Fenris pulled up his horse as they rounded a curve and saw light ahead; a clearing, and in the middle of it, motion. Zevran stopped beside him, rising in his stirrups as he stared ahead , trying to make out what was taking place in the road ahead of them.
"Weapons at the ready," Fenris ordered the guards, loosening his own sword in its sheath; not a weapon he could easily use from horseback, and best left where it was for now. "Forward," he commanded, and they fell into formation as best they could on the narrow road, riding forward.
The motion proved to be a group of frightened horses, still tacked up, having been kept from fleeing by reason of their reins being looped around the branches of a tree at the edge of the clearing. The source of their fright was obvious; a circle of scorched and melted earth, the twisted and burnt remains of a person sprawled on the ground in the centre of it. Three other corpses littered the ground, all armoured men. To one side was a collection of packs, several opened, bread and cheese set out on a scrap of clean cloth. And two large wooden boxes; one reduced to a few smouldering scraps of wood, the other dragged off to one side, its lid closed.
Fenris was off his horse and running toward the box even before Zevran dismounted, heart pounding in his chest. He flung opened the lid, freezing for a moment as he saw the battered man strapped down inside of it, then swore. Not Anders. He looked at Zevran, worried. "Have we been following the wrong men after all?" he asked anxiously.
Zevran crouched down and quickly examined what of the man he could uncover without first unstrapping him, then strode over to the pile of backpacks and quickly dumped them out. He suddenly exclaimed happily, rising to his feet with a bundle of cloth in his hands, and shook it out. A chantry robe; one cut for a female. "I think he was here," Zevran said jubilantly, and came back over to take a second look at the man's injuries. "Most of these injuries look too well-healed to have been caused last night. Unless, of course, someone healed them."
"Anders," Fenris said, voice full of relief.
"Yes," Zevran agreed, then rose to his feet, looking around the clearing again. "If there were ten people in total, as I thought from the signs yesterday... then they are down to five now, Anders and four others. They are not here, and they did not take their horses, so..."
He turned slowly, then pointed at the undergrowth nearby. "Broken branches; you see? They went that way. On foot, because horses cannot travel easily in such thick underbrush. In fact we will have to leave our own here, if we are to follow." He paused a moment, lips pressing together for a moment as he thought. "I do not believe they can have planned to leave their belongings and horses here; something caused them to enter the bush. I must believe this means that someone – most likely Anders – fled while they were distracted in battle, and that they pursue him, trying to recapture him."
Fenris nodded. He quickly called out orders for two pairs of guards to remain behind, to care for the wounded man and bury the dead, and keep guard over their horses and everything else found here, then he and Zevran led the way into the forest, following the signs of passage.
Anders ducked under a thick tree branch, skirted a patch of closely-growing balsams, and scaled a small rock-face, hissing as the rough stone abraded his finger-tips. He flung himself down on a patch of thick moss at the top of it, feeling drained and overheated from his flight through the heavy bush and needing to stop a moment to catch his breath. He had one major advantage, he's quickly realized; dressed in simple cloth as he was, it was likely rather easier for him to travel though the forest overgrowth, especially when it came to obstacles like the rock face, than it would be for the knights in pursuit of him.
He didn't remain there long, just long enough for his heart to begin to slow from its frantic pounding, then rolled over and back to his feet, moving off along the top of the low ridge. He let himself travel at a walking pace for a while, following the ridge as it sloped up to the south, then when he came to a place where he could, turned eastwards, soon dropping back down to a small valley. A stream meandered through the trees at the bottom, heading generally north-east, the direction he wanted to go. Remembering an old trick, he sat down on the ask long enough to pull off his shoes and socks, and roll his leggings, before setting off downstream, toes curling tightly at the cold bite of the water. He supposed it must be spring-fed; such waters tended to be cold.
He stayed in the stream until his feet were aching with the cold, then climbed out again, sitting down on the bank for a moment to put his footwear back on. Spotting a clump of young cattails while he was pulling his shoes back on woke an old memory, and he paused long enough to yank a few up by the roots. He swished them around in the water to wash the mud off, then headed off again. The roots were crunchy and fibrous, with little flavour, but nutritious, and edible raw; to his half-starved body, it was ambrosial. The young greens could be eaten too, and had an almost peppery flavour. He gnawed hungrily on the plants as he strode along, feeling considerably better for having a little food in his belly.
It wasn't enough to make up for the short rations and stress of the last few days, however, nor how thoroughly he'd drained himself twice today. By the time he reached where the stream emerged from the forested valley to an area of low grass-covered hills, he was feeling exhausted and in need of rest. He moved away from the stream along the edge of the forest for a while, until he came to a fallen tree covered by a heavy overgrowth of leafy vines. He lifted the mass of vines aside, and wormed his way beneath the slanted trunk, letting the vines fall back down and conceal him.
He only meant to rest a while, but the warmth of the day and his tiredness conspired to make him fall asleep.
One of the guards proved to be experienced at tracking through forest, having been a hunter for some years before joining the guard. With him leading the way, they followed the trail the others had left with ease, even when it climbed up a steep rock face, or followed a stream bed downstream.
"How do you follow tracks in water?" Fenris asked, perplexed.
The guard glanced back at the pair of elves and grinned, then gestured at the gravel stream bed as he continued leading them. "There is a little fuzz of algae growing on the stones here; where people have walked, it has been scuffed away, and some of the gravel flipped over to show the clean underside. It is possible to use water to help hide your tracks, but only if you know how and where to step to leave little sign. Whomever we are following has made no sign to hide their passage."
Eventually the tracks re-emerged from the stream, the marks of bare and armoured feet in the mud lining the banks clear to everyone. They stopped to pull on their own boots, adding to the muddle, then set off again.
"Do you think we're any closer to them?" Fenris asked worriedly.
"Perhaps," Zevran said. "I do not think we can be all that far behind them; if we are right and they are pursuing Anders, then they are having to follow the faint tracks left by a single man who has much past experience at escaping templars. We, on the other hand, are pursuing the much more obvious tracks left by a group of heavily armoured men moving through the forest with no attempt to hide or disguise their passage. We will catch up with them, hopefully in time to prevent them from taking any regrettable actions with our mage; I doubt they will be in the best of moods after fighting a battle, loosing several men, and chasing Anders through heavy forest."
Fenris nodded. They hurried onwards, following the guardsman's lead.