"Do you need any help?" asked Reeve.
"No, I've got it under control. Go ahead first, I'll catch up very soon", replied Rizaneth.
Reeve nodded his head, and then scrambled to run after Soren, who had gone ahead. He caught up to Soren, and then they continued walking. "Aren't we supposed to wait for that girl?" asked Soren.
"I'm sure she'll catch up. Don't worry about her", replied Reeve.
"If she gets captured--"
"Then we'll have to keep moving!" Reeve sighed as he said this. It wasn't that he didn't want to go back once they ran into the worst-case scenario. The problem was that the bandits had stolen his gold, and Rizaneth was a pain in the somewhere most of the time. He couldn't afford to pay for a carriage to the capital. Well, right now he had considered asking for help from the kid. The only problem was that the kid sounded untrustworthy. His family was rich, but then, so what?
Worst case scenario was the kid would refuse to help, and he would be all alone in Sky City. That didn't sound pleasant at all. A sound of rushed footsteps derailed his train of thought, and as he looked behind him, he saw Rizaneth running.
"I've left them a pleasant surprise. I'm sure they'll like it. It won't take time before they get to the present that I've left for them. We need to start running, they will catch up soon. Oh, right! We also need to smear something to mask our scent so that the dogs they are using won't be able to track us any time soon", she said, as she arrived.
"What works?" asked Reeve.
"We could find the Crown imperial plant. I'm sure it'll work miracles", suggested Soren.
"Where could we find such a plant here?" asked Rizaneth.
Soren shrugged his shoulders. They began to run towards the direction Soren had pointed earlier. As they were running, they found a Valerian plant. This plant had small white flowers, and it unleashed a powerful scent. No, rather than calling it a powerful scent, it was safe to compare it to tons of dirty socks put together.
"Do you think this plant is okay?" asked Reeve.
"The odour will help to eliminate our scent and confuse the dogs. However …"
"What?" asked Rizaneth.
"The Valerian plant is notorious for putting most of the animals that consume it to sleep!" declared Soren.
"Oh, it's got effects of a sedative? Then we need to take it, after all, it'll come in handy later!" said Reeve, excitedly.
"Sedative? What does it mean? And where did you learn these words?" asked Rizaneth.
"There's no time to explain. Take as much of this plant as you can! We are going to use it to get rid of our pursuers! Come on, let's take the flowers!" urged Reeve, as he hurried to take the flowers, while smearing the leaves on himself.
"Ugh!" exclaimed Rizaneth, as she held her nose.
"It's perfect! Hurry up, will you?" urged Reeve.
Unfortunately, as much as they hated the stink of the Valerian plant, they still ended up collecting the flowers and smearing the leaves on the clothes they were wearing. Reeve also ended up throwing some leaves and flowers in separate directions to the one they were taking. Why? To try to make sure the dogs couldn't tell the scents apart! After doing this, they left in a hurry.
Some moments after they had left, the bandits arrived at the spot where they were just now. They no longer had torches, after all, the sun had risen up. The number of bandits seemed to have lessened significantly somewhat. Upon closer inspection of the arriving bandits, one would discover that their faces were all swollen. Currently, they were following the dogs they were using to track the escapees.
"Umm bos'th, what do we do now? It sth'emes that the dogsth cannot get the kidsth' sthendsth anymore", said one of the bandits. From his slurred speech, it was evident that some disaster had befallen his tongue.
"I guess I underestimated those kids! Whoever came up with the trick of using the bees was very clever", replied the bandit leader, who seemed to be in a much better condition than his underlings.
After looking in every direction, he finally spotted the Valerian plants. When he saw them, he frowned deeply. Once again, he had been outsmarted. Well, it's not like he was smart or anything. The dogs would sniff the air, before letting out pitiful whimpers. They couldn't stand the smell of the Valerian plants. Who could blame them?
"Okay, you, take the dogs back to camp. It's time to start hunting", said the bandit leader, pointing to one of his underlings. He ended the speech with a very weird smile.
"Yes boss!" replied the bandit who had been tasked with taking the dogs back to camp. He was very happy because he would escape from this calamity their boss was eagerly calling a hunt. So far, the only thing they had to show for their troubles was swollen faces!
Reeve and company kept running, changing direction every once in a while. After what seemed like an eternity of running, the finally arrived at a wide road. It was now early in the afternoon.
"With this smell, do you think anyone will stop?" asked Soren.
"I don't know, we'll know when we actually meet someone. For now, we need to keep running along the road."
"Wouldn't it be a much better idea to cross the road and go the opposite way?" asked Rizaneth.
"Why?" asked both Reeve and Soren, with puzzled expressions.
"I'm sure the first thing the bandits would try to do is to follow the road that way", responded Rizaneth, pointing in the direction the road seemed to be going.
While she was still speaking, a growling sound echoed into everyone's ears. Reeve and Soren turned to look at Rizaneth, who responded with a bashful smile.
"We need to find something to eat as well. So, we'll go in the direction she pointed", said Reeve.
As they started walking, a carriage came up from behind them.