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Rude images and graffiti littered the walls along the passageway. Apparently, these bandits had an artist in residence, one that liked breasts and had the vocabulary of a school child. We slowly made our way through the winding passages, with me in front, followed by Sige and Nigel in the rear. At every turn, I raised my crossbow so I could clear the corner quickly and brought it back down to cover my angles. Sige stayed close to offer support with his sword, and Nigel covered our rears and tried not to shoot me, which I appreciated.

The air grew cooler as we continued down the passage, and then we heard the tinkling of water. I turned to Sige and tapped my ears, then gave him a thumbs up. He gave a nod, and we continued our approach.

The passage opened into a cave. We could see chambers continuing in front of us and to our left, with stalagmites and rock formations creating divisions in the chamber, like rooms. We stepped into the first chamber, my crossbow tucked into my shoulder ready to fire. I pointed a finger to the left and turned to look at the other two. Nigel nodded and covered that direction while we entered. There were occasionally some crates or barrels stacked carelessly along the wall, but not much else. Each chamber seemed to have a torch or brazier lit and I wondered if desert bandits were organized enough to have a designated light person in their gang.

We left the first chamber and entered a second that was split by rocks in the middle that were too tall to see over, but we could tell it was one circular room. It was dank and foul-smelling. On a large boulder in the center we could make out dwarven runes scrawled on the rock face over a rusty, discolored spot. A skull lay smashed at the bottom on the floor. I didn’t speak or read dwarven so I ignored it and started duck-walking to the right to clear the chamber in a counter-clockwise movement.

Before I had gone far I heard Sige whisper, ‘Thja … hathorth … thali. They hate … oh that’s a name. Thali. They hate Thali.’

He seemed to be speaking to himself and I waved a hand to shut him up because I heard what sounded like a chair being pushed back across the floor. We stopped but made ready with our weapons. A surly-looking Sumadean human in leather armor came around the bend, looking curious. I shot him and he let out a weak cry before crashing to the floor. The others went around me as I reloaded, and Sige finished him off. We saw that we were in a makeshift bunkhouse. There were pallets and bedrolls, disheveled and scattered across the floor on small piles of hay.

We saw a rusty scimitar and a short bow leaning against the wall of rocks that we had just come around and figured he had heard Sige translating the graffiti. I threw him the bow so he had a ranged weapon and we continued around the corner of the chamber. It opened up into a larger cave and we kept what seemed like the main wall to our right until we reached a blind bend.

That’s when we heard the voices.

‘Listen, Cletus or whatever your name is. That is not what I agreed to pay you,’ a haughty voice said. It sounded familiar somehow, but I couldn’t quite place it with the echoes in the cave.

‘It’s Brutus,’ a low voice replied, sourly.

‘I don’t really care. I paid you to get the girl and get the package. We agreed on a price, and you will …’ the voice was muffled somewhat.

‘Listen, cupcake. No one talks to me like that, understand? Not in my own place, not ever. I’ve killed men for less,’ the voice named Brutus said, with a low growl.

We looked at each other. If Brutus was the leader of these bandits, he wasn’t the mastermind behind the kidnapping of the girl or the ambush. Just a hired thug. That meant the other voice was calling the shots, for now. I crept closer to the turn in the passageway to hear better. But in so doing I grew too focused and stopped checking our flank.

And that was where we messed up.

I saw a flash of movement to my left and began to pivot the business end of my crossbow toward it. Sige yelped, while another voice called out in alarm. Three Fangs were coming at us with blades drawn. I managed to get a bolt off at the one in the lead and then let my crossbow drop with its sling around me while I pulled out my saber. The others kept coming, one at Sige and the other at Nigel. They were full-size, with drawn faces, and had overbites like orcs, but they were more man-like in the rest of their features. I thought later maybe they were quarter-orcs or something. One came down with an axe that Sige just barely dodged, while another swung at Nigel with a scimitar. I turned my back to the bend in the chamber and made weak contact with my saber, drawing blood from the left arm of the brute fighting Sige.

The three of us fought hard and Sige managed to pull his dagger from his belt, but his wrist was quickly pinned against the wall by the bandit. Nigel was struggling the worst; he wasn’t a fighter, he was a rancher who was rarely ever in a fight, but he had that farmer strength and the bandit fighting him was equally struggling.

While Sige occupied the arms of the one attacking him I took my saber and sliced it across his stomach, letting out a spray of blood. He let go of Sige’s arms and clutched at his abdomen with a hand before stumbling backward onto the ground. Sige finished him off and we turned our attention to Nigel’s bandit and then everything went dark and my headache came back.

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This is part seven of “Love’s Sendero.” Click here to read the next part. If you like these free stories, please subscribe. If you REALLY liked them, please consider leaving me a tip by purchasing it on Kindle for .99 (the cost for 1/3 of a cup of coffee).