Waterskin in hand I stare blankly at the guards as they yell at us.
"Intruders, surrender your hostages or die!"
This only causes the civilians to cower even more from the power in the mans voice as he glares at the few of us with weapons. The dry air causing me to feel suffocated as their well equipped forces bear down on us.
Anger building up inside me I yell back,
"What is this claim against us, we protected these people who ran over to us."
I get a reply of a mocking smile as he glares at each of us with weapons, some of us barely able to stand from tiredness.
"You dared to lure creatures into town only to garner favour amongst us. We have it on good word that you travellers are traitorous."
The civilians surrounding us start to slowly back away with all the claims of the town guard. Some even with fear in their eyes similar to the fear they showed the monsters. I feel slightly sick at the present outcome of this.
"This is unfounded, your claims tarnish my reputation as a trader."
"Trader indeed. You traded an item recently to a shop which caused reason for alarm. You sold a mage-vice bearing the Dukes mark and recently the Duke of this city reported one missing. You are a thief and now you use these civilians as trading goods, just like you do a handful of coins. There doesn't need to be a trial, only a block, thieves normally have their hand taken, but for you we can take your head on the dukes orders."
"Just stop a minute you egotistical bastard, shut up and stop spouting your useless trash, my cart carries no chains, no way to trap people, and we haven't stopped these innocents from fleeing. You should know the adventures guild wouldn't allow people to be hired for evil acts. You as a person in power should be thanking the defenders of the innocent who didn't even ask for a reward before you started claiming they were criminals, where is your proof, who is your witness?"
My reply finally gets a response from the leader, his glaring becoming more self introspected than angry. After a minute of waiting that feels like an hour the man speaks up with an unsure look on his face.
"I have decided that the block would be too fast, for saving the lives of people regardless of your intentions, I have decided to put just you the leader in a cell while we decide on a course of action.
I get dragged along trying not to resist too much and hoping that the people I hired don't just abandon me because of this confusion. My arms tired from swinging my weapon in a life or death situation for half an hour now being weighed down by the shackles gripping coldly at my flesh like a hungry dog.
I'm dragged along to a nearby cell, according to the guard outside my cage they didn't need to put me in a public cage because I'd get something worse than humiliation soon. Thankfully they didn't assume I was a mage and so I still have my powers should I need them, I tested it by trying to keep myself warm using magic, which I managed to do with only minimal burns in the end.