Everyone stared at the approaching shadows. Except for the sound of hooves pounding against the dirt, James grinding his teeth together and Richard breathing through his nose, nothing could be heard. Not even the wind stirred as it waited for what would happen next.
Gwen was the first to snap out of it, yanking Quinn's sleeve and tapping a hand to James's arm. "Trees. Now."
Despite her command, she all but had to drag them off the road with her. James was the first to shake his head, straighten his back and nearly carry Richard along with them. Quinn almost tripped before he came to his senses and followed the others into the woods.
Covered in the darkness of the leaves once more, Gwen didn't wait for her eyes to adjust, instead trudging on with her arms in front of her. Her fingers found the bark of a tree and she stepped around it. James was right behind her with Richard in tow.
"Isn't it all right if we hide here?" Quinn whispered as he stepped over an outstretched tree root. "Wait 'til they've passed?"
The half-elf shook her head. "If we saw them, then they saw us. We have to get away from the road."
Nobody said a word after that. Instead they made their way deeper into the forest, with Gwen leading them in a diagonal line away from the path. Just in case the humans tried to follow them.
She did not know for how long they waded through the shrubs and moved around tree trunks. It didn't take long before everybody's breathing had become laboured. She saw the sweat glistening on the skins of her companions whenever she looked back to check if the group was still complete. The wind refused to blow, denying them any coolness.
Just when the half-elf opened her mouth, intent on letting them stop and catch their breaths for a short while, a different sound had her stopping in her tracks. Quinn all but crashed into her, cursing loudly as his hands found her shoulders in an attempt to keep her steady.
"Woman!" he shouted. He inhaled sharply, ready to yell the next thing, but she held a hand in front of his mouth.
Before she could explain, the barking returned. This time it was closer and louder and it made Quinn's face grow pale. His lips trembled against her palm. Voices of men yelling and horses whinnying as they were guided through the thick growth of the forest accompanied the noise this time.
"Run!" Gwen hissed before she took off again, her companions hot on her heels. Even so, she knew they were doomed. There was no way they could outrun dogs. In the panic that took hold of her, she couldn't think straight. What should they do? What could they do?
The moment they reached a small clearing within the rows of trees, James flung Richard to the ground in front of him and unsheathed his sword. Without asking what he was doing, she and Quinn released their bows.
"Get behind a tree," the human commanded as he did just that while dragging Richard behind him with one hand. The others did as he told them, their bows trained on the side of the clearing where they had just come from.
Gwen held her breath and concentrated on the spot at which the tip of her arrow pointed. Vaguely she wondered if they had enough arrows for this, but the choking panic halted when she breathed out through her mouth. At the corners of her mind, she sensed the stinging of the cuts on her wrists while they tried to bleed through the blanket of calm she had dragged over herself. Even so, she managed to push the pain away.
And then the world around her came crashing down once more when a hound launched itself from the bushes, followed by two others. One of them struck the ground before it could land, an arrow sticking out of its chest. Without thinking, Gwen pulled another arrow from her make-shift quiver.
Quinn's arrow, on the other hand, missed its mark, and how could it not? He had barely ever touched a weapon in his life. Gwen did not know why she had made him one in the first place.
She could not further contemplate the thought, since James rushed towards the animals with his sword raised. The first one to snap its teeth at him received a blow to the chest. The cut wasn't enough to kill the beast, but it stopped its assault and slinked off with a pitiful whine.
Seeing one of its companions dead on the ground and another fleeing with its tail between its legs, the last dog did not even try to attack James and sped off instead. It did not take a genius to figure out these animals had only been trained for search efforts, not combat.
That didn't matter, though. Only a few moments later, a horse burst forth from between the trees. Already throwing its head up and stepping around while whinnying nervously, the smell of blood only worsened the horse's anxiety. The soldier sitting on its back tried to hold the reigns steady and ready his sword at the same time, but he couldn't quite get his mount under control again.
Another horseman appeared behind him, this one on a dark stallion whose shoulders probably were taller than Gwen herself. Its coat shone in what little sunlight managed to make its way into the clearing.
It mattered none to James, who did not allow any of them to regain their bearings. Gwen followed suit, aiming at the mounted men. From the corner of her eye, she noted Quinn doing the same.
The half-elf managed to hit the soldier riding a palomino gelding in the shoulder. The force of the blow, combined with the antsy behaviour of his mount, caused him to lose his balance. He fell to the ground with a yell, his armour clinking when he hit the ground. Now free, his horse whinnied and threw its head up before trotting off.
Ignoring the guard on the stallion, James stalked over towards the fallen human, who struggled to get up again. From deeper into the forest, voices shouting indicated that more soldiers were on their way. More arrows soared through the air, but they missed the man on the stallion as he tried to close the distance between himself and the large man.
James's shoulders hunched and he lifted his sword without even glancing in the direction of the horse charging at him. Then he slid it into the downed man's chest with ease. Blood cascaded out of the guard's mouth and when his killer pulled his weapon free, he sagged back, as though his spine had disappeared.
The man on the black stallion roared, holding his own blade ready. Cursing her lack of a sword, Gwen held her breath. She knew that yelling would not help when it came to James. Her friend beside her refused to stay quiet, however, and called out the other man's name, but to no avail.
In the end, Quinn's yelling hadn't been necessary. James raised his sword almost in a casual manner, as though he weren't quite paying attention to the matter at hand, and caught the blow of his attacker without breaking a sweat.
A yell came from somewhere to the right. Although Gwen ignored it and kept her bow trained on the man on the horse, from the corner of her eye she saw Quinn look past her in the direction of the cry. At first, somewhere at the back of her mind, she thought that it might have been one of the dogs yelping again.
A moment later, however, a human rushed out of the bushes from the opposite direction, stumbling and holding his hands out in front of him as though he were praying. It then took Gwen a few more moments to recognise the person for who he was.
"Richard?!" Quinn muttered and lowered his bow.
Gwen cursed before she darted out from behind her tree. At this rate, the man would trip into the battle and get caught between the clashing blades. No matter how irritating she might find him, the half-elf did not want him dying just yet.
The stallion cried out as it reared, its front hooves kicking out at James, who moved out of the way with a speed that his large body belied. Even so, by now his shoulders had begun to heave, the fabric of his tunic darkening with his sweat.
On the other side of the scene, Richard neared the two of them. Gritting her teeth, the half-elf pressed on. Each time her foot hit the ground, it sent a shock through her body, but she pushed through it. If he got tangled up in the fight…
Clinging to his horse's back, the guard raised his sword once more. He most likely planned on using the moment to his advantage, but his eyes widened when he caught sight of Richard half running, half stumbling towards them. The blond opened his mouth several times and tried to call out, but all that came out were gasps and grunts.
Even James turned ever so slightly and used the distraction to catch his breath. Gwen hoped it was enough for her to reach the damned humans in time, but even as she came close enough that, if she had launched herself, she could have tackled them, Richard placed himself between James and the stallion.
He tried to spread his arms but was hindered by his bound hands. Instead, he settled on squaring his shoulders and planting his feet wide apart, his chin in the air. Even from where she was, Gwen could see that his blue eyes were hard and filled with defiance.
"Stop!" he called out, but to Gwen's ears his voice sounded garbled and distorted.
She saw James's head follow the human as if someone had cast a spell on them that slowed down time. The guard pulled the reigns of his horse, making it take a couple of steps back even as its two front hooves remained in the air. A drop of sweat slid off of James's forehead and shone as it flew through the air. A ray of sunlight blinded her as it was reflected off his raised blade.
Richard's hair swayed to and fro as the stallion's hooves barely missed him.
His head jerked back and a trail of saliva left his mouth, joining James's sweat on his skin. Specks of red mingled with the spit and left tiny dots on the human's tunic. More red joined them when James jolted and tugged his sword back as if he was surprised by what he had done.
But what had he done? Gwen's mind refused to work yet again, leaving her with a blank mind.
Richard staggered forward and reached out for James with wide eyes and furrowed brows. Dust sprung high into the air when he hit the ground with a thud.
A scream from behind her broke the spell and only then did she realise that she stood still, her hands poised to grab one of the men despite the fact that she wasn't yet close enough to do so.
In front of her, James took two more steps, swung his blade in a sideways arch, and cut the soldier's hand clean off. As the man cried out and slipped off his mount, James brought his weapon down once more, his face red and his teeth bared. The human's head joined his hand on the floor beside Richard's twitching body, spraying those nearby with blood. The stallion roared once more and dashed off, kicking up a cloud of dust as it went.
Without tearing her gaze from the scene before her, Gwen sensed rather than saw Quinn rush by her. Towards the catastrophe surrounding James, who had dropped his sword to the ground and had placed his hands behind his head. He stared down at the bodies on the ground in front of him as if he couldn't quite believe what he had done.
"What… Why… How…?!" Quinn wailed as he tried to roll Richard onto his back. He was gasping and covered in blood, and the paleness of his face said enough. The blues of his eyes offered an even starker contrast now.
James did not have an answer for any of Quinn's questions.
The moment of reprieve was cut short when the new shouts and cries from before returned, louder this time. They would have to mourn and process whatever had happened here some other moment.
Pushing the sight of Richard's body from her mind, Gwen lifted her bow again and aimed at the bushes from where the hounds and horses had burst from before.
"No," Quinn croaked as he stood up before he reached down for James's blade. "Gwen, you've gotta get outta here. You saw how many there were."
The half-elf stared at her friend's back, slack-jawed. "What are you… There's no way—"
"Go!" he yelled without turning around. "You've got somethin' to ask Iorveth, don't you?"
Why?
But… did that really matter right now? In the face of death? Would she rather satisfy her own pain than be beside her friend at a time like this?
Before she could respond, he shooed James away as well. "I'm not doin' this for you. Someone like you doesn't deserve to be treated like a human. A Witcher'd fit you just fine. But at least get her out of here. Get her home."
By the sound of the approaching clamour, the soldiers would enter the clearing any moment now. They would see the scene before them, and they would…
James nodded before he moved towards Gwen, who dug her heels into the ground at the sight of him approaching her.
"I'm not leaving!" she yelled, but before she could reach out towards her friend – no, her brother – let alone take a step towards him, James had grabbed her by the arm and had started dragging her away from him.
She scratched at him with her nails, kicked at him, slapped him, tried to sink her teeth into his skin, all the while crying out for Quinn, but the human would not let up. Not when the horses had surely burst through the bushes, or when the soldiers must have realised what had happened, or when the battle finally began, or when Quinn fell to the mud beside Richard, surrounded by nothing but enemies.
Only when another elf appeared before them and yanked them up into the trees did he stop carrying her along with him.
And only then did she stop calling out Quinn's name and instead tried to stifle her wails by burying her face into Ivor's chest.