Three days after leaving/escaping Hurlann they were approaching a hilltop along the road when Anaya frowned and gestured for Rue to stop, listening.

 “I take it you hear it too,” the witch said, tilting her head. It sounded as though there was a commotion up ahead. There were faint screams and what sounded like sounds of battle, but oddly lacking in the signature sound of metal clashing against metal, with there only being one occasionally.

 “Should we check it out?” Then before Rue could even answer she decided for herself. “Ah, hells. Let’s go.” Since it was something apparently happening along the roadway, there was a high chance of innocents being in trouble. She might’ve left her job as a town guard behind, but not her morals. Coincidence or not, ever since she’d met Rue, these random encounters sure seemed to be becoming more common. She ushered her horse into galloping forward.

 The scene in front of them was almost as if a campfire tale brought to life, other than the fact that it was still some time until sunset whereas such tales usually happened in the dark. It was what looked like a merchant caravan, and it was under attack. But not from bandits.

 “Is that…” Anaya started but fell silent.

 “Yes. Undead,” Rue confirmed. A sole skeleton was one thing, but now there were at least a dozen undead at a glance, some closer and some farther out from the wagon.

 “Just what in Kiraya’s name is going on,” Anaya muttered to herself, her voice too low for Rue to hear. A second time coming across undead in two weeks seemed extremely unlikely, yet there they were, clear as day.

 Without slowing down, Anaya drew her sword. Prior to the skeleton she’d smashed without opposition in the forest thanks to Rue’s magic, she’d only fought undead once when accompanying his father. But from that as well as her father's stories of his other times hunting them down during the Necromancer War she knew that a sword wasn’t exactly the weapon of choice against most undead. The way to kill most regular undead was to simply damage them enough, and they eventually succumbed. But a skeleton, being essentially nothing but bone in physical terms, usually required smashing them to pieces since cutting bones wasn’t easy. A sword was ill-suited for such a task; even trying was a great way to dull and dent the blade. However, a sword was all she had in addition to the bow, which in turn was even less useful.

 As she closed in, she could see more clearly what was happening. Not all of the undead were skeletons. There were also what were known as ghouls, more recently deceased apparitions that still retained a varying degree of flesh. The caravan seemed to only have two guards standing, who were understandably overwhelmed, with another lying unmoving on the ground. There were other people aboard the cloth-roofed wagon, but they weren’t fighters. The horses were frightened by the unnatural apparitions and were neighing and almost jumping around fearfully. The wagon had a broken wheel and was tilted, which explained why they hadn’t simply tried to make a getaway.

 Heading to the side of the wagon where the guard had gone down, leading it unprotected, she switched around her sword, grabbing it by the blade rather than the hilt. She directed her horse right past one skeleton that had already reached the wagon and swung the sword like an axe. It impacted the thing’s skull with the combined force of the swing and the moment gained for the speed of the horse. Anaya let out a sharp breath. She’d trained using a similar move, but with the extra momentum of doing it mounted the impact was much stronger, and the sword slipped in her hands and cut through the palms of her gloves and her skin, resulting in the sword being torn from her grip. But the damage to the skeleton was quite extensive, with the skull shattering into pieces that were sent flying. The skeleton teetered for a moment before finally collapsing.

 Avoiding a few other undead, he steered her horse close to the wagon and quickly got off, pulling the spare short sword she’d kept from the band camp before sending the horse off. Being a trained guard horse, it could stay safe on its own to a degree, but these people in the wagon didn’t seem as capable, not that she blamed them.

 “Do you have any more weapons?” she shouted to those in the wagon without looking at them in order to keep her eyes on the undead. The short sword was better than nothing, yet even worse than her father’s sword. “Even just staff?” There were two undead closing in on her rather quickly, and they were in between her and where her sword had landed.

 Rue watched Anaya’s rather reckless charge and shook her head. Somehow, she’d expected it to go just like it then turned out.

 She’d fought undead before as well. She’d still been with her family at the time, during the War. Seeing as they were in the middle of a plains area, the road wasn’t exactly the best possible place for her particular powers, unlike the forests where she’d previously fought them. She cursed herself for not even having made herself a new staff yet, which would’ve helped. She decided she had to improvise a little.

 Anaya was trying to keep her distance from the two closest undead, but she didn’t have anywhere to go unless she left the wagon defenceless, and they were pressing on her. One had already got in a swing at her, denting the protective plates on her left upper arm, and almost leaving the whole arm numb. The thing with the undead was that while they could use weapons or even armour if they found any, or if they became undead while still wearing any. But they were quite dangerous even without them. Their magic-fuelled strength could be rather terrifying, though it varied. With just a short sword her hits were barely chipping the skeletons. Her hands were slick with blood, so grabbing it by the blade was out of the question, and the wagon had no weapons to offer.

 “Get back!” Rue’s voice suddenly called out. She leapt back by instinct, her back bumping into the side of the wagon. Rue on her horse swept past her, colliding with the two skeletons and knocking them down. Without wasting time, Rue circled back and also dismounted, then came to the wagon. “Give me a few seconds.” Anaya wasn’t sure what she was up to, but she used the momentary reprieve to look around.

 The two caravan guards were still up, even having managed to take down a few of the undead. Though one of them appeared injured. As she looked at the shambling undead, Anaya realized that they were in a way very lucky. This group of undead, as strange as its appearance here was, appeared to be largely aimless. If they acted with more purpose, likely the whole convoy would be dead by now. From what she’d read and heard, during the Necromancer War the farther from the Necromancer itself the undead were, generally the weaker and less ‘organized’ they were. She had no idea what was going on to cause them to appear now, but it seemed that they weren’t nearly as dangerous as they could’ve been.