Chapter 682: Three Familiar Ways

Morning fog still clung to the gorge when Rumi crouched on the family’s private track above the narrow lower-yard road. Pell, the taken man’s lanky cousin, flattened himself beside her and pointed down into the gorge with a shaking finger.

"Raiders," he whispered, "right at the pinch, where the walls almost kiss."

Five men in toll sashes were stripping a family of travelers beside their overturned cart.

’Five sashes, one loud boss, and a mule that hates every single one of them.’

Behind the bound travelers, a short seam shimmered between two leaning rocks, glowing like a back door left politely ajar. Its far mouth winked high on the gorge wall, beside a goat ledge nobody down there even bothered to watch.

"Their boss built himself a bolt-hole," Rumi breathed, ears flattening, "and he parked it right behind the hostages."

"The expedition’s still an hour back, should I run and fetch everyone?"

"So they can blow horns down the gorge and give him time to carve a hostage on his way out?"

Pell winced, clutching the strap of the satchel his family packed.

"No, we free them first and announce ourselves after," she murmured, tail lashing once against the rock.

’Hajin would kick the front door in and yell his name, which is adorable but loud.’

"Then what do I do?"

Rumi tapped the scroll case at his hip, "You stroll down there whistling and ask which shift signs for the salt delivery."

"And if they stab me?"

"Then I get very rude, very fast."

Pell picked his way down the track whistling terribly, and two raiders turned toward him with hands on knives.

Rumi slid along the opposite wall and touched three spots while their attention stayed glued to the whistling young idiot. Her palm marked the boulder beside the baggage, a flat shelf across the stream, and a cleft below the ledge.

’Boulder to shelf, boulder to cleft, and only one road carries weight at a time.’

"Salt for the lower yard cook, which shift signs for it?" Pell squeaked, holding the satchel up like a shield.

"Night shift signs for nothing, and who sent you up the side track?"

"Uh, the cook did, the fat one, he wants it before the porridge burns—"

The raider laughed and shoved him back a step, and every head in the pinch turned to enjoy it.

Rumi crept behind the overturned cart and sliced the rope binding four travelers together at the wrists.

"Stay low and creep for the cleft when they chase me," she whispered, pressing a finger to her lips.

She hopped onto the cart’s upturned wheel and spread both arms wide, "Morning, boys, did your manners fall off somewhere back up the road?"

The leader whipped around, a scarred man with a toll baton and a stamped pouch swinging from his belt.

"The cat’s loose, take her, she’s alone!"

Rumi yelped in fake alarm and bolted for the boulder, where her first road opened like a pale startled mouth. She dove through, and four raiders piled in after her before the shimmer could even think about closing behind them.

The shelf across the stream was barely wide enough for one woman and four angry idiots.

"Welcome to my side of the water," she purred, "mind the step."

She caught the first raider’s knife wrist and swung him straight off the crumbling edge into the freezing pool below. Her dagger pommel cracked the second man’s temple, and her knee folded the third before he finished drawing his blade.

"You bitch, he can’t even swim—"

"Then go fish him out, sweetheart."

She kicked the last one in after his friend, and the stream swallowed both of them up to the chin.

’Two in the water, two asleep, and that road still owes me one more trip.’

The first road folded shut behind the raiders, then opened again and carried her alone back to the boulder.

The leader stood frozen near his glowing seam, staring at the empty pinch where his crew stood a moment ago.

"Where are my men?" he barked, baton trembling.

"Bathing," Rumi chirped, grabbing the rope of the seized baggage sled.

She shoved the sled at the second road, and it swallowed the whole pile before he could move a step. She followed it through at once, leaving him alone in an empty clearing with nothing left worth guarding or stealing.

’Let him sweat down there while I take the long way up.’

The second road spat her out beside the sled, and she sprinted straight up the goat ledge without slowing down. Thirty broken steps of real rock, the kind of path a man forgets once he owns a nice glowing door.

Far down the track, the expedition’s vanguard horn echoed off the gorge walls, bright and early.

’There’s your front door knocking, so run, you rat, run straight to me.’

The seam beside her flared, and the leader tumbled out onto the ledge clutching his baton and a drawn knife. Pell crouched three steps away, exactly where Rumi told him to wait, and the knife swung straight toward his throat.

"Not him, you bastard!"

Her shoulder drove into his ribs and slammed him flat against the ledge before the knife arrived. ℯ

The blade clattered off the rock and spun down into the gorge, and she knelt hard on his wrist.

"Get off me, you mangy little—"

"Rift-lynx, actually, and my coat is gorgeous," she hissed, twisting his arm until the baton dropped.

Pell stared between her and the dead seam, voice cracking, "You were already up here, how were you already up here?"

"His door, my legs, and he forgot the stairs."

She bound his wrists with his own toll sash while Pell pinned the ankles with trembling, stubborn hands.

---

By the time the expedition reached the pinch, the travelers were counting their packs beside the sled inside the cleft. Rumi handed back purses, a cookpot, and a carved toy horse, while four raiders sat dripping and groggy under guard.

She kept only one thing for herself, a pouch of stamped tokens taken from the leader’s belt.

Hajin came skidding down the track with Nari at his heels and the broadcast running.

"You started a whole damn fight without me?" he bellowed, throwing both arms wide.

"I brought my best yelling voice and everything!"

"You’d have announced us from the bottom of the gorge," Rumi drawled, flicking an ear, "and somebody here would be bleeding."

"She’s right, you hummed the entire climb," Nari snickered, tail swishing.

"I hum quietly!"

"Like a bear with a cough."

Rumi gave the report aloud for his camera, covering three endpoints, the shelf, the sled, and the forgotten goat ledge.

[ HearthKeeper: She freed the hostages before the bad guys even knew an expedition was coming, terrifying and amazing. ]

[ Seoul_Tactician: Bait road, cargo road, then real rock for the finish, she only spent magic where it mattered. ]

[ ashley(mod): No footage of the gorge, that’s Rumi’s spoken report, quote her before anyone guesses. ]

"So you turned his own exit into a trap," Hajin breathed, crouching beside the trussed leader, "that’s just mean, and I love it."

Pell shuffled closer to her, clutching his satchel strap in both fists, "Could you teach me how you watch things, the looking part, I know I can’t do the roads?"

"Watch whatever people stop looking at, like ledges," Rumi said, softening, "and bring snacks to the lesson."

Nari hooked his left arm and Rumi took the right, and their purring started up in smug, perfect unison.

"I’m being held hostage," he complained, though his ears went pink and he never tried to escape.

[ Rumi | EXP gained: 3,500,000 | 7,500,000 / 37,500,000 toward Wing Five ]

Nobody died and no Wing unfolded, just a clean capture and honest credit for the work on the road.

Rumi tipped the pouch into her palm, and Pell went pale the moment he saw the third token.

"Lower sluice, second night shift," he read, voice shaking, "and that’s my cousin’s hitch knot scratched on the back."

’So the fort’s toll reaches far past its guarded road, all the way down here.’