A Record of Ash & Ruin: The Grieving Lands

Chapter 8: Surprise & Respite

The Fae of the deep woods and the places of the In-Between honored ancient pacts and promises, presenting their best warriors and life mages. They also gave unto the First Children great stores of witchwood lumber, grown from the giant sentient trees that had roots in both worlds so that the elven craftsmen might make living ships to travel the deeps. The forces under the command of the Elven High King were named the Eastern Alliance, as an entire continent prepared for war.

- On the Cataclysm by an unknown Quassian Scholar circa 103 AC

I awoke first to a kick in the stomach, where I felt nothing, which was followed by another more painful strike to the small of my back. Howling in pain, I forced my eyes open, reaching for a weapon that was no longer there. I dimly realized I was surrounded by four individuals clad in heavy-looking fur-trimmed leathers and chainmail. Shock filled me, as it dawned on me this was my first encounter with people, and they did not seem at all friendly. Through the pain, I tried to explain that I meant no harm, that this must all be some sort of mistake. But all that came out of me were wheezing coughs.

One of the men, the leader I presumed, was equipped with a plumed iron nasal helm. He spat out what I guessed was a mixture of invectives, curses, and orders in a coarse guttural language that had far too many consonants. I glanced at the other men, my eyes drawn to the mixture of cruel weapons hanging from their belts. An eclectic mixture of weapons, ranging from cavalry sabers to crude-looking clubs, heightened their menacing presence. One of their number held my broken half-spear reverently, which I subconsciously reached out for only to be met with a stinging backhand to the face.

The men were laughing cruelly at me, no doubt viewing me as no threat. Grasping at straws, I mentally targeted the leader of the small group and invoked Identify to try and regain some control of the situation.

Bogurchu Batbayar - Waverider (Human lvl.12) Health 142/144 Stamina 36/37

Mana 8/8

The men continued to taunt me, some with undisguised scorn in their eyes. One straddled my back, forcing my face to the ground, and muffling my cries of pain. Overpowered like a child, he grabbed my hair, forced my head up and shouted at me in a rage-filled voice, spitting droplets of hot saliva all the while. I imagined I could understand from their tone one in three of his insults, something to do with my mother, animal, or perhaps slave?

Another of the men, squat and heavily muscled but bow-legged in the manner of experienced horsemen, kneeled down before my face. Looking closely at him I saw cruel black Asiatic eyes and a jagged scar ran across his nose in a face that was pockmarked with the ravages of acne. His hands were calloused and rough from a hard life. He ran them almost gently through my dirty hair, muttering soft tones of perverse appreciation.

Then from behind, I felt the hands slip up the hem of my robe before another pair grabbed my buttocks firmly. Panicked, I tried to twist away, futilely flailing and kicking with my limbs. The men jeered and laughed at this, trading whoops and hollers with one another. With an angry grunt, Bogurchu pushed the man to my rear off me. Angered, the man issued a feral challenge to the leader, snarling with pent-up frustration. Bogurchu, in a firm voice that brooked no rebellion, barked at the man, until eyes downcast he grunted in frustration and stepped away from me.

They then gagged me with some sort of dirty cloth, the horrible taste like ash and ruin in my mouth. A crude sackcloth cover was then forced over my head before my limbs were tied with a strong rough rope. Then I felt another strike hit me in the back of the head. Dropping a large chunk of my Health, I fell into merciful unconsciousness.

Awaking to darkness, my first sensations were of the acrid stench of the sackcloth, like a mix of rotten vegetables and spoiled milk. I became aware of the rocking motion of some sort of creature. I could feel blood trickling down from the back of my head and a ringing sensation in my brain.

The hood was ripped from my head and a rough canteen was brought to my lips. I drank fervently, the water tasting of leather and stale, before coughing a little to the crude jeers of the men. Two pairs of hands from behind set me down upon the ground, and I could see that the animal in front of me was just a horse. It reminded me of the steppe ponies I had seen in nature documentaries, but a few hands taller with stronger, more muscular flanks which promised great strength and endurance.

Tied behind the animal I was forced into a shuffling stumbling walk, half dragging against the rope that bound me. Looking wearily in front of me I saw the strangest of sights

Before me was a sprawling city of tents surrounded by a high wooden palisade and a deep earthen ditch filled with sharpened stakes. Pairs of men armed with fine long lances patrolled upon the ramparts. There were four gates, at what I presumed were the cardinal points of the compass. Gasping, I saw that in the center was what could only be described as a great ark of a ship, like some enormous leviathan of the ocean that had been beached. Its neighbor was a large golden-domed white structure of some sort, reminiscent of the grand mosques I had seen back on Earth. Around the ark, four main streets of hard-packed earth, sporadically paved with bleach-white stone, could be seen flowing from the center of the city. Scattered across the tents there were a few rare stone and wooden buildings one and two stories tall. Towards the east just outside the walls was a primordial forest of trees golden and green in the late afternoon light. The smoke of many charcoal burners could be seen at the forest’s edge rising lazily into the air. Near the forest, I spied a quarry or a mining pit filled with workers toiling away at the alabaster rock.

Taken together the nomadic tents, the rough stone buildings, and the presence of primitive industry defied direct categorization. But the academic in me placed the level of civilization at around the 11th or 12th century, and a really rough guess would establish the population at perhaps twenty to thirty thousand. As I performed these rough calculations in my head, I was filled with a renewed sense of wonder as I realized that this single area was bigger in scale than the entirety of any of the adventure role-playing games I had played back on Earth.

Someone kicked me from behind as I had stopped in my tracks, snapping me from my reverie and forcing me to hurry and keep pace with the horse. Weary and exhausted, it was sundown when we finally approached the southern gate. Bogurchu exchanged words with the group of guards at the entrance before handing a length of knotted leather string and a single copper coin to a young boy who then quickly scampered into the city.

The streets were dry hard-packed mud, with the occasional deep ruts. People were closing down shutters as the city began to wind down for the day and make ready for the night. I could hear the daily sounds of city life when humanity is pressed together; the arguments, the minor violence, the crying of babies. A long line of miserable pale-skinned muscular men was being led down a street in chains, their eyes devoid of hope. They passed just as we walked by a great tent filled with music and the sounds of laughter and merriment, a stark contrast to the misery of the chained men. Their equivalent to a tavern I presumed. Occasionally a mounted patrol would pass us and Bogurchu would salute them, a closed fist over his chest.

Finally, we arrived at our destination; a squat building of rough-cut stone around two stories high. Every window of the building had wooden shutters and cast iron bars. At the entrance, two guards stood. They looked bored and tired in the way of men who had performed the same duty many times over, every action and order now just rote and repetition. They saluted our leader before lazily making way for our party.

Inside a stubby, bored-looking man was reading characters written on animal hide at a desk. He looked up to give us a lazy nod as we passed before I was roughly shoved into a stone cell. The hinges of the stout iron door squealed in protest as it closed with an ominous clang, heralding the finality of my imprisonment. I saw the guards turn to leave through the bars of the cell, a jaunt to their step of a job accomplished. Further down from my cell, the sound of playful laughter could be heard; men giving each other a ribbing, only to be tersely cut short by an authoritative voice.

My new environment consisted of a small cell, with a pile of straw in the corner. In the other corner were two buckets, one filled with water and the other empty. The walls were made from solid stone of uniform length and shape, the gaps filled with damp rotting mortar. A small window secured with iron bars just above my head let in a drizzle of twilight into my new dank dwelling.

I moved to the straw in the corner, sitting almost catatonic. A glance at my Health reminded me that I had suffered great damage with my beating this morning. Silently I cast Heal. Normally in a game, I would always be eager to try out an improved spell or skill, but now I felt nothing but dejected exhaustion. Halfheartedly I noticed that my spell was healing me for five points of Health, a vast improvement. This helped soften the aches that were running through me.

However magic could do little for bitter humiliation and hope cut savagely short. Huddling in the corner on the straw, I hugged myself in my cold damp cell. Feeling helpless, alone, weak, and under-leveled, I longed to return to the comforts and security of my old life. Frustrated at the absolute powerlessness I had experienced, I wept myself to a troubled sleep, filled with grim dreams of cruel men.