The women chuckle as Tyris squirms away from Spider.
"Strong, silent type, eh? Well, let's get these carts under cover."
The cave they mentioned is not far off the road, and well-concealed. After moving the carts into it, they spend some time re-arranging the leaves to hide their passage. By then, others have arrived. A few stay with Sven and the drivers to guard the oxen, while the rest load up what gear they can from the supplies. When everybody is ready, they move out. The group moves east, skirting around the northern edge of the mountains, and into a group of lower hills to the east. In a well-hidden valley is Ismene's camp. It's well-kept but without many amenities. Ismene is there, along with the rest of her crew.
"Welcome," Ismene says. "Welcome back to you three. Hope the journey wasn't too hard. Heard you had some trouble with ants. They've been around more and more recently. Not sure what's up with them. Anyway, glad you're here. The supplies will help. And since you're here, we've got a lot going on and could really use the help if you're not planning to head back immediately."
She takes a seat on a tree stump, and motions to everyone to have a seat on nearby logs and rocks.
"I don't know what exactly Mallaby told you," she says, "but here's what we're going to do. We're gonna get civilized. I started ranging these woods after the village I came from got burned down in a Hzakan raid. Thais and I were the only survivors that I know of--at least the only ones not hauled off to be slaves somewhere. We lived as best we could, hunting and so forth. For the first year we did all right, but when winter came, we started...er, scavenging from the local villages. With only two of us, we did a lot less damage than the hobgoblins, and we were able to warn the locals of a couple of raiding parties coming through the area. I don't know if we did more good than harm or not. It seemed like we did at the time. But then we added some others. Carlotta was hunting on her own in the woods, met up with us and decided to stick with it. Then Dirk showed up, then Willa--Willa was with us for while, but she volunteered to play distraction to lure a pair of bugbears away from the rest of us. I hope she died quickly. Her body was pretty badly mauled. She managed to avoid slavery is about all I can say positive about that. Then others joined us. Some from villages that no longer exist, like mine. Some are orphans. Some might have been better off if they were. Edgar doesn't say where he's from at all. One or two showed up attracted by the reputation of our group. Those are the ones that really scare me."
She stops short.
"Sorry, didn't mean to tell you my life story. The point is, it's not just a few of us any more. Hunting isn't going to support us, and we're no longer a small group of romantic bandits to the villagers, but a threat. I'm no longer a free operator either. I've suddenly realized I've got responsibility. That's why I want to change things. I hear about this new republic down south of here, but they're not here yet. If we're going to keep the Hzakans at bay we're going to have to do it ourselves. I've called a peace conference. There are four villages right in this area. I've asked them each to send delegates. If we can organize, maybe we can keep the Hzakans out so that they don't want to come back. Maybe expand to more villages. Maybe... anything.
"So, since you're here, there's a bunch of stuff I could really use help with. If you want to help set up, that's great. You could also go meet one of the delegates that are coming. I've got responses from Doorna, Brugwal, and Achirem, so they're all sending people. I guess you could go to Sudney and see why they're not sending anyone. Or we can always run another sweep up north and east of here. Any of these sound like a good idea?"
