[i]Just outside the mysterious camp[/i] Rogers did not look like he was in a hurry. If not for the longsword strapped to his back and the chain mail he was clad in, he would have looked like an ordinary traveller. Suddenly, our ordinary traveller realized he had only mere seconds to live. Captain Ironmaw scrutinizingly glared into the pig-nosed man’s eyes. The other ninety-odd guards followed his gaze. “H-hello, u-um... kind sirs! I-” The captain had no patience for thorough interrogation. With a mighty cry accompanied with a fierce flaring from his nostrils, he yelled something in Draconic. Roughly translated into common, it would have been this: “Attack!” Not all of the Estermerean garrison knew Draconic, but they sure as hell knew what their captain meant. With a mighty cry, they trampled Rogers the Nisceni underfoot (or underhoof, for that matter) and charged into the Nisceni camp. The captain was about to order his men to slay everyone in sight when a familiar green cloak dropped down onto his horse, in front of him. A few other of his kin did the same to Ironmaw’s lieutenants at the front of the convoy. “Stay your hand, captain! Before killing them, I think we’d like to find out where they came from, no?” Ironmaw was about to raise his voice in reply, but saw the sense in this and nodded. The wood elf, along with his comrades, leapt off the horses and strode towards the surrendering red-clad guards. He swiftly grabbed the collar of the mysterious elf, who was trying to escape in vain. They began to converse in Elvish. “Ordinary travelers in the forest, eh? We’re not that stupid.” “H-hey. P-please, let us go, or they’ll get angry-” “Who’ll get angry?” “T-t-t-them!” “WHO?!” The wood elf raised an intricate yet sharp dagger to the Nisceni elf’s throat. Meanwhile, Ironmaw gave a subtle nod of approval. “T-the emperor!” Before the wood elf could give another brutal collar tug, the Nisceni continued “Of Nisceni!” Under a green hood, two bright emerald eyes glittered. “That is all we need to know.” He turned back to Ironmaw. “Chain these boys up, captain, and let’s go back to the town. I think we got a niiice long talk later with these birds.”