He woke up.

Wait, I should be dead, shouldn't I? He lay still with his eyes closed for a moment, taking inventory of his aches and pains. They were not quite as bad as he remembered. I'm alive. I don't know how, but I'm alive. He could feel bandages, too—real ones.

He heard voices nearby but couldn't make out the words. When he opened his eyes, he saw that he was surrounded by elves. For a moment, all he could do was stare dumbly.

Elves? What?

Oh. Right. I found elves in a cage. He tried to take in his surroundings. They were in the woods, and one of the wagons was right next to him. The sky was clear and it was somewhere near midday.

The memories of the night before came back to him. Demon shit. Everybody's dead. Everybody but…these elves. Good gods, what are the elves doing? What are they going to do?

Belatedly, he realized that the reason he couldn't figure out what they were saying was that they were talking in Elvish. His lack of comprehension wasn't only because of his pounding headache and exhaustion. He looked around at the elves as best he could, viewing some of them upside down from his position.

He counted eight of them: four men, three women and a boy. They were still wearing the slave collars. However, they had changed out of the rags they had been wearing. Their new clothes didn't fit very well and had obviously been looted. Well, good for them. The clothes don't do the dead any good, after all.

This was the first time he had ever seen an elf up close. Huh, their ears really are pointed. They swept up and back a bit but stayed close to the head, rather than sticking out sideways like in some drawings he had seen.

The elves varied a lot in appearance. The oldest, judging by the white hair, was a man of average build. Next to him was a thin blond male probably a few years older than Tom. Make that a few decades, he corrected himself. His eyes were red, and Tom was alarmed for a moment before he realized that that was just his natural eye color. The next man was taller and wore leather armor that had bloodstains on it. His hair was sandy brown and his eyes were yellow. The fourth man looked markedly wan, as if he had been starving for a while. His hair was dark brown and Tom couldn't see his eye color.

His gaze kept on darting from person to person. The boy had black hair and orange eyes. He looked like a ten-year-old human, and the hate in his eyes was understandable. Wasn't me, kid. Not that he expected the boy to care.

The three women were standing together near his feet, so he could at least see them mostly right side up. One was tall and fit, with red hair and green eyes. Another was of average height, with straight black hair and the amber eyes Tom remembered seeing in the dark of the cage. The last woman was short, beautiful, and very busty. She had violet eyes and clear, pale skin, and her black hair hung in ringlets framing her face. Good gods, if she looks this good fresh from a cage…

The beauty crouched next to him and offered a water skin, holding it to his lips. He started to reach for it, but she grunted in wordless warning. Tom heeded her wishes and gratefully drank what little she poured into his mouth. I'm exhausted, and weak. He did his best to clear his throat.

“Hello,” he managed.

“He-lo,” the woman with amber eyes replied. Everyone else fell silent, watching.

Right, starting from nothing. They don't speak Western. He tapped his breast with one finger. “Tom.”

She pointed at him. “Tom.” Then she pointed at herself and said her name. Tom didn't quite get it.

“Dee-avala?”

“Di-av-la,” she sounded out.

“Diavla,” he tried, and she nodded. “Hello, Diavla.”

“Hello, Tom.”

“Kervan,” the thin blond man said.

“Hello, Kervan.”

“Hello, Tom.”

What should I say first? Tom touched his bandaged arm, then his chest, then held his open hand out, smiled and nodded. “Thank you.”

“Thank you,” Diavla answered back.

“Um…” She doesn't know what it means.

Diavla reached into a pouch and pulled out the key he had given her, showing it to him. “Tom. Thank you.” Oh, she did understand. He smiled, and she smiled back. Tom blinked. Wow. When she smiles, her face completely changes. It's like the sun coming out from behind a cloud. Somehow, he hadn't seen how pretty she was until she smiled.

Then he squeezed his eyes shut for a moment. Focus, Tom. He opened them again. My head is killing me. What should I say? He took a breath, then gently almost-touched his temple, his left arm, and his side. “Pain.” He closed his eyes again and put his hand to his temple again. “Sorry. Pain. Um…words. You need words.”

He took a breath carefully. “Human.” He tapped his chest, then ran his finger around the curve of his ear. “Human.” Then he pointed at Diavla. “Elf.” He ran his finger over an imaginary point on his ear.

Diavla pointed at him. “Tom. Human.” Then at herself. “Diavla. Elf.” Then at Kervan. “Kervan. Elf.”

“Yes.” Tom deliberately smiled and nodded.

“Yes.” Diavla nodded back. She looked around, and picked up the water skin, pointed at it. “Beloo?”

“Beloo. Water.”

“Otter?”

“W…water.”

“…water.”

“Good. Yes.” Tom nodded. “Beloo. Water.”

Kervan recited, “Hello, thankoo, Tom, human, elf, water. Yes. Good.”

“Good!” Tom was impressed.

A long game of pantomime followed, with Tom teaching them a handful of words like talk, sleep, go, drink, eat, give, get, food. Diavla and Kervan both recited them back, and Tom asked for the Elvish equivalents and did his best to learn them, too. Diavla looked surprised when he first asked, but didn't object.

Kervan asked for numbers, so they went over counting for a bit, and just kept adding words and practicing them. It took a minute to get “I” and “you” sorted out.

“Hello. I am Tom. I am a human. Bada. Tom fez. Onala fez.”

“Zedda,” Kervan answered with a nod. “Good.”

Gesture, gesture, gesture. Tom understood Diavla more easily than he did Kervan. Tom asked for water a couple more times. He found out that the short cute elf was named Sheema. “Thank you, Sheema. Gozalo, Sheema.”

After a bit, Diavla got serious and started asking real questions. She pointed in many different directions, asking, “Human?” each time. She wants to know which way humans are. Understandable.

They learned to translate tree, forest, road, town, day, and then Tom tried to answer. He didn't actually know much of the geography, but he described the road, and got across that there were few humans in the forest, for days in any direction, and Middleton and Rivermarch were two days and five days away along the road. Then everything got a bit blurry and he closed his eyes for a moment.

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When he opened his eyes again, the sun was somewhat lower in the sky. I fell asleep. Passed out, I guess. He felt a warm weight on his good arm, and turned his head. Sheema was asleep, her head on his chest and her curves pressing gently against his good side.

Wow, she is spectacular. Tom got an eyeful of her bountiful cleavage, then made himself look away. A strange place to take a nap…

Wait a minute.

Tom realized that his headache was appreciably less than before, and his gut felt less weird. Kind and gentle gods…Sheema is a healer! Healers were fairly rare; a big town like Middleton would only have a few. A bigger city like Rivermarch might have a handful. A healer. Wow. No wonder I survived.

Tom understood that healing magic was draining for both the patient and the healer, and Sheema wore herself out helping with his injuries, to the point of falling asleep on him. His exhaustion also made more sense now. She's giving a lot, to heal me.

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Kind and gentle gods, thank you. Tom could hardly believe his luck. I…might actually live, if Sheema keeps helping me. Tom wanted to laugh from relief, but held back. I need to make sure to stay on her good side. His survival was still miraculous, and Tom would certainly make an offering at the next temple he visited.

Right. No more staring at her, no matter how pretty she is. I can't risk angering her. I might still die without her help.

Tom turned his head and saw the tall redheaded woman standing nearby and smirking at him. Tom lifted his hands gently in surrender and defense. It's not what it looks like.

Inwardly, he thought, Gods, I'm the funny fool in a play. Tom glanced down at Sheema again. I probably shouldn't wake her, she needs to rest up if she's going to keep healing me.

When he looked up again, Diavla was there, wearing an expression of annoyance. Uh-oh. Varga and Diavla chatted quietly; Tom didn't know any of the words, but Varga was clearly joking at his expense, and Diavla was less amused. Fortunately, Sheema woke just then and jerked herself up off of him. Tom's eye caught the lovely bounce but he quickly forced his gaze elsewhere.

Tom went back to learning Elvish and teaching Western. For some reason, the elves got very stressed when he tried to talk about coins, but after a minute, relaxed and brought a copper piece, a silver piece, and a gold. He also got them to bring him a stick and some small rocks.

Very carefully, Sheema let him roll over onto his good side. He smoothed the dirt in front of him, and started laying out rocks by feel. He taught them the words merchant, guard, bandit, wagon, gold. Then he did his best to tell the story of the caravan attack.

He had an important request to make, and it took quite a while to get it across, but finally Kervan seemed to get what he was driving at. “Elf go.” He pointed at the spot Tom had marked as the camp the caravan had made in the evening. “Elf get, banditch, merchuh, guards. Elf go,” and he pointed at their current location. “Elf give Tom. Elf get clothes. Elf get armor. Tom get…” and Kervan vaguely gestured for small things.

“Yes. Please.” Explaining that word took a moment. Then the elves had a discussion, and three of the men left, including Kervan. Worn out, Tom took another nap.

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When he woke again, it was early evening and Tom's stomach was rumbling loudly. He asked for food, and Sheema said no. He asked for a little food. Sheema and Diavla talked back and forth a bit, then Diavla said, “You get water food.” Sheema held her fingers close together for emphasis.

They went over parts of the body, and Sheema showed more interest in learning Western for a bit. Diavla kept reciting words over and over, determined to learn as quickly as possible. Finally, they got to the important words kill, slave and collar.

“Humans see elves. Humans kill elves?” Diavla asked. Tom didn't have a good answer for her. He explained that he had only ever seen a couple of elves in the distance in his travels, and didn't know the law. “Humans see elves no collar, humans kill elves?” Again Tom protested his ignorance. “Humans see elves and collar, humans kill elves?”

“No.” Tom was glad he could finally answer something. He went over take, ask, steal, then tried to explain that someone killing the elves would be like stealing from the elves' master. The elves' expressions grew more hostile, and Tom tried to convey that he wasn't a slaver. I suppose they consider me guilty because I was guarding the caravan transporting slaves. Honestly, they kind of have a point.

Huh. I wonder if that's what got Kurt so angry just as we were leaving town? Maybe he didn't want to be guarding slavers, but Mr. Parson had already made the agreement for them to join the caravan.

He had missed things while his thoughts wandered, and they had to repeat some words. He tried to apologize, but getting that straight with their vocabulary would take a while and he couldn't think well enough with his headache. The elves tried to focus on the most important questions, apparently understanding that Tom was going to keep falling asleep on them and had limited stamina for thinking.

They asked him if there were any more bandit bodies than the four already burning, and he said no. He warned them that he had seen one man leaving, headed east. He told them that one or more was missing. They nodded to show that they knew, and pointed out the number of wagons.

Tom noticed a few changes. Some of the elves now had simple wooden spears for weapons. It seemed that some of them had actually gone back to the campsite and collected things. They had more armor than before, more clothing, and eventually, Kervan brought over three pouches. “Banditch, merchah, guard,” he recited, pointing out which was which, then left them with Tom.

“Thank you.” Tom didn't have the strength to go through the personal effects right then. Rest up, heal up, then do things, he told himself, his eyes heavy.

∘ ⛥ ⛯ ⛥ ∘

When he woke, it was dark. He felt much better. Sheema must have healed me again. The elves were having a lively discussion. Tom listened but couldn't make out any of the words. Eventually, Kervan noticed that he was awake and came over to sit beside him.

“Hello, Tom.” The elf had dirty blond hair and blue eyes. Something in his manner said scholar to Tom's soul. Maybe that was why he and Diavla were the ones learning Western most intensively.

“Hello, Kervan. What are you talking about? Um, what say?”

“We say… we do… day.” The elf was good at making a few words cover a lot of ground.

Tom furrowed his brow a moment, then took a guess. He pointed over his shoulder, at his lap, and then ahead and up, reciting, “yesterday, today, tomorrow. Yesterday, I am hurt. Today, I wake up. Tomorrow, I…eat. You say what you do tomorrow?”

Kervan looked upward, tapping his finger in the air as if reciting the words back in his head. He had a look of intense concentration, then nodded. “Yes, Tom. Yesterday, we are slaves. Today, we stay, tomorrow, we go. What we go, we say. Brallik say one, Varga say two, Rillik…you see?”

“Argue,” Tom supplied. “Um…yes! No! Yes! No!” He gestured with his hands as if they were arguing with each other. “They argue, where you go tomorrow.”

“Yes. Good good, Tom.”

“Good good, say very good.”

“Very good.” Kervan has a sharp ear. Heh.

“Yes. Um… Arven is tall,” Tom gestured about his forehead, “but I am very tall.”

“Brallik is…?” Gesture.

“Big.”

“Brallik is big. You is very big.”

“I am. You are.”

Kervan snorted. “Am is are is is. You know I say,” he dismissed the detail with annoyance. “What you know I say.”

“You know what I mean.”

“You know what I mean.”

Tom nodded. “Fire is very hot.” Gestures.

“Fire is very hot.”

“Sheema is very…” Tom stopped with his mouth open, then closed it, thinking better of finishing that sentence. The two men shared a look.

Kervan lowered his voice. “Yes. Sheema is very,” he agreed with mock seriousness.

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Tom let the Elvish argument flow around him, trying to pick out a word here and there and mostly failing. Meanwhile, he thought about his own future.

What do I do next? If they want to leave me here tomorrow, I might be in good enough shape to make it back to Middleton in a few days, less if I can catch a ride. It sounds like they don't want to stay put, and I don't blame them one bit. I wonder if they would let me go with them?

What's going to happen to these elves, if they are left to their own devices? They'll probably camp and hunt in the woods. The nights are starting to get colder. Do they even have winter where they come from? Do they know how cold it's going to get?

How long will they last before some other humans stumble across them? And what happens when they do? Will the elves kill anyone who sees them, to protect their secret? Rillik certainly looks like he wants to go human hunting.

They'll end up being hunted down and either killed or put back in chains eventually, unless they come up with a plan to get out of human lands and back across the Elven Ocean. But we're hundreds of miles from the coast. They must have been traveling in that cage for months, come to think of it. How horrible.

I don't want them back in a cage. I don't like slavery, period, but these people probably aren't even criminals, they're just enemy civilians, which as far as the Eastern Empire is concerned makes them fair game for enslavement. Which is just wrong.

So, I should help the elves. I owe them my life, after all. How could I…? Tom had an arresting thought.

“Huh.”

“Tom?”

Tom looked at the elf. “Kervan, I argue?”

Kervan raised an eyebrow and looked at him a moment, then muttered something to himself. Tom guessed it was something like, “well, this ought to be interesting.” Then the elf turned to the group, raised his voice, and got their attention for him.

“Kervan, I say human, you say elf?”

“Yes. I translate.”

“Thank you, Kervan.” Tom cleared his throat as all eight elves stared at him expectantly. How to say this with our bare handful of words and some gestures…? He took a deep breath and plunged in, with frequent pauses so that Kervan could keep up.

“One. Thank you. Thank you very much.

“Two. I thank you, I give.” Gesture, gesture. “I help. Help. Um…you are good, I am good. You are not good, I am not good. I want, you good.” He probably wasn't being too clear, but couldn't think of how to say it better.

Gesture. “Three. You…go…elf land. Very far.” Gesture. “Very, very far.” Gesture, gesture.

“Humans…ocean…elves.” Gestures. “You on boat. Boat go far, boat go elf land.” Gesture, gesture, gesture. “So…you get boat.”

He had their complete and undivided attention now. Diavla in particular was squinting a little, and looked as if she were waiting for a reason to smile. Tom was doing his best to give her one.

“You give gold, you get boat. You go home. Um, you go elf land.

“So…you want gold.” Tom pointed at the wagons. “You give wagons, you get gold.” Kervan's eyes widened and he rocked backwards, looking thoughtfully at the whole caravan. “You give gold, you get boat, you go home.”

“We get wagons. We go to Rivermarch. In Rivermarch, we give wagons, get gold.”

More than one elf started to interrupt but Diavla shouted them down so that Tom could keep speaking. She looked more wary now, but was giving him a chance. Tom took a deep breath and continued.

“We go near Rivermarch.” Gesture. “You stay in forest,” gesture, “I take one wagon. I go to Rivermarch. I give wagon, I get gold. I come back, I give you gold. I take wagon, I get gold, I give you gold. I take six wagons, one by one…” Gestures.

Rillik shook his head violently, and yelled. Kervan translated, “He say, No! You give elves, and you get gold!”

Tom raised his hands helplessly. “You say. You say, we do. Um…You stay in forest. I give one wagon. I get gold. I go to wagon. You hide.” Gestures. “I put gold in one wagon. I take another wagon, do it again. And again. When I go, you get gold, you hide. Again, again.”

Brallik rattled off something in Elvish, and stopped so Kervan could translate. “Brallik say, you take wagon, you give wagon, you get gold, you get guard, you go, you get elves.” Given the way Kervan pointed, ‘you go’ meant ‘you come here, back to us.’

Tom shrugged, then winced at the pain from the motion. “You say, we do. I thank you, I give. I help.”

“You get gold!” Tom felt tired of the accusations, and just plain tired.

“Yes. Some.” Gestures. “You get gold, you get gold, you get gold, I get gold.”

Kervan spoke up. “Tom. We get…nine gold. I get one gold, Diavla get one gold, Rillik get one gold, (something) elf get one gold, you get one gold?”

“Yes. Exactly. Yes.”

When the elves started murmuring in reaction, Tom's eyes closed, and he forced them open again. “I sleep. You talk. You argue. You say. Tomorrow, we do. Yes, do, thank you. No, no do, thank you.”

Tom's eyes closed again and Sheema yelled at the others a little. The conversation switched to purely Elvish again. Tom let his eyes stay closed this time, too tired to do anything else. His last thought was, I hope they keep an eye on Rillik so he doesn't kill me in my sleep.