Loyalty Trial (PT pt3) - Jeon-e, Mer, Valentine

The night sky above them made them feel like it was pressing on them, a punishment instead of a blessing, suffocating instead of freeing as they were fleeing with no light to guide them. The sky that should have been their guide in the night had no stars and no light to light the path in front of them, as opposed to the reddish hues they could still see in the distance from the city they had just left. Their flee from the city was aided just by that, by the knowledge that the lights should always stay at their back, and they knew they were going in the right direction only because the sand below their feet quickly (and luckly) soon became grass once again. The sand had started a couple kilometers before reaching the port that would bring them to Thedale, a natural delimitation to complement the various signs that pointed towards the nearest cities in both directions, and they were so glad to see those signs and to feel this grass under their feet as they crossed back into the valleys of the inner parts of Vitalus.
The relief was short lived anyway, just a ray of hope that their pursuers would give up and not want to leave the outer parts of the city, but it still was something to them. Something of a reassurance, that they had travelled far enough, that they could maybe take turns helping each other to a floating island and rest for a while, hidden from the bandits that had been following them. The open valley made them feel exposed, sparse trees and low bushes where danger could hide in, but the knowledge that they knew the territory and had some way to escape if worse came to be made them have hope.

Jeon-e kept glancing back, her attention fully on the sounds around them, her mouth closed so her own labored breath wouldnt distract her. She'd been careful, and she had tried to guide the others to the safer routes the guide listed, but they still got ambushed on their way out of the city and she had been plagued with guilt during the whole escape. She couldn't do anything to prevent it, nothing more than what was already done, but she still felt awful about it. So she was focusing all her attention on the sound in her surroundings, of catching any signs that they were still being pursued early, so she could spare her companions more pain than the one already endured.

Near her Mer walked with his head low, his muzzle to the ground, his mouth also closed but his nose sniffing wildly as he tried to find the scent that they for sure had left hours ago, when they had traversed these open fields hours earlier, when everything wasn't so fucked and they weren't fleeing from danged. He was slightly ahead of them all, but he hadn't caught their scent yet, so they were half walking half running around blindly, trusting they would get somewhere.

Valentine was in the back, his pace slower. He was carrying everything they owned as they were fleeing. They had their weight split evenly when they entered the city, but once they left it and got attacked? Bags were thrown around, lunges and bites were exchanged, and when they realized that they were losing? It did not matter who had more and who had less weight, what mattered was getting out of there fast, with or without their supplies. So they had run, and while Jeon-e, Mer, Taha and Canna were all busy fighting for their life, he and Rehan got everything they could and booked it.

Rehan had been a vayron they had met in the city, and when they got attacked the five reos all looked at him with betrayal in their eyes, but they soon realized that he, too, was not joking around anymore and was in fact terrorized beyond relief like them. So they had listened to him while he spouted who the bandits were, and they had taken his warnings to heart when he told them they were dangerous, but they still chose to engage and they paid the price for it.

And now they were running, with Valentine and Rehan holding everything they owned, Jeon-e and Mer trying to find a way, and Taha and Canna?

They got the worst of it. The fight had been brutal, and Taha was the most aggressive of them all, the biggest threat, the biggest reos on account of being a haedian, so she had tried to rain hell on the bandits and now she had paid the price the worst of them all. Her wings were folded tightly against her back, but they rustled now and then as her muscles cramped and hurt from overuse, and the lacerations all over them made it hell to keep them closed but the pain of their overuse made them even worse to hold them open, so she trudged on and did not complain, even if one of them was probably strained and even if her legs hurt, because she was not the one that had it worse.

Canna was the one that had been in danger, they had gotten her out by a miracle, with Jeon-e and Rehan sweeping in while Valentine kept the bandits at bay with Mer, but she was injured. They had strapped her against Taha's back, with the harness they used to strap their bags, quickly and as secure as possible while fleeing, but the harness dug both on her body and on Taha's as she walked, and they would have to stop soon to check on her. Canna had got hurt in the leg, a nasty scrape that kept gushing blood even now, staining her and Taha's fur and sticking it together, and as she was trying to assess the damage she had been hit straight in the head by one of the bandits falling on top of her, making her land on her back and hit her head on one of the few rocks that was out there in the sand. They had her up and on Taha's back fast enough for them to run away, but it had been a bloody scene and they were all covered in blood, Jeon-e on her front while she dragged Canna up Taha's back, and Rehan all over his front, paws and legs as he held her steady and fixed her leg while Jeon-e closed the last straps, his white coat now a dark red and his reddish spots almost completely blended in. His loose face fur was all dry and frazzled, and the tie that held it together was nowhere to be seen.

It had been a close call, and while they had escaped, they wouldn't call themselves lucky with two injured companions and no idea of where the way home was, no idea of where *help* was. Four of them were mostly unscathed, with Jeon-e, Mer, Valentine and Rehan tired and roughed up, scraped and bloody but not their own, Canna was breathing, unconscious but whimpering in her state, Taha could still walk even if her wings were hurt, they were ok. They were running away.

Only, as they were running, as the silence stretched between them in their concentration and the tense atmosphere, everything came to an halt as Canna let out the most gut wrenching and pained sound they had ever heard. She was waking up, and they all stopped and went to check on her, all surrounding Taha's back while Canna trashed on it, still in fight of flight mode, still in the battle between them and the bandits.

"Canna!" Jeon-e half shouted. She knew they should be stealthy, knew the risk of making themselves noticed by being careless, but Canna was panicking hard, and they had to stop her before she hurt herself.

Luckily, Mer and Valentine knew it as well, and they all grabbed her limbs, with Mer holding gently the paw of the leg with the open wound, immobilizing it so the wound would not open once again if she kicked.

Jeon-e watched Rehan then, and he approached as well, going to Canna's face and nudging it, trying to jolt her into calm by touching her reassuringly instead of violently, and she calmed down. Canna opened her eyes, her vision spinning ad her confusion evident in the "Huh?" she let out, sounding drunk with nothing in her body making her so.

"She's burning up" Rehan said, while Jeon-e, Valentine and Mer let Canna's limbs go once they were sure she would not try to free herself. "Her leg is getting infected and it's making her feverish."

Taha's teeth ground together "Check her leg, we can afford to stop. I don't care if we have to fight again" she said, rage bubbling under the surface at the thought of one of her companions' condition getting worse while in her care. She lowered herself to the ground, making it easier for the others to reach Canna, even if it put her in a vulnerable position if they were to be attacked.

Mer scanned around them, eyes darting left and right, a guard ready to sound the alarm. It was necessary, stopping in the middle of the open field could be a recipe for disaster.

"Rehan, come here, let me check the bag on your left, there should be bandages in it. Jeon-e, can you check the ones on me? I don't know whose bag i grabbed but in Mer's there should be a disinfectant." Valentine said, and Rehan approached him and gave him his flank.

"Let's get closer to Canna, so i can look the wound over and see if it's still bleeding" said Rehan, and he was right to ask so, because Canna had darker fur on her thighs, and he had to nudge the long fur away from where it was crusted over to see the extent of the damage. "It's still bleeding" he said, apprehensive.

Jeon-e growled and stepped away from Valentine, forgetting momentarily about the disinfectant, and Mer as well glanced back and whimpered. She approached Canna and saw that Taha was straining to see what they all were staring at. The tear was worse than they were expecting, the edges inflamed and swollen, the skin pulsating with her heartbeat. All the while, a slow trail of blood kept leaking from it. There was no pus in the wound, but that didn't mean that there was no infection. Once the wound scabbed over, the bacteria in it would multiply and start leaking it soon enough.

Mer’s apprehension was palpable as he looked at it over. “We can’t wait till Hoius to treat this, she will keep getting worse."

"She might bleed out" Taha said, her tone curt, voicing the fear they all had but nobody wanted to say out loud.

"Let's keep searching for the disinfectant" Valentine said, pulling out a roll of bandages and a clean cloth. Rehan started moving the fur with his mouth, trying to pry from the wound any hair that got in it and trying to expose the extent of the damage.

Mer went back to his guard role and Jeon-e went back to her search, producing from the bag on Valentine's side a blue glass jar. As she opened it, the smell of herbs and mint hit the air, the smell of it pungent enough to burn their nostrils and comforting enough to soothe their worries.

Without hesitation, Rehan took hold once again of Canna's leg, and Jeon-e dumped the whole jar on Canna's leg, top to bottom, trying to cover the wound. Canna, as expected, whimpered at the burning ad tried to drag away her leg, but Rehan kept it firm in position. Slowly, Canna's body relaxed, and Rehan could release the leg as the disinfectant did it's job, burning away the bacteria and cooling the skin where it was inflamed.

Valentine ripped a strip of bandage from the roll, while Rehan took hold of the cloth and covered the wound with it. With Jeon-e's help, they wrapped Canna's leg, making sure the bandage did not touch the skin and that no part of the wound was exposed to the air from under the cloth.

“We need to keep moving,” Mer said, urgently. “It's too far to see, but there's lights in the distance. They could be in the city, but it's better if we don't wait to find out." The words settled over them like a curse.

Jeon-e nodded slowly, forcing herself to focus. “Let's go” she said while shoving the bandages back in Valentine's bag.

Taha did not wait and rose to her feet, supported on the side by Rehan and Mer so she would not lose balance. Canna on her back was making it hard to keep her weight centered, but it was necessary.

With Canna’s leg treated as best as they could manage, they started walking, keeping a faster pace than before. They had rested a little bit, even if it was not proper rest, they would push themselves once more, so they could be safe by the time morning came.

Rehan spoke as they moved "They target tourists. The bandits, i mean. They're known to the locals, and they usually avoid messing with the locals. Tourists, on the other hand? Free reign. Nobody will complain if someone from the pompous inner cities get's roughed up a little."

Taha growled and looked at him, poison in her eyes. "So what, you're letting them free just because they don't hurt the locals? What kind of vayrons are you, to think of yourselves so high and mighty that you think other cities' reos deserve to be attacked?"

"I did not know they would show up there, and neither did Canna, and you were traveling with her!" Rehan shouted, and the loud "shhh" that he got in return from Mer and Jeon-e was harsh enough to make him lower his ears instinctively. "We try to save as many as we can, but we're just citizens, we dont control the justice system".

Jeon-e's nose scrunched, and Taha snorted, clearly pissed off. They still kept moving.
The valley stretched in front of them, the trees becoming denser and the islands as well. They were slowly but surely getting further away from the port city, and the lights at their back were disappearing in the dark sky, no longer visible under the horizon. The fear was ever present, but this was the home of four of the six of the group, it instinctively gave them reassurance just to have the grass under their paws instead of the sand and rocks from the city at their back.

The wind picked up, and Mer sprinted forward, his nose going in overdrive "I think i smell us" he said, looking in front of him "if we keep going towards that direction" he pointed slightly to the right from where they were "we should find where we had breakfast this morning" he said and pushed forward, not waiting for the reassurance that they would follow.

Because they did follow, with Valentine and Rehan covering their backs while Jeon-e kept an eye on Taha's slightly limping form and Canna's body on Taha's back.

They went on, and they found their spot from that morning, and they kept finding traces of their passage as they followed their steps backwards. Hours passed, the night dragging on, the cold making itself known once they slowed down from exhaustion and their running was a mere walking pace now, their sweat cooling off.

They all checked on Canna at some point, with Jeon-e, Rehan and Valentine being the most prominent ones, but Mer as well once he swapped shifts with Valentine, turning off his tracking brain for a while while Valentine took the place of guide and scent follower for them.

At one point, closer to sunrise than sunset, Taha's sprained leg gave in, her tiredness making itself known, and a choked noise left her throat as she tried to balance herself to not fall. Rehan and Jeon-e were there immediately, holding her up while Mer and Valentine rushed over as well. "Let's rest for a while" Jeon-e said, "Let me take Canna, she's smaller than me" said Mer, and Valentine nodded as well, offering himself.

Taha shook her head "I can do it" she righted herself up "we are close, we can rest when we get to the city.

Rehan watched the others suspiciously, trying to understand if they were really close to the city as she said, and found that they did not doubt Taha. They really were close, but he had not known since he was not from here, not from Vitalus.

So they kept going, the sun peeking over the horizon, the night left behind them. They had stopped checking for the bandits a couple hours ago, and now the only enemy was the exhaustion.

Luckly, that too would be a thing of the past soon enough.