Damia and Alf had been travelling through the forest since the previous day, all through the night, and now well into the next day. They were tired, sore, and hungry, but Damia had insisted that they must not rest until the glowing path stops glowing.
"Just how vast is this forest, Alf?"
"It's a very large forest. I'd venture to say that we have not even made it half way yet. But if this trail keeps glowing like this, if the horses can keep up, we'll be out in two days or so."
In order to be able to join Damia, Alf had called on the forest to guide a horse to him. He was now atop a sienna colored stallion he named Dusk, and keeping stride behind Damia's mare, Helize.
As they trotted along, they ate while riding on the horses, but Damia agreed that it was beginning to wear her out more than she wanted to admit. They were approaching the foot of a mountain and Damia turned to Alf, giving him a questioning look as he never mentioned they would need to travel over a mountain to get out of the forest. Alf looked confused himself as the village she had mentioned wanting to visit didn't require to take this particular path. In fact, this would be considered the longest, most dangerous path.
The path took them up to a lower, shallow cave along the foot of the mountain and then vanished.
"I guess we're to set up camp here." Damia dismounted Helize and started to set things down to give her horse a rest too. Alf followed suit.
"At least we'll be staying in a cave, and it looks like it doesn't connect to inner systems so we would only need to protect against the mouth of the cave. But my powers only work on the flora of the forest, so they're pretty useless in this cave."
"It's alright. You brought a quiver and a bow with you, right? And I assume you know how to use it if we need to defend yourself?"
Alf threw his head back in laughter. "Know how to use it? Of course, I do! I am quite adept, if I do say so myself."
Damia laughed along with him too. "Alright, good. We should sleep now. We've been traveling for nearly a whole day and we're not at our destination yet."
Damia glanced over at where Alf had been setting his belongings and realized she was talking to herself. He was already fast asleep. She set out her bedding as well and fell asleep.
She didn't know how long she had slept, but the sun had not yet risen, and she was awoken by Alf nudging her shoulder while holding a finger up to his lips, motioning her to remain silent, he then motioned with his hand to follow him, and pointed to his ear, then out the mouth of the cave. Damia nodded her head to let him know that she understood his gestures.
As they tiptoed to the opening of the cave, Damia kept an eye out at what Alf was trying to show her. It was extremely dark, and Alf was pointing to the tree lines which shadowed everything within them. She tried to squint to see if she could spot whatever it was that he noticed. The more she focuses, the more she felt a pressure growing behind her eyes, until finally, something flashed before her, and her eyesight seemed to improve. She couldn't see perfectly because it was still pretty far away, and the image appeared in muted colors, but that didn't keep her from being able to see a tiny figure moving in the branches of one of the trees.
Damia now knew what Alf was trying to say. They needed to prepare for a potential attack. She stepped back and slowly picked up her sword. Alf gathered his quiver and bow, along with a sheet of paper and quill. He quickly jotted something down, tied it to an arrow and then, leaning against the cave wall for cover, he aimed for the tree where the figure was hiding. Once he set his target, he released the arrow carrying his note and he hit his mark perfectly.
Damia could see the figure was startled by the shot, but as the target was the tree, the figure did not seem to become defensive or choose to counterstrike. The figure instead reached for the arrow and took down the note to read it.
"What did you write on the note, Alf." Damia whispered.
"I wrote, 'We know you're there. Come down peacefully and we can speak diplomatically."
"How straight forward. Do you really expect that to work?" Damia scowled.
Alf just pointed back out to the location where the figure had been. Damia looked and could now see that the figure was slowly approaching the cave, weapons down. She was pleasantly surprised with how simple that had been, and waited for the figure to come into clear view.
A few more steps and Damia could see that the figure was a female. She had an extremely slender build, and was short in stature, shorter than Damia and Damia was below the average. Regardless of her vertical challenge, the way she walked towards them gave off a vibe of a fierce warrior.
"Why do you two trespass on my mountain?" The girl finally came within earshot.
Alf looked to Damia and noticed that, while she looked calm, her hands were trembling so he took lead. "We were guided here for safe shelter. We mean no harm and will leave once the proper time comes. We can assure you that we will leave it as we found it."
"I don't trust you! Who are you?"
"Do you not think that you are being rude to ask for our names without first giving us yours? Why should we answer you if we don't even know who you are to make demands of us?"
The girl hesitated in her next step, but conceded. "I am the guardian of the mountain. Alcippe."