I don’t know if I’m freeing them gently or breaking the bracelet murderously (sometimes referred to as bonds)
I just want to let them go nicely 
I’m not sure there is a canonical interpretation. I think it’s up to you how you choose to interpret it - this is, after all, a sandbox game where we are free to play as we choose. We also ‘break bonds’ with pets and they don’t have bracelets. If you wanted to be murderous, you could sacrifice them for sorcery, or interpret it in that way. On the other hand, as you wish to be pleasant, there is no reason to assume that you could not give them directions to Sepermeru (or back to their own village).
In my current playthough, I have no unwilling followers - only those that have chosen to join having been rescued from a cage (or, in due course, perhaps some will be hired from a tavern). Some have been sent on their way to a place of safety, others have joined the small group I am building. And multiple adult animals have been released into the wild. That is how I choose to interpret it.
When the bond is “broken”, there is no cry of pain or anguish.
They simply drop whatever they may have been carrying and are set free.
To think it over in such cases as named T4s, they must be forever bound to the Exiled Lands or the Isle of Siptah. Even if you free one, you will always find that one again.
Oh yeah, I didn’t think of that. I broke my bond with my horse. Thanks! and yeah, what you said makes sense. That does sound better.
Yep, you’re right about that. Now I feel better about releasing the people I set free from cages.
A reference to Conans master setting him free perhaps?
Wizard:
“It has been surmised, that perhaps, my Lord had become like a wild animal that had been kept too long. Perhaps, but whatever, freedom, so long an unremembered dream, was his”
Another example of “breaking bonds”:
that’s awesome