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Abby cringes at Kuori's crass comments, but then goes about playing unconscious as the plan called for. Arthur then closes up the wagon and heads to the front. The wagon shakes as he heaves himself into the driver's seat and within a few minutes the wagon is on its way.

The wagon vibrates slightly as it heads down the road and the silence inside is only disturbed by the occasional creak of shifting merchandise. The sounds outside are muffled by the wagon walls but within a few minutes, it's obvious by the garbled voices of of peddlers outside that the main street had been reached. After a while longer, the wagon stops and once again shakes Arthur gets out of the driver seat. He can be heard talking to someone but his voice was low and and too muffled by the walls to be understandable. The voice could be heard moving towards the back of the wagon when the door is suddenly pulled open. A figure dressed in a Gladesdale guard uniform stands at the opening with Arthur behind him.

"So you guys managed to subdue them at the garrison with the local guards' help?" There is a pause as the party can almost feel the guards eyes going over them. "They must not have put up much of a fight... there's barely a mark on them."

Arthur would quickly interject. "Well, it's hard to fight back when you're unconscious. We also cleaned them up a bit before moving them. Figured it would be best if the locals didn't see us moving around bloody corpses."

"Good point, though I still find it odd that we didn't receive any message about this. Are you sure you want to continue on escorting her by yourself, sir? From what they told us of this one, she seems far too powerful to risk a single escort."

I'm surprised the message familiars haven't been sent yet, but it was the order given by the captain. He wants to draw as little attention to this as possible. A bigger escort means more eyes drawn. Besides, we're not sure we've apprehended all possible targets in town, otherwise we would all be pulling out. This one couldn't have turned those guards and civilian into stone, so we still have to monitor the area. Expect to receive a message once I arrive back at the division."

The guard nods at Arthur and closes the door to the wagon. There is a little more muffled conversation before Arthur can be heard climbing back into the driver seat and the wagon moves forward once more. The sounds of the town begin to fade until nothing could be heard beyond the rumbling of the wagon wheels on the road and the occasional bird cry.

The flap in front of the wagon is pulled open and Arthur, now with his helmet off, speaks to the party. "All right, I think we're safe now. We're out of sight of the city. I can lead us to where they are taking the petrified individuals, but we should do our best to avoid the division heading back in our direction. It's odd, though. When I returned to the garrison to spring my trap, we had not received any message back from them so I don't know how much progress they have made in returning to Gladesdale."

Petra burst out from the chest she was hiding in. "Thank the gods we are free! That trip out of town felt like it took hours. I barely dared to breath."

Abby would look up and smile. "You did great there, Arthur. Thank you for all your help. I think we all did a good job pulling that off." She would then look sheepishly up at her husband. "Could you please untie me now, dear? I think your work was convincing."

Twyla jumped up, feeling exuberant from sneaking out of the city.

"I think we should definitely avoid the division if we can--we need to help those poor petrified people! I have the wand right here with me and I'm ready to un-rock-ify them!" She peered out of the wagon to look around at the road and forest. All looked still. Continuing on seemed like a safe bet.

"Oh, Arthur," she asked, "how'd it go at the garrison? You don't think anyone's coming after you, do you?"

Arthur seemed confused by Kuori's comment. "Hmm? What friend are you thinking we'll find?"

At Twyla's question he would laugh. "Well, I didn't kill any of the bastards, as much as I would have liked to. They will be taking quite the nap, though. I rigged our entire stock of sleep grenades to go off and it gassed the entire building. I knocked out the temporary Gladesdale guard captain, too, but it looked like he could do with a bit of sleep, anyways. I reckon they'll be asleep for a few hours more, but they'll be discovered before that. At that point they will know I betrayed them, but it doesn't matter." He would glance over at Petra and they would share a meaningful look. "Now that I found Petra, all that matters is that I keep her safe."

"As for abandoning the wagon... we might have to do that. There is a hidden path that leads to Aria's portal, big enough for a wagon to fit through; that's where they are taking the petrified people. The hidden path leads to the main road here, but the rest of my division is no doubt at some point along there as well. The way I see it, we can either leave the wagon and try to trek through the forest running alongside the road, or try to use some back roads to maneuver around the division and come to the hidden path. I'm not familiar with this area, so I can't really guide you, but I'll definitely recognize the hidden path when we come upon it."

At the mention of abandoning the wagon, Abby looked a bit distressed. She looked around at all her worldly belongings. The new life she had built for herself all resided within these wooden and canvas walls. However, she would look to the rest of the party with determination. "I'll do whatever we need to do." But she would quickly add in. "Perhaps I could disguise the wagon with an illusion spell and we would could back for it later."

"Just remember, that many of the 'bastards' are people with families of their own, who are simple soldiers following orders, with the unfortunate circumstance to be born within illusory borders where a handful of twisted individuals are calling the shots. I'm not keen on holding people accountable for things that they have no knowledge of. So Arthur, I appreciate the non-violent means." Revenge would shoot the young man a somewhat forced half-smile. "There's not a circumstance where killing should ever be a first resort."

Turning to the party, he would then ask, "We need to figure out the best way of getting to the petrified guards. That was the whole point of Araethos's trial, wasn't it? I expected to have to fight our way out of the town, so I wasn't expecting the luxury of being able to decide what to do next. How do we want to go about this? We should all be in agreement before we proceed."

A division to be returning, while the people they wanted to rescue would be heading towards that portal... the paladin had hoped the words of Sehanine would minimize the bloodlust and rage some of their number had fault, but it was hard to control a person so fixated on the path before them. He worried about engaging more Arians than necessary, but worried about that outcome's inevitability.

Kuori weighed the options, holding her hands out like a scale. "Stop division heading towards town that will probably be razed in an effort to find us or save statues from going to Aria where they will be cured and questioned. Hundreds of people in town, or 5 guards ..."

She held them up, shrugging and said, "Golly gee will ickers Revenge, I don't know what to choose it's just so hard." Her voice was heavy with sarcasm.

Arthur finally chimes in. "Well, I can tell you that my former division would not raze the town. That would be a bit... extreme. We are instructed to work within the laws of the towns we visit as we search for the targets we are assigned. The entire division was already in Gladesdale for the last two days while we conducted our search, then most of the division left early this morning and left twelve of us behind to observe the town for an indefinite amount of time. There were fifty total in my division, and I'm sure some are continuing on with petrified guards, so I'm guessing there are probably about 30 to 35 soldiers coming back to the town to help subdue and apprehend Abby.

"I don't mean to be too blunt, but I'm not going to let you take Petra anywhere near my former division. I don't know your group's combat prowess, but I do know theirs, and I don't think you would win by yourselves. I'm not about to let you risk Petra's safety. It took four years for me to find her and I'm not about to let them take her back."

Arthur would look over to Petra who would give him a sheepish smile but otherwise say nothing.

Abby would add. "I... have my doubts about the soldiers, but one thing I'm certain of is if they get those petrified guards through the portal, they will be beyond our reach and they will never be coming home again."

The paladin inquired as to the best way to avoid the division, and how best to get to the people they were trying to rescue. And in response, everyone seemed to look at him like he had just kicked a puppy.

"Er... huh? I never suggested risking anybody. Everyone here can choose to risk themselves if they so choose. I, for one, want to try to rescue those people who were the very reason why we've endured what we've had for the past week. If it involves you all spectating from the sidelines, then so be it. I'd still like to rescue them."

Turning to Kuori, he'd add, "Wasn't the whole point of us leaving as we did to fool them into NOT looking for us in town? I mean, they had some of their number see us leave, and when they find Arthur betrayed the garrison as he did, they'll put two and two together and come after us. Part of why I wanted to avoid the division and get around them, if possible."

Thinking on what Twyla had said, and Abby's concerns about her wagon, he'd offer up one possibility. "There's three ways I can see us utilizing the wagon. Like you said Twyla, we can try to bring it as far as we can to try and escape with later... though I don't know the terrain here to know if that's a possibility. Abby, we can try to move it out of sight and disguise it so we can come back for it later, which is option two. There's one more option that I see: If we can try to leave it hidden so we can come back for it, but as a decoy. I have a feeling in my gut that they might find it despite our best intentions to hide it, so If we can position it the right way, maybe we can trick the division into focusing their search in the wrong direction at least. If they don't find it then that's just as good, but we can at least try to do our best to throw them off our scent. Make them think we focused on saving our own necks and didn't go after the petrified guards."

Gesturing with one hand towards Kuori, he'd add, "That would, of course, require the expertise of a ranger, if you'd be willing to lend it."