The next morning was bright and warm, a fine day for traveling-and for giving the enemy an unexpected surprise.
Allen and his party of more than ninety carried five days of supplies and wore loose cloaks that concealed all their armor. Mounted on warhorses, they rode along the repaired road toward the Old Ford.
Allen had already learned the details of the Half-orcs in the Misty Mountains, and he worried that they might charge out of the forests or down from the Hillside to attack at any moment.
To preserve enough strength to handle such surprises, everyone advanced toward the High Pass at a steady, reasonably brisk pace under Allen's orders.
By evening, they stopped in the wilderness between the High Pass and the Old Ford. After setting up a simple camp, they spent the night resting warily beneath the stars and moon.
Bunduk, who had set out around the same time as Allen, led his infantry and archers to camp near the Old Ford, twenty kilometers away. Firentis and his cavalry would leave Wilderness Town at dawn the next day and reach the vicinity of the High Pass before dark.
This allowed the three forces to advance in succession, so that once Allen's bait force came under attack, the troops following behind could quickly reinforce it.
Yet the camp's surroundings remained quiet all night. The Half-orcs entrenched in Orc Town seemed to have truly abandoned the forests around the Misty Mountains and hidden in the tunnels deep within them.
The complete lack of activity that night gave Allen a few doubts about his baiting plan. If those nearly thousand Half-orcs stayed in their dark tunnels, doing nothing but breeding, they really would become a problem for him.
One could pursue thieves for a thousand miles, but no one could