“You can stop now,” she said as she jiggled a small pouch in front of his face with a smile, “I found our jewels.”

Andyr looked at the pouch skeptically, “Where’d you get that?”

“The pig didn’t react well to the drug and began retching violently,” she explained, “so I was able to find it in the bile.”

“Huh,” Andyr said, his eyebrows raised.

After wiping his hands on unsoiled parts of his shirt, he brought his fingers to his mouth and whistled.

The two spotted Renae as she sped back to them. She wiped sweat off her brow, “Found them already?”

“Yeah,” Sera exclaimed, handing the pouch to Renae, “so we can go now.”

Upon spotting the soggy, smelly pouch, Renae recoiled in disgust, “You can hold it.”

“Renae, lead us out of here,” Andyr demanded, quickly glancing over his shoulder, “Now.”

Looking past Andyr’s field of vision, Renae spotted two guards standing above the poor fellow she had knocked unconscious and dragged into the shrubbery earlier.

“With pleasure,” she smirked as she led them around the back of the castle, carefully avoiding the commotion. The three shimmied along the narrow ledge, back towards the area where Renae had entered.

Renae pointed downwards and mouthed, “good luck.”

She was the first to descend the cliff, then Andyr and Sera followed, carefully copying her footing. Moments after the three reached the bottom, Renae walked towards the water.

“Home’s thataway,” she pointed across the river.

Without hesitation, Andyr entered the water and began rinsing the blood and sweat off.

“More exercise?” Sera groaned, removing her outer working garments, and begrudgingly entering the water, “Haven’t we had enough excitement for one night?”

“If we just let the current take us downstream, we should be able to swim ashore easily,” Renae explained.

“Let’s go. It’ll be dawn soon,” Andyr reminded them.

Without dawdling further, the three began swimming downstream, letting the current carry them home. Sera clutched the pouch tightly in her hand as they swam.

“You know, I expected to feel much happier once we got the jewels, but I actually had a lot more fun stealing them,” Renae mused.

“Renae, no, we’re set for life,” Sera retorted.

“Yeah, but it doesn’t have to be a boring life, does it?” Renae responded, “I heard that the King Lothar next door also has a crown with nice jewels.”

“No, no, no,” Andyr chided, “Absolutely not!”

“Let’s talk about it over a few beers.”