I don’t know if it will be a surprise to you, but it was certainly a surprise to me. The rest of my journey to the capital, Westfield, was peaceful. I didn’t get into one single fight. Not one. I never really even got close to getting in to it with anyone. It was a new record.
The road between Shroud Hallow and Westfield was more trafficked, better patrolled and small towns and villages appeared near the roadway regularly. In fact, they were so common that I spent the majority of my nights sleeping in beds of various qualities at a variety of inns and guest houses along the way.
All the while, I projected the illusion of Dakota Brown’s pinched and waxen face. If anyone was able to pierce the illusion, it went unremarked.
About three days out of Shroud Hallow, I saw the column of guards riding back towards Shroud Hallow. They moved at a much more leisurely pace. Their appearance was not nearly as polished. Even their leader looked tired, and the dust of the road had marred her impeccable appearance. They didn’t stop to talk, but their leader nodded at me as she rode past. I noticed that they didn’t have any fugitives from justice with them. Strange, that.
My purse was pleased by the prices I encountered in the villages along the trail. Everything was pretty affordable, a little more expensive than the prices in Sleetfield but significantly less than the price gouging in Shroud Hallow. I guess that Shroud Hallow really was a boomtown, rich with the wealth generated by enslaving my kind and the resources plundered from the island. I knew that at some point in the not too distant future I would need to return to the town, to travel to the island, and to see what I could do to improve the lot of my people.
After my last few social encounters, I largely kept to myself on the road. When others attempted to converse with me, I responded pleasantly. I also didn’t answer in a way that invited further conversation. Usually, these exchanges would end after only a couple of sentences, and I was happier for it. I don’t know what it was about being unmoored, alone in a world where I didn’t know anyone and couldn’t trust anyone, but my suspicion of others bordered on paranoia. Experience is a great teacher.
When I was done traveling for the day, to occupy my time I began studying Meditations on Light. I soon concluded that Erasmus Nickleberry, whoever he was, must have been a con artist of the highest order. The writing was dense, pedantic, and nearly inscrutable. Take this sample passage as an example:
Light can illuminate but can also obfuscate. Without it, we have no sight and are forced to perceive the world with the lesser senses. Touch, smell, sound, these are all inferior to the wonders of the natural world that are revealed by the gift of sight. None of these other senses allow one to perceive a soaring mountain vista, or the shimmering reflections of the moon on a body of still water. The light of the sun warms and nurtures us, and without it plants soon die, falling into rot and decay. Light plays tricks on us, our minds leaping to conclusions, often confused by what we think we perceive, mirages, rather than what is actually there, present in the world. The absence of light touches a deep part of our souls, allowing our imaginations to run wild, our other senses heightened, the ominous weight of the darkness influencing us at a primal level.
So, in summary, his profound conclusions were that seeing is better than not seeing. Most plants die in the darkness. Sometimes we misinterpret our sensory input and see things that aren’t really there. And as a race, we are afraid of the dark. Truly profound stuff there. What a waste of money.
Still, I soldiered through it, even rereading it a second time. After all, I had dropped a bunch of coin on it, and perhaps in his recitation of truisms there might be one or two things that would spark my own reflections. Maybe the fact that I like to read and didn’t have any other books played a part in it as well.
It took me another twelve days to reach the capital, and I wasn’t lackadaisical in setting my pace. On a slow day, I covered at least twenty miles, and many times five or ten miles more. My speed increased as I approached the capital. I traversed another range of mountains and followed the road, which ran beside a river, out onto a broad plain. The land was lush and fertile, farms dotting the landscape to supply the needs of the greater population in this part of the country. As I reached the flatlands, my pace increased. Certainly, it was easier to walk along level ground than it was to climb up and down hills or to traverse a mountain pass, but all this exercise was the workout program I needed to improve my stamina. It was what I needed but not necessarily what I wanted.
By the time I was getting close to Westfield, I was passing through multiple villages every day. In some respects, it was difficult to tell one from another. Although I am certain that the inhabitants each had their own brand of civic pride and could spend hours extolling the virtues of their village versus the one a three hour walk away, I didn’t see much difference between them. Where I could, I unloaded a little more of the jewelry, but could find buyers for only the most basic pieces. A few of the things I was carrying likely represented enough wealth to buy their whole village. Sometimes, I was actually grateful to come into this world the way I did. If I had gone to sleep one night and had just woken up in a whole new world without any resources, I doubt I would have survived long enough to write this.
The river continued to broaden as it curled eastward from the last set of mountains. Soon, I could see barges hauling goods plying the river. As has always been the case, moving goods by water was less expensive and more efficient than carrying them over the land.
Whenever I stayed at an inn, I would ask the innkeeper how much farther it was to the capital. When the answer was ten days, eight days, it was a letdown. I was so habituated to just getting into a car, or on a bus, or train, or on a few occasions even an airplane, and watching the miles pass by with little effort on my part. It’s different exploring the world on foot. It seems so large, so much more grand.
When the innkeepers started answering five days, three days, one day, my flagging spirits were revitalized. I was almost there, and it appeared that I would survive the journey. Finally, in the middle of the afternoon on my last day of travel, I started seeing a city in the distance. First, I spied a pair of towers soaring into the sky, but as I got closed I noticed the capital was surrounded by a high, stout looking wall made of grayish stone. The city had long outgrown its original wall, and businesses and dwellings surrounded the wall in a disorganized mess. A little urban planning would have gone a long way in this world.
As I reached the city proper, I realized that I must have been entering from the stinky quarter. Stockyards, tanners, butchers, smelters and other buildings that pervaded the air with the noxious fumes of their craft surrounded me. After so long in the fresh air of the wilderness, the stench was overpowering. It didn’t help that this part of the city appeared to lack a sewer system and nobody seemed overly interested in keeping the streets clean. Animal dung was everywhere, but some of the waste that turned the dirt streets into muddy rivers of filth and excrement wasn’t from animals. I learned to step lively when I heard the shutters of an upper window swing open as on many occasions I saw people dumping their chamber pots down onto the street.
I felt like I needed a course of antibiotics and fervently wished I had been better vaccinated when I pondered the filth that caked my boots. I was actually quite lucky as the main road was cobblestone and not dirt, but that didn’t keep anyone from using it as their public cesspit.
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The people on the streets in this park of town looked pretty rough. Life was clearly hard here, and the strain of making a living aged people. I saw young children put to work in a variety of occupations. Some of the people I crossed path with who looked middle age were probably in their early twenties. There seemed to be an unspoken agreement, however, that people walking the main road were to be left alone. Unless, of course, you were a beggar, reaching out with a piteous expression on your face, highlighting physical infirmities both real and imagined.
I say imagined because there was one older orcish woman who was pretending to have no legs. She sat huddled on the ground, the bottom of her body covered with a blanket, but she had not arranged it carefully enough. I saw her heel poking out from the edge of the covering.
I stoically marched onward, hoping that this wasn’t all that Westfield had to offer. Although it felt like it took hours to get there, soon enough I was approaching the wall. A wide gate, fully opened, beckoned me into the city proper. A squad of guards flanked the gate, and there were more on the top of the wall, but one glance at my well to do appearance and I was admitted to the city without issue. It was a little creepy walking through the sally port under the wall. The ceiling was lined with murder holes, ensuring a painful welcome for those who attempted to enter uninvited.
Stepping out into the late afternoon sun, I was greeted with a very different vista. This part of Westfield was well-kept and orderly. After entering an open plaza, which I assumed was meant for the marshaling of troops in the event of a siege, stone streets ran outwards in several directions. With an eye towards defense, no buildings were built within fifty feet of the wall. Looking towards the two soaring towers, I noticed they capped a stone keep in the middle of town, the hints of its wall poking up over the surrounding buildings.
OK, so I had made it. Now what? I had spent so much time planning my travel, treating reaching Westfield as a trip to the promised land, that I had not really considered what to do when I got here. Sure, I knew that I wanted to attend the slave auction, which was still a couple of weeks away, and I needed to sell some jewelry but what was I going to do in the meantime? Where would I stay? How would I occupy my time?
I spent almost an hour just wandering around that square. There were a couple of street vendors selling food, so I strolled around sampling their wares. After consuming some sort of dubious looking meat on a skewer and half a loaf of bread, I was approached by a human male, apparently in his late teens. For all I knew, he was probably thirteen or so. He was dressed in a plain woolen robe of some sort, and I immediately distrusted the zealous gleam in his eyes.
“Hi, stranger,” he said. “Are you new in town? You look a bit lost.”
I had to fight the urge to scream "who are you and what do you want from me?" I had spent enough time in this world to know that people who would go out of their way to help a stranger were few and far between. Warily, I responded.
“Yeah, I’m new here. I walked all the way from Sleetfield. I’m tired and, no offense, but you seem to want something. If you are trying to sell me something, I don’t want to buy it. If you are offering your services as a guide, I’m fine with finding my own way. And if you are here to ask me for money, you can kindly piss off.”
Yeah, my response was a little caustic. It was so harsh in fact that the young man drew back as if he had been slapped. Which, all things considered, I guess he had. Verbally at least. But if he didn’t leave me alone, other options were still on the table.
He quickly recovered though, plastering a fake smile back on his face.
“I represent the congregation of the one true god, the Lord of All. I would be glad to offer you a place to stay for the night, and free food if you would be willing to listen to the Lord’s wisdom.”
Apparently, people here didn’t proselytize door to door, they just waylaid weary travelers. I didn’t know who this Lord of All was. I didn’t know whether the congregation was influential and could make my life miserable in the city, or whether I was being recruited to a cult. Either way, I didn’t much care.
“Do you know how many football games I missed on Sundays because of church services,” I said, totally exasperated.
“Football games?”
“No, of course you don’t. I have enough money for food, enough for lodging, and my time is my own. I don’t give a shit about your Lord of All and certainly don’t need any of his wisdom.”
The young man gasped at my response and fell to his knees. “Lord forgive this heretic for he knows not what he speaks of,” he intoned, raising his arms to the sky.
Then he stood and gave me a grim look.
“Your heresy has been noted and you have been marked.”
I felt a sudden warmth spill over me, then there was a painful burning on the side of my neck. I felt the skin bubbling and cracking. Although I couldn’t see the side of my neck, I reached out with my hand and ran it over the painful flesh. It felt like a thin, ridged scar had formed on it.
The young man stared at me with a look of astonishment, studying my neck. Oh, yeah, I thought. He can’t pierce the illusion. Then he closed his eyes and soon a look of relief passed over his face.
“I don’t know how you are hiding the visible mark, heretic, but my faith lets me see it. Yes, I can see it and so can all of the loyal followers of the Lord. You will be given no succor unless you repent and follow the righteous path.”
This jerk had cast a spell on me! I was not going to just sit there and let him walk with impunity. My hand darted to the rapier sheathed at my side. As I started drawing it, I heard a person nearby clearing his throat.
Glancing that direction, I noticed one of the guards from the gate, a large heavily scarred orc, had wandered in my direction.
“What’s going on here?” he asked.
The young man and I both started talking at the same time. He kept shouting about unbelieving blasphemous heretics. I was equally incensed, talking about how this asshole had cast a spell on me, marking me. Raising his hands, the guard opened his mouth and shouted.
“One at a time!” Pointing at me, he said “You first.”
I explained what had happened, and as I talked his face clouded over. I could see a vein throbbing in his forehead. If blood pressure medicine existed in this world, he needed some.
“Is this true?” he asked the young man, turning to face him.
“It is. I cannot let him demean the one true god!” the young man replied.
“I’m sorry you were assaulted,” the guard said to me. He reached out towards the young man. “And you are under arrest.”
“Another heretic,” the young man spat. Then he raised his hands towards the guard and the guard’s body went rigid, locked up with a pained look on his face.
I have had enough of this, I thought. Drawing my rapier, I lunged forward piercing the young man’s left shoulder. That seemed to break his concentration, and the orc guard was suddenly free. He jumped on top of the young man, bearing him to the ground. Then, his mailed fists rose and fell, delivering an unremitting series of punishing strikes to the young man’s head. He continued pounding out his fury for some time until he shakily rose, out of breath.
I gulped as I glanced at the young man’s ruined face. His nose was broken, all his front teeth were missing, and his breathing was ragged.
“Thank you for the assist, sir,” he said to me. “If this one survives, he will be hung for attacking me with magic. I suggest that you visit the Mages Guild. They should be able to remove the mark.”
Nodding, I asked for directions which he happily provided.
Now, I had somewhere I really needed to be. If there were any more of these nutcases around, I really didn’t want to come to their attention.