather, I’m…” He turns his head and smacks face first into a tree. The young bandit bounces off the wood, twirls once, and collapses to the ground where he lays still.

I laugh out loud as my attention turns towards the left of the bandit leader’s rock. The lady knight is like a she-wolf among dogs, feinting with a head cut at a ragged bandit, who raises a rusty sword to block, then dropping her blade to take him across the stomach. Clutching his belly he falls as the knight’s sword swings upward to block a broad-axe plummeting down at her head. 

Sparks fly as the axe is knocked away, and in a deft motion she hooks one foot behind the bandit’s ankle as she throws her weight against his chest. The bandit staggers, almost falling as his broad-axe flails about, and the lady knight drives the tip of her katana into the bandits face. He drops the axe as she pulls out her sword, red and yellow gore following her blade as the bandit drops to the ground.

An arrow pings as it glances off her shoulder armor and she turns, dropping to the dirt a moment before an arrow giving off red sparks and a hail of icy spikes hiss as they pass the place she’d just been standing. Several guards without her family flag cry out as the icy darts strike or fly past, one unlucky man catching the arrow in his chest. 

It explodes, showering the woods with gobbets of bloody flesh as the guard staggers a few steps and falls. The knight seems unperturbed as she rises to her feet. “Tiny and I will take care of the mages,” she calls out without looking backwards, her attention focused on the flat outcropping of rock. “The rest of you go after the bandits.”

Most of the guards turn and continue running up the slope at the ragged men waving rusty weapons or desperately trying to reload their heavy crossbows, but I notice her squires are hanging back with concerned looks on their faces as the Ogra-Ki picks up the great axe from the ground. He turns towards the rock and the Young Lord’s head whips from side to side as he takes in both threats. “Tarko,” the leader calls out in a worried voice, “I need you.”

From beneath the leader’s rock an oily voice calls out, “Always at your service, my lord,” and my mood darkens like a shadow across the sun as one of the Daemo crawls out and gets to its feet.