15 Come to the rescue.

"My lady, the dress that you ordered, isn't that look a bit bland? You should make another one that is covered with jewels!" Vanessa said.

"Really? I thought that's good enough since the dressmaker said it's perfect," Alexandria replied.

"She used to be a commoner, my lady, she married a baron, and do you think she doesn't know that you hate commoner? She said it's perfect but I think she's just trying to make you look unappealing in that dress!" Vanessa explained.

"Yes, my lady, Vanessa is right. The dressmaker was staring at you with a hatred look on her face, I saw it with my own two eyes," Nadia said.

Alexandria looked out the window with her eyes squinted. "I see..."

Both Vanessa and Nadia were glancing at each other with a smirk on their face.

Ares noticed that they had been followed ever since they left the capital city and since they were in the middle of the forest, it seemed a good opportunity for whoever followed them to start making a move. He told the coachman to stop and the coachman just looked at him with confusion. "What's wrong, Sir knight?" he asked.

"When I said you go for it, you go as fast as you can because there are dozens of men that have been following us ever since we left the capital city," Ares said as he jumped off of the carriage.

The coachman looked around immediately but he couldn't see anything but trees and bushes.

The carriage door opened and Nadia looked at Ares with confusion. "Why are we stopping?"

Ares walked toward the carriage door and looked up to see the three of them. "My lady, it seems that we have been followed by a group of people. They have been following us since we left the capital city and that only means a few things either they want to get some gold or they want to kidnap whoever is inside the carriage," he explained.

"What?! Are they crazy? Who dares to do something like that when they knew who's carriage is this belong to?" Vanessa said.

Ares shook his head. "Does it even matter? Look around us, my lady, we are in the middle of the forest, do you think they care about who you are? All they're seeing right now is a carriage with only a knight escorting the carriage,"

Alexandria looked at Ares unfazed. "What's your plan? Are you going to fight them off?"

"Of course, my lady, but with my lady here, I can't focus on dealing with them so I already ordered the coachman to leave as soon as they showed themselves," Ares answered.

"Good, now go and deal with them," Alexandria said. "Close the door, Vanessa, I don't want anything to happen to us," she continued.

Vanessa closed the door and Ares walked to the back of the carriage as he looked around.

"The hide and seek is over, show yourself," Ares said.

One by one a person appeared from the bushes and behind the trees. "One, three, five, eight, twelve, fifteen..." Ares mumbled as he counted the total of people that appeared around the forest.

Ares slowly backed away, Alexandria, Vanessa, and Nadia were looking at him with a worried expression since they saw how many of them were as well. He looked at the coachman and nodded, the coachman nodded back at him and immediately whipped the strap on the horse then the horse started running.

Alexandria was holding the wall and leaning on the couch, the three of them were starting to panic because of how fast the carriage was. The three of them were too scared that they didn't dare to open their eyes and suddenly the carriage stopped moving and they could hear the horse was neighing and the coachman was screaming. Not long after that, the carriage was flipped over and the three of them fell to the side.

"What's happening?!" Nadia asked while she was terrified.

"I don't know... I don't know..." Vanessa mumbled as she covered her head with her arms.

Alexandria looked around and heard footsteps, she tried to understand the situation even though she was terrified as well. She looked up and that was the only way out, but she didn't want to because it was safer for them to stay inside the carriage.

Alexandria looked at Vanessa who couldn't stop mumbling. "Keep your mouth shut!" she whispered.

Vanessa immediately covered her mouth with tears running down her cheeks.

The three of them could hear people laughing and chuckling from outside the carriage.

"Please... please spare my life!" The voice of the coachman could be heard from behind the carriage wall.

"Don't worry, we are not here for you, little guy, you can leave," A deep voice man said.

"Thank you, thank you!" The coachman stood up and immediately ran away but then he screamed as one of the bandits stabbed him in the throat and killed him instantly.

"How stupid can he be?!" The deep voice man said as he giggled. "There's no way we are going to let him live after witnessing everything," he continued and the people around him started to giggle and laugh.

"My lady, what should we do?" Nadia asked with her trembled voice.

"Shh!" Alexandria put her finger in front of her mouth as she glared at Nadia.

Alexandria's heart was pounding really fast that her eyes started to throb. All she could do was to keep quiet and the only thing that came to her mind was Ares, she couldn't think about anything else but him. She crouched and covered her ears to calm herself down, and deep down she was calling Ares's name over and over and hoping to see her and save her.

Nadia kept calling Alexandria but she ignored her and kept covering her ears because she could no longer endure the fear. The banging sounds that came from all around the carriage made her press her ears even harder, Nadia and Vanessa started to scream in fear then followed Alexandria by covering their ears.

They didn't know for how long they were stuck inside the carriage and suddenly they could see a bright light that came from above them. A shadow of a person could be seen blocking that light and it made the three of them even more terrified.

"M... ady..." A faint voice could be heard by Alexandria. "M... ady...!" the same voice could be heard and Alexandria noticed the voice and she slowly opened her eyes to look at the person. Her eyes couldn't see clearly because of the brightness until her eyes adjusted the light and saw Ares was offering his hand to her.

"My lady!" Ares said.

Alexandria smiled with relief without her realizing and she immediately grabbed his hand.

Ares pulled her up and immediately carried her down the carriage, Alexandria didn't complain about him touching her and not to mention carried her body with his body that was covered with blood.

"Are you alright, my lady?" Ares asked as he put Alexandria down.

Alexandria nodded her head repeatedly without saying anything.

Ares was relieved that he came on time or they might have done something bad to her. One thing that he was so sure about was that the bandits did not belong to that woman because they didn't know the code he said.

"Don't leave!" Alexandria said as she grabbed Ares's arm.

"I'm not going anywhere, my lady, I'm just going to help Lady Nadia and Lady Vanessa get out of the carriage," Ares replied.

Alexandria still didn't want to remove her hand from his arm and so he decided to calm her down first before helping those two. Her hands trembled as she kept looking down with her red eyes, she didn't even dare to look around her because of the dead bodies of the bandits.

Ares went on his knee and looked up at Alexandria. "My lady, look at me,"

Alexandria slowly looked at Ares with her whole body trembling.

"Everything is fine now," Ares said. "I will never abandon you, my lady, I will save you whenever you want and wherever you are," he continued. "That's the promise that I made to you, my lady, so you don't have to worry because I will risk my life to protect you," he explained.

Alexandria nodded with understanding.

"Now, am I allowed to take the other ladies out?" Ares asked.

"Yes, you may," Alexandria answered with her trembling voice.

Ares climbed up the carriage while Alexandria hugged herself and kept staring at Ares who tried to lift up Nadia from the carriage.

The three ladies were safe and they were scared to look at the dead bodies around them. Ares looked at the road and looked at the horse, the horse was dead and the carriage couldn't be used anymore. The only thing they could do was to walk back to the Valtris territory which was half a day of walking but knowing that he brought three ladies with him, it would take them a whole day.

"My lady," Ares said. "We have to go on a walk to go back to the mansion and that would take at least half a day without resting," he explained.

"A day?! Are you out of your mind?!" Nadia said as she glared at Ares.

"My lady, we can't walk that far!" Vanessa said.

Alexandria kept staring at Ares and ignored them both. "Okay, I will walk with you, Ares,"

"My lady?!" Both of them said with surprised expressions.

Alexandria turned around to look at them. "If you want to stay, be my guess, I trust him more than have to do nothing with you both around me. So, do what you want because I'm going to walk with Ares since he can protect me, not like you both who can only whine,"

Alexandria looked at Ares. "Let's go,"

Ares bowed his head as Alexandria walked past him.