Fred Rightsed and his crew were quite happy to have met Mister Edward. They were between jobs, and times were lean. Then he came out of nowhere with a route for some noble girl’s carriage, an actual journey timetable, and even a map of convenient choke points along the route. How lucky was that? Turned out Mister Edward had been employed by the lady in question until recently, and just because he’d arranged himself a small five fingered pay rise (practically obligatory in most of the big houses as the pay was so lousy.) He had been driven from the house like some kind of criminal. It was a crying shame really. He seemed like a decent enough bloke, he’d even stood the entire gang a round before the job.

“To Mister Edward,” Fred slurred, as the gang raised their glasses for one final round before getting to work. The target was only a few miles down the road, and the boys could handle their booze well enough to handle the ride he reckoned.. So they poured out of the Legless Lemur and saddled up. Riding off like a slightly inebriated horde (which to be fair they pretty much were.) It was time to go to work

Behind them Ed smiled, if any of the gang had looked back they would have noticed that it never reached his eyes. With any luck they’d get the job done, and if not nobody was getting any answers out of them. He did so love poison, with creative use it could be so... punctual. He flipped a bag of gold to the inkeep. (He’d take care of that particular loose end later, probably a tragic fire where the barrels fell over blocking the doorway, or something like that.) For now he’d settle back and watch the show from a safe distance, of course, no call for getting close, unless you were behind the target.

************************************************************************

The carriage trundled along, Sir Humphrey was not their escort today, Sir Leeroy would be filling in, in the Carriage Mibbet and Elvira relaxed in becushioned bliss. (Rascal was quite happily relaxing in the housing for the heat gems.) As for Alba it was quickly becoming apparent that adolescent owl bear was the best feathery pillow ever, hands down. So long as you did not violate the fluffy tumtum. That way lay a mauling.

So far the journey had been unbelievably tedious, and there was only so many rounds of noughts and crosses a body can tolerate. Chess had lasted somewhat longer, but it had a downside with a feline the size of a pony in the carriage who had a hidey hole, and viewed freestanding things on edges as a personal affront that must be removed from said edge as quickly as possible. Even pillow fights were starting to become mundane (and believe me they had plenty of bloody pillows.) They were desperate for something, anything to break the mind (but at least not butt now) numbing tedium of the journey, when as if the gods were listening, and also fancied a laugh their prayers were answered by a screaming mob charging out of the hills.

Elvira was chuffed, as she popped a hatch on the roof of the carriage and stood on a carefully arranged ledge, readying spikey, the motivational pike to be decidedly DE-motivational.

Mibbet grabbed choppy, and readied herself for battle, while the carriage driver took cover under the seat and seized his crossbow.

Mibbet hopped out of the carriage while Sir Leeroy charged in like an idiot, seemingly convinced he outnumbered his foes one to twenty. Soon Fred and the boys were in range, but the driver held his fire until he could see the reds of their eyes (traditionally it would be the whites, but this lot never were the cleanest, and as previously mentioned they had more than their share of liquid courage.) With the first shots a few bandits were down, but soon they were too close. So the footman and driver quickly took cover (so as not to hinder the others, honest.)

The bandits came in closer before Mibbet, dodging a slightly wobbly sword swing decided to challenge her opponent to a game of choppy, armour, toes. (Apparently choppy won,) then dove into the fray kicking (and boy can she kick) and swinging.

Errol meanwhile was proving his worth, by dashing in and striking whenever the opportunity arose. Looking decidedly noble for an apprentice in armour several sizes too big, and a helmet that he’d inherited from his big brother (his entire suit was hand me down, but that’s because it was too good to throw out, and apprentice knights don’t exactly earn a lot. So he had big bro's old armour, his mum had insisted,) Elvira meanwhile was laughing maniacally while jabbing left, right, and centre, from her vantage point on the luggage rack.

The bandits were starting to press the advantage of numbers though, and pushing the group back, when Alba and Rascal, cranky from their disturbed naptime clambered out of the carriage to join the fray. Mibbet hopped onto Alba’s back (literally), no time for a saddle, but when one of your enemies suddenly mounts an owl bear it tends to be unsettling for the enemy.

She soon wished she had had more time to train this with Alba though, as apparently being mounted is the one thing that would make a cranky just woken up Owl bear more cranky. He reared up with his most impressive SQWROAAARRRRRKKKKK (and it was impressive, believe you me, he’d been practising,) and charged head first into the enemy cavalry. Now funnily enough when your regular plain ol’ bandits are training their steeds for combat they do not have a section on dealing with maniacal hatchet wielding owl bear cavalry, or pissed off pikey princesses. So unsurprisingly a number of the bandits, who are used to no targets harder than the occasional mercenary suddenly remembered they had appointments elsewhere, while others (whose horses were apparently the brains of the operation) suddenly found that their faithful steeds had made their decision for them, and were scarpering.

Meanwhile Rascal was jumping from enemy to enemy in the mauliest game of the floor is lava ever. The footman, emboldened by the sight of the bandits breaking up faster than a 5 person band with creative differences had stepped out of his box and was taking pot shots at the retreating foe.

Ed watched from a distance through his binoculars, cursing to himself. “You just can’t find good lackeys these days.” Oh well the poison would take effect soon enough. He was interrupted by the sound of hoofbeats, and turned to see Fred. “Over here” he shouted, noticing the fool seemed to be resisting the poison. “I’ve got a hut round here you can hide out in.”

He led Fred to a shack, and gestured. “take cover here till the heat dies down.”

“Oh it was horrible Mister Edward, did you know they had a bloody Owl Bear, none of the boys made it.”

“Please” said mister Edward in his best reassuring voice as he drew his knife behind an unsuspecting Fred, “Call me Ed.”