Few things were more annoying than competent enemies, especially if their area of expertise was evasion and obfuscation. After Adra had somehow managed to follow whatever mark the scouts had left on the hard ground, certainly nothing that I could detect, we ended up in another grove of trees, with the trail stopping near one of the larger trees. That stopping-point brought a wide and predatory grin to Adra’s face, while she started to chant the words of another spell, quietly infusing the world around her with her power.

Her happiness was understandable, if the scouts had gone arboreal to evade further pursuit, it was akin to handing a giant advantage to Adra, thanks to her dryadic connection to plants, especially trees. By my understanding, she could essentially talk to trees and glean some understanding of the events in their surroundings, not that trees had the most sophisticated sensory organs, limiting the amount of information. Climbing them, however, would be more than enough to leave a memory within their mind, or whatever trees had.

There was some expectation when Adra stopped chanting, quietly listening for a moment, before she started to chant in a very different manner, rather vile language spewing from her mouth, her tone seriously annoyed.

“It was a false trail.” she spat out, after venting her annoyance for a moment. Luckily, the curses she had let out hadn’t been magical in nature, or we might have needed decontamination.

“They were here and rested for some time. But they didn’t climb the tree, of that I’m certain. Unless they managed to completely erase their tracks, they moved back to the river and likely left it at the other point.” Adra explained, her voice filled with frustration.

“And went into the swamp.” Olivia groaned, before letting out a long-drawn, terribly unenthused, “Yaaaaay!”

“Those guys will not get away!” Adra snarled, clearly getting annoyed at being led by the nose, despite her rather impressive magical efforts. By my estimate, she had burned through more than half her power-reserves while tracking them down, despite constantly replenishing power from the Astral River. Just that, was a sufficient reminder that she was currently doing some magical heavy lifting, but had nothing to show for it.

Getting back to the swamp, and the obvious tracks leading into it, was quite quick, even if we were keeping an eye out, just in case we had missed some trick the scouts had played to get some more distance. There, Adra took the lead once again, carefully picking her steps as she moved into the muddy area, making sure she didn’t lose her footing. I had a feeling that if that were to happen, we might get to see a truly enraged Adra.

Soon after entering the swamp, a disgusting stench caught my attention, a mix of death and decay, suffusing the moist air around us with its aroma. Ylva instantly stopped, before letting out a soft whine and retreating into her Hallow, unwilling to endure more of the smell. Similarly, Sigmir and Rai, who both had improved olfactory organs, one thanks to her spirit-companion, the other simply due to race, looked like they were about to be sick.

“More tricks.” Adra groaned, the smell getting to her as well, while she was searching the ground for further tracks. Again, the obvious track we had been following from the water simply ended, essentially in the middle of a small clearing, the vegetation around it seemingly undisturbed, while something was decaying in a pond nearby, creating the disturbing smell.

I had to suppress a laugh, when I heard Olivia speak a soft prayer under her breath and felt a gentle magical aura surrounding me, nothing powerful, easily broken with just a little resistance, but the effect was, literally, a godsend. The moment the aura surrounded me, the stench instantly lessened to the point that what had been utterly nauseating was merely uncomfortable.

“Thank you.” I mouthed to Olivia, not wanting to disturb Adra, who, again, was chanting another spell. If that continued the way it had been going, she’d soon need rest or I’d have to try providing power to her spell-work, something we had done before but it was a very uncomfortable experience that I’d rather not repeat.

It took Adra longer than before, and I could feel complicated magic radiating out from her, suffusing the air around us until she finally stopped chanting, her eyes closed as she likely took in what information the magic was gathering for her.

“I’ve got you now.” she suddenly snarled, her voice quite vicious, yet filled with satisfaction. Part of me wondered just how she would react if we found another distraction further down the line, she seemed to be so happy to have found the trail leading away from this latest one, that I couldn’t bring myself to ask.

Moving slowly, still radiating powerful magic, she continued on, not moving in the same direction as before, but at an angle, along the edge of the swamp. As before, we followed, while murdering enough blood-sucking insects that I felt we should begin to get experience for them. Part of me wanted to freeze the whole swamp into a solid block of Ice, letting the mosquitoes die a horrible death, but it would be a waste of Astral Power.

It took us far too long, for my taste, to cross the swamp, but then, every single minute within that mess was too long. Having to pay attention with each step, to make sure you didn’t lose your footing and tumble in the mud, it was a pain in the behind. While I had to give the scouts we were hunting some credit, their methods made it extremely annoying and difficult to track them. I wanted to take the credit I had to give them, shape it into a large icicle and shove it up theirs. Watching Adra get more and more annoyed had been fun at first, but by the time we got out of the swamp, the amusement had been long gone.

I could almost hear Adra’s teeth grinding against each other, as she pushed on, using her magic to find tracks none of us could even come close to detecting. Part of me wondered why she was so committed to finding these scouts, and finding them fast, especially on a trail that had already been cold to begin with but whatever her reasons, she was pushing on. The tenacity with which she continued was quite impressive, even more so than the magic she was using and I was slowly analysing. While I was far from able to truly comprehend the minutiae, I was able to grasp the broad strokes, and those strokes were impressive.

She was gathering information from each leaf, each blade of grass, each tree and each shrub, every bit of vegetation in a rather impressive area, at least impressive for such a task, using the tiny, individual data-points she was gathering to form a greater image. Before, I hadn’t been aware that such a thing was within her abilities, part of me wondering if I was mistaken, or if I had seriously underestimated our companion.

After following the trail towards the foothills, I was slowly getting concerned with Adra and the amount of magic she was using. While it was difficult to estimate the amount of Astral Power she had available, I could feel the amount she was using, which was a lot. I had overdrafted my own power before, stubbornly pushing on despite my body giving me warning signals and I feared that was what Adra was doing.

We were getting close to the foothills, with their shrubs and trees, making me want to suggest resting there, at least for some time, so Adra could recover and we could have lunch. It was that time of the day.

Just as I was moving forward, to catch up to Adra, she suddenly stopped, freezing in place. Before I could ask what was going on, I felt a warning coming over my connection with Lenore, while Adra called out, warning us of an ambush. Thanks to Lenore, I knew where the trouble was coming from, an image of a humanoid moving into a standing position, likely from a hideout similar to the one Sigmir and I had seen a few days ago, transmitted into my mind, clear enough to allow me to see the bow in their hand.

Falling back on reactions I had trained the last few days, I instantly activated Overflow, letting Astral Power gush out of me in a misty smoke-screen, taking away their ability to see, while leaping to the side.

Apparently, we had underestimated the bandits of the area and ran straight into an ambush.