He slept for a long time. He had vague memories of trying to wake up, and Sheema saying, “sleep, Tom, sleep,” and then nothing but dreams. He dreamt of Diavla's eyes and Varga's smile and Sheema's body.
There were also nightmares about Rillik killing him, about the massacre, and about guards taking the elves away in chains. But those seemed to lose much of their power when he heard Sheema's voice whispering to him.
It simultaneously felt like just a moment had passed and ages had passed. Tom didn't have the words for it, except to say that his soul was scrambled, which he sometimes thought was his natural state anyway. Even though he often felt that he was cleverer than those around him, the world was big and often confusing, and the important details were always blurry.
When he woke, it was sunset, and the elves were making camp. He felt a lot less pain than before, though his arm still hurt and itched about as much as expected from his wounds. He wondered whether he could sit up on his own now, but was reluctant to try in case he broke something that Sheema had just fixed. He really, really didn't want to get on her bad side.
“Good (something), Tom,” Varga greeted him. He turned his head and she gave an odd little wave. “(Something) sleep good?”
“Good evening, Varga,” Tom said, parroting the word. At least he hoped that that was what he was saying. “Yes, I sleep good.”
Varga looked startled, as if she hadn't expected him to understand her, much less answer in Elvish. He winked at her. “You're cute,” he told her, knowing that she wouldn't understand.
“What you say?”
“I no say you,” Tom teased.
“What you (something) me?”
Tom just grinned. As he expected, she took it in fun and smiled back, with her green eyes narrowed. Even without a common language, it was obvious that she was a playful soul. The tall elf turned and shouted something to the others. Arven and Kervan came over and warned him with gestures, then got ready to lift the blanket he lay on. Then Kervan hesitated.
“Tom? You get? Please?” He pointed. Tom looked down at his side and spotted the pouch he had looted from the lead bandit. He grabbed it without trouble, and the men carried him right to the edge of the woods and set him down.
“Thank you,” he told them with feeling, and promptly crawled into the bushes for a minute to do his necessary, then returned. Sheema was making little noises of criticism without words.
Stay still, she clearly gestured, and the men carried him over to where Brallik was building a fire. Orvan held out some spices to Tom and asked questions, but Tom didn't really understand what he wanted to know, and he didn't know much about cooking anyway. “Sorry,” he told the old elf. “I no know.” Orvan sighed and went back to his cooking. He rejected his first creation as not good enough, even though it smelled fine to Tom.
While they were waiting, a lot of the elves did some stretches, like a training routine. The women were distracting, so Tom deliberately focused on Arven and took note of his moves. He mostly managed not to stare at the women that way, though he couldn't help stealing a couple of glances when Diavla bent over, her looted pants stretching tight against her lovely well-shaped behind. Tom felt his face heat and looked away into the trees, trying not to imagine what it would feel like in his hands.
They're all attractive: Varga, Diavla and Sheema. I don't know if sex works differently with elves though. I know we can't breed, and maybe there are big reasons for that. Tom discarded that idea when he remembered that one of the main reasons for keeping slaves in peacetime was for sex. So it must work somehow.
He looked at the physique of all the elves, trying to identify the differences from humans. The ears were obvious, and the eyes were every color of the rainbow and more. They were all shorter than average humans except maybe Arven and Varga. Every elf except for Brallik was thin; Tom wondered whether that was a racial trait or just that they hadn't been given enough food while they were prisoners.
Arven was stronger than he looked, and so was Varga. He was surprised to see how much she could comfortably lift when she brought more firewood. Her arms were lean and muscular, but not that muscular. Their muscles might work better than ours. I wonder what an elven blacksmith would look like?
Orvan called them to dinner when his second attempt measured up to his standards. The elf ended up making a sort of porridge, which Sheema allowed Tom to have in small portions. He ended up propped up against a tree a short ways from the fire.
“Saa, Kervan, ask Tom (something something),” Varga called as they sat around the fire. “He (something) good (something) tell (something.)” Tom was pleased to have caught that much, and probably couldn't do it again.
Kervan cleared his throat and Tom watched him. With some gestures he taught Tom three new Elvish words. Once he was confident, he translated, “ ‘here’, ‘there’, ‘where’.” Kervan repeated those back, then took a breath.
“Tom.” He paused, thinking. He pointed over his shoulder. “Yesterday?”
“Yes. Yesterday.”
“Good. Tom, yesterday yesterday yesterday…” he gestured for Tom to imagine continuing that. “Where you are?”
Tom blinked. “Oh! Where am I from?” He chewed his lip a moment. How do I want to do this? I'll pretend I'm in a play. I'm telling a story, after all. I should try to do it in Elvish, otherwise I'll use too many words they don't know.
Tom cleared his throat. “I…yesterday am…” He cradled his good arm and rocked it, making baby cries. “Waaah! Waaah!” Varga laughed. Kervan offered a word, but Diavla contradicted him. They made the gestures they had agreed on for a thing, and for doing, and Tom figured out the words baby and born from that. Kervan supplied was, and Tom tried again.
“I was born on Flax Hill. Um…flax…hill.” Tom made gestures. He was confident that huhm meant ‘hill’ but was less sure about flax. Close enough.
“Flax Hill is big? Small?” Diavla asked in Western.
“Very small. Very small. Uhh…” Tom got hung up on a number and thought about how to teach just the number he needed without interrupting the story for a whole lesson. He started lifting his fingers one by one very quickly, and recited in Western, “123456789 ten…” He switched back to one finger and continued raising fingers quickly, “ten ten ten ten ten, ten ten ten ten ten.”
“Hundred.”
Tom pointed at Kervan. “That,” he agreed, too tired to learn the word, and Varga laughed again. “Hundred,” he explained. “Ten ten is hundred.”
“Two…hundred …humans are in Flax Hill.” A flurry of gestures and pointing got him mother and father, using Varga and Arven as his victims. Varga made some sort of joke about her and Arven that Tom couldn't follow.
“Tom…father…farmer.” More gestures got it across and another word gained. “Boy,” he said next, pointing at Rillik, who scowled at him. Making a show of looking around, he pointed at Varga, and then mimed smushing her down to half her height.
“Girl,” Brallik called out. “Boy and girl.”
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Tom started again for practice. “I was born…Flax Hill. Tom father is John Farmer. Tom mother is Ann Farmer. John and Ann…baby…John and Ann…”
Varga shouted out a word, and most of them burst out laughing while Diavla and Kervan frantically waved their hands at Tom in denial, Kervan trying to hide a grin. Tom looked at Varga suspiciously, who made a vulgar gesture with her hips while grinning unrepentantly.
Tom sighed at Varga, smiling. Then he shook his fist at her, saying, “Vargaaaa…” in a warning tone.
Every elf immediately lost their smile.
Tom frowned, then froze, belatedly understanding. A couple of seconds of silence followed.
Make them understand. Now, he demanded of himself.
“No,” he told them firmly. He looked at his fist and shook it once. “Tom no do. No today, no tomorrow, no.” He went to pray to the sky but winced at pain in his left arm, so only raised his right as if to hug the stars. Looking up, he shouted, “Tom say! Tom say no do!” He hit his chest with his right palm, held the pose a moment, then dropped his arm and looked at the elves.
“You see? You see, please? I am sorry.”
He saw belief in Varga's face, and Orvan's, and Diavla's. A few moments later, Arven and Kervan nodded. Brallik and Rillik looked angry and unconvinced. Sheema scowled at him, but then spoke in halting, angry Western. “Tom! You arm no …go!”
“Sorry,” he told her contritely. She nodded, and her face grew less hostile.
There was quiet for a few moments. Then Varga stood up, obviously trying to lighten the mood. She jutted her chin at Tom, and said something combative in Elvish. Then she mimed pulling off her collar and throwing it away, and then pointed as if to say, “You. Me. Here. Fight.” She raised both fists and waved them threateningly at him, hopping in place, a smile on her lips.
“Oh, yeah? Yes?”
“Oh, yeah?”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah?”
“Ha!” Tom called. “If no collar, no collar, then one. Boom!” He held up one finger, then mimed throwing his fist. “No collar,” he said again, to be very sure everyone understood.
“Ha!” Varga gestured at his prone body. “Rillik (something something). Rillik go boom you now! I (something).”
“You do now? You go here now. No collar…” Tom mimed reaching up as if to pull it off of her.
All the other elves froze again. The blood drained from Varga's face. After a moment, she walked closer.
“Yes?” Hesitantly, she stumbled over the next words. “N-now? P-please?”
Tom stared at her in shock for a few moments. Then he blinked. “Wait. You've been waiting for me? You…” He stopped short.
Could it be that they can't take the collars off themselves? Magic or something? Is that why they're still wearing them?
Tom looked around at the elves, and saw the tension, fear and hope on their faces. They need my help to get the collars off. Why didn't they ask…? Tom drew a deep breath through his nose. They were scared I would say no. Tom actually felt insulted, even though he knew their fear was perfectly sensible.
“YES! Of course!” After a beat he translated, “Yes yes! Now!” He scowled. How could they even think that of me, that I might have said no!? Tom turned and looked at Kervan. “Kervan, go…” he pointed at the ironwork wagon, “get…” he mimed a cutting tool.
Oddly, Kervan just stared at him. The elves all looked at each other in silence a moment. Then Diavla took a breath and made some sort of declaration in Elvish, addressing the group. She turned to Tom.
“No Tom. No cut…” she mimed cutting. “Key.” Everyone else was absolutely silent.
Tom wondered what he was missing. It was very important, whatever it was. “Where key?”
“You have.”
Tom blinked. I don't have anything that could be keys, unless… Quickly he looked around, and saw the bandit leader's pouch beside him. He opened it and shook out some coins, the only things still left in it. On a second look, the coins were the wrong color and felt a bit off-weight.
Tom shifted position carefully, Sheema helping him. “Diavla, here,” he called quietly. Diavla hurried over and crouched next to him. He held out the pouch to her, but she flinched away.
“No, Tom. You do.”
“You do,” he asked. “Please?”
Diavla shook her head violently. “I no do. You do. You.”
Tom tried not to scowl again. This is going to be awkward. “Fine. Yes. I do. What I do?”
“Get key.” Diavla pointed at her throat. “Key go here.”
Tom grimaced. He picked up one of the fake coins. Diavla sank to her knees, offering him her throat nervously. He reached out and touched her neck; her skin felt cold, and she had goosebumps. She's scared. “I help. I help,” he almost whispered, trying to reassure her. Her breath caught.
Tom slid his fingers along her throat until he reached the collar, then carefully started feeling along it one-handed until he found a circular dent. I guess it goes in there. Gently he pressed the key into the depression, and nothing happened. Tom frowned, pulled it back, turned it over, and tried again. Still nothing. He started rotating the coin in place, little by little.
“What I no do?” he demanded, frustrated.
“Tom,” Kervan said quietly. He had crouched down nearby. “Yes, Diavla key.”
Tom squeezed his eyes shut a moment in annoyance. Of course they had to be individual keys, it couldn't be something simple…this is going to take a while. He opened his eyes, put the wrong key into the pouch, and picked up the next one. Kervan was watching closely.
“Tom. Is no Diavla key.”
“Then which one is it? Show me!” Tom gestured vaguely.
“I no do.”
For the love of the gods… Tom stabbed his finger down on another coin. “Diavla?”
“No. Tom, key say.”
That doesn't help me, Tom growled mentally. He stabbed at a different one. “Diavla?”
“No. Tom, Diavla collar say, Diavla key say.”
Kervan sounded annoyed as well. Tom felt frustration and did his best to stifle it. He think's I'm just illiterate, and expects me to match the symbols. He stuck his finger on the next one.
“…Diavla?”
“No.”
Tom took a deep breath, trying to keep hold of his temper. “Diavla?”
Kervan paused. “Yes? …Yes.”
Tom picked it up, rubbed it a moment to make sure it didn't have dirt on it, and pressed it against the slave collar around Diavla's neck. With a loud click, the collar opened.
Diavla gasped and yanked the collar off of her, flinging it away. For just a moment, she stared into his eyes with blazing intensity. “Thank you.” Then she scrabbled in the dirt, picking up another key. She stood up and shouted. “(Something) me (something) collars!”
Most of the elves gathered around her, but Varga knelt in front of Tom. Kervan was still crouched beside him, and leaned over to peer at Varga's collar for a moment. They had to go another round of guessing before Tom put his finger on the correct one, and then he reached up and unlocked Varga's collar.
Varga threw the collar hard over her shoulder the moment she could. Then she leaned closer and Tom couldn't see her expression any more. She grabbed his head with both hands and pulled him into a firm kiss.
Tom was stunned. The kiss wasn't sexy but it was clearly passionate. She…she's kissing me… Tom's soul wasn't keeping up. Varga pulled back after a moment, not letting go of him, and cried, “Thank you, Tom! Thank you, thank you, thank you!” and she pulled him into another kiss.
She tastes salty. Is this what all elves taste like, or…?
“VARGA!” Diavla yelled. She sounded angry with the other woman. “Help (something something) collars (something)!”
Varga broke the kiss and yelled something back, then turned back to Tom, still too close for him to see, and shifted her hands to his shoulders. “Thank you! Diavla (something something) you,” she told him quietly. Then she reached down, grabbed a key and bounded to her feet. Tom decided that he didn't want to think about that kiss right then, and determinedly focused on what he could see before him.
In about a minute, the last collar came off and the clearing was full of joyful shouts in Elvish. Tom was glad for the elves, but upset that they had thought he might not take the collars off when they asked. He knew it didn't make sense; they barely knew him, and plenty of men would have told themselves that being the elves' master was the best thing for them. The existence of those horrible collars was reminder enough how nasty some people could be. He struggled with his pride, eventually succeeding for the most part.
They had no way of knowing that I wasn't a slaver, or greedy, or… He took a steadying breath. Let it go, Tom. They're free now, and that's what's important.
He sighed. Free, but fugitives. They still need my help if they're ever going to get home. I don't even know what the laws are, but I guess I'm their lifeline. He watched with a smile as Varga jumped up and down with glee, and thought hard about the situation.
If we're going to work together, I should take charge. I know the language, I know humans, and I know the area. I've led groups before, I can do it fine. But being given orders is the last thing these people need right now.
To be fair, if I were them I'd probably still be worried about betrayal in Rivermarch or something. Or me acting like their Master even though I'm not. Tom grimaced. Actually, I might be their Master, depending on what the laws say, and I might have to act like it. We're probably going to need to do a lot of lying to get through however many countries it takes to reach the coast. And a lot of that won't be fun for the elves.
Tom took a deep breath, noting with gratitude that he could, thanks to Sheema's healing. They need me. I don't envy them their position. They're going to be doubting me every step of the way, especially when I have to act superior to them, all high and mighty like the nobles I used to guard. I'll need to prove myself to them over and over until they see that I mean them no harm.
Well, then, that's what I'll do. Thoughts sorted, Tom allowed himself to relax and smile. I did a good deed here, and I should enjoy it instead of brooding. His gaze wandered from elf to elf as he tried to get more familiar with their personalities. If my guess is right, we're going to be together for a long time. I should do my best to get along with everyone.
For the moment, Tom just sat back and watched the elves be happy.