He moved slowly, silently, one hand on his sword hilt, the weapon still in its padded scabbard, the other he held out slightly to make sure he was balanced as he crept -- the last thing he wanted was to avoid stepping on a branch only to stumble and alert his prey. Telric had been a bounty hunter twenty years, after a brief and not very successful career as a cooper's apprentice. He'd been partnered with Admart for twelve of those, the most successful twelve as well. In that time they'd tracked debtors, murderers, deserters, errant husbands, equally errant wives, runaway children, a drunk priestess (that was a story he'd tell his grandchildren) and dozens of common thieves, cutpurses and footpads. They'd never tracked an Amazon before and for Admart, Telric was sure it was as much the novelty and challenge which motivated him as the money.
For Telric it was the money, and as Amazons had a reputation as being dangerous, the money was good. Admart was back with the horses half a mile away, a small patch of trees next to the road which had good grazing and a spot under a tree where he could happily read a book whilst he waited for his illiterate partner to return. Perhaps their differing motivations and personalities were why they made a great team, if they seldom met outside their work, within it they fitted like a hand in a perfectly tailored glove. Admart was the smart one, the charmer who could interrogate anyone from a town guard to a local whore so skilfully they didn't know they were giving out clue after and who could then tie the disparate facts into a whole map. It was he who'd tracked the Amazon and her granddaughter this far, taking small clues along the way from innkeepers and foresters who'd glanced at the travelling women. It was him who'd realised that it wasn't a random direction that the Amazon was going and that she was heading to somewhere and that probably also meant someone. In each town he looked for clues, gently probing the locals to get some idea if there was a destination here.
And in the last town, it had been a reclusive Mom and daughter, who lived outside the walls. Telric could never work out how his partner had pulled together the threads of the woman being from elsewhere, not having had a man since her husband died sixteen years together and them vanishing for a period after an orc-raid and both Mom and daughter becoming even more reclusive after that, only coming into town rarely to sell potions. But he had and he'd confidently told Telric that the woman was an Amazon and that was where Katarinka and the granddaughter had gone.
This was where Telric skills came in. Experience, and the fact they were still alive, had taught both men you didn't rush in and hope that the target was both there and unprepared to resist, plus there was little more embarrassing than smashing down the door to a farmhouse and discovering it wasn't your target (and Telric had done that several times in his early years). You needed to do your reconnaissance and be careful about not being spotted. If Admart was brains and charm, Telric was sharp-eyed and cunning like a fox; he could creep through the undergrowth as silently as a field mouse and see signs of passing that even a hawk would miss. He moved swiftly and stealthily towards the building.
The rays of from the sun were quickly vanishing leaving the woods gloomy if not yet dark and through the trees he could see the spark of a lamp being lit through a window. The house was occupied at least, but he needed to be sure it was the right one before he went back to his partner. He slowed down, his eyes darting around to find a suitable place to hunker down, his dark cloak around him and all his face masked apart from his eyes, so there be no glint of light on his skin to give him away.
Finding a spot, which allowed him to blend against a tree whilst still offering a perfect view of the door and the yard he settled down. There was a chill in the air, winter might be over, but it was hard to say that spring had yet come. The cloak was chosen for its darkness less its warmth, the bounty hunter pulled it around himself anyway, shivering and thinking that Admart had probably got a fire going. If he was lucky Katarinka would be out to check on the chickens before she retired, if not he'd be here all night and hope she'd come out after breakfast; though he was resigned to the fact she might stay inside for days and eventually he'd have to take more direct action to see if she was in.
The door opened and out came a woman. For a moment, in the darkness, he thought it might be his target -- she was certainly an Amazon, wearing armour which covered her breasts and a metallic skirt over her thighs and holding her sword with an easy casualness, despite its size and weight. But after a second he could tell she was too young, though she had a resemblance to the woman in the picture. Still, it was promising and suggested Admart had been right about the woman who lived here being an Amazon.
The Amazon had a lit taper in her spare hand and used it to light some straw in the braziers around the yard, lighting it up, so that Telric could see her even better and fully confirm she wasn't Katarinka. The woman practised a few swings and Telric, who knew a fair number of things about sword-fighting himself was impressed with the speed and dexterity with which she moved, she wouldn't be easy to take down, he decided.
A few moments later the door opened again and two young women came out, Telric guessed they were eighteen or nineteen, perhaps twenty. Unlike the Amazon they were in normal attire, both of them wearing dresses with low-cut bodices which clung tightly to their slender waists. The Amazon paused to say something to them and they both giggled, before taking hold of each other's hands and wandering over to stand near the gate to the paddock, waiting as the older woman finished lighting up.
