In the Spider's Web - part II

Slowly they are taken southwest towards the area of Anequina called the Rim, fighting the currents of River Larsius. Only the men and mer among the captives are offered water and scraps of bread while the beastfolk are ignored. The blindfold of one adventurer slips down and his attention is drawn to the riverside by the swift figures darting through the shrinking shrubbery and increasingly gnarled trees, but is unable to identify the stalkers. Meanwhile, Synette is struggling not to succumb to the great shame of lying naked among strangers, men at that.

At a spot where minor streams intertwine with several wadis, often called the source of the river, is where the wardens drag their captives off the barge. A few more mercenaries, some with horses are waiting for the barge at the shore. They place the five in manacles and chains, interlocking them all in a row. Now the beastfolk are given water for the first time, but only enough to survive the journey and no semblance of food. While the wardens take to the comfort of horseback, their wards are dragged along the chain they have tied between two horses.

The sun somehow seems harsher in this land and the air seems greedy about the slightest amount of moisture. Along a cobbled road on bare feet they travel, a road that occasionally disappears under a blanket of sand. Some of the adventurers manage to shake down their blindfolds enough to behold their wardens. Among them are only humans and none wears anything that could be considered a uniform or a badge to signify the presence of an authority. Rather the opposite these men seem like another collection of mercenaries.

Spirits are low among our adventurers, bound in iron and being led through an unforgiving desert. Their judgement at Rimmen seems like a distant worry. But despair is momentarily broken as the alabaster domes of the city rises beyond the dunes ahead.

 Source

Question of the "day" - What do you think is their crime? And what will their sentence be?