Chapter Seven: Pross and Jela
Tranith Argan: Book 3
Slaves of the saarks now, the travelers look around their surroundings and meet some of their fellow slaves
They could see across the corridor to cells on the other side, and for a few cells in either direction. They could also see through cells on their side, for each cell abutted the next on a side, with only bars separating them. Across the way were a few sleeping prisoners, to their left was an empty cell, and to their right a cell containing two prisoners, a man and a woman. Kara walked over to that side and looked in at these two, wondering what their story was and how they got there. They looked to be in their early adulthood, though a worn look sat on each of them, giving them years on their face they had not earned. The young man had brown hair and a dark, scraggly beard. The woman had his brown hair, and eyes to match. As Kara looked at the woman, she looked back, and then stood up and approached Kara.
“I am Jela,” she said quietly. Her eyes looked tired, and her forehead was lined.
“I am Kara, and this is my brother, uh Fel, and my friends Dolen and Alessa. Are you hurt? Have you been mistreated?”
“No, I am not hurt yet,” said Jela, “but it will happen. We are to be punished, my brother and I.” She waved her arm toward the man lying on the floor behind them, sleeping. “He’s Pross. My older brother.”
“Why are you being punished?” asked Kara.
“Same as you, I suppose,” said Jela. “Did you disobey too?”
“We just got here,” said Kara. “We’ve not had any orders to disobey, but I’m sure I’ll do my share before long.”
“Oh no, don’t!” cried Jela as her sad expression turned to fear, “it’s not worth it! I’m so sorry I did what I did.” She looked around fearfully to the corridor as if sensing saarks approaching to administer her punishment.
“What will they do to you?” asked Kara with concern.
Jela closed her eyes and shuddered.
Kara reached through the bars and grabbed Jela’s arm and squeezed it gently. Jela jumped at her touch and opened her eyes in surprise, but then relaxed and looked at Kara wonderingly. Jela smiled tentatively, and then reached out herself to return the touch. A tear welled up in her eyes, and she merely said, “Thank you,” and then turned away.
Kara returned to the others and they sat on the floor and discussed their situation, but nothing came of their talks other than realizing they knew too little of their surroundings to create an escape plan yet. So after a while Felanar stood up and walked over to the bars between them and the brother and sister. Kara joined him and together they talked with Jela about her story.
“We were captured six months ago,” she said sadly, “I think. Maybe it was longer. I don’t know. Keeping track is hard here.”
“Where are you from, a nearby village?” asked Felanar.
“No, farther away, along the river,” she said. “Beautiful land, I miss it so much!”
“What do you do here?” asked Kara.
“We both mine for gold, Pross and I. They use it for trading with the autarch, or to buy supplies from my people.”
“Your people trade with these animals?” asked Kara in shock.
“Yes, of course,” said Jela puzzled.
“But they treat you as slaves!”
“Only a few of us. With most of our people they deal fairly. This is their way,” said Jela, “it has always been this way in these lands. When they need extra workers, they take them from my people. The rest of the time we just trade with them, and they are good traders.”
“But don’t you object to this? Being taken as slaves?” asked Felanar.
“It is sad, but what can we do?” she asked. “They are too strong for us, and the autarch does not protect so far north. My brother and I are chosen so the rest of my village can be spared. It is our sacrifice for the village.”
“Why do your people live in this area?” asked Kara. “Why not go further south to live nearer the autarch and come under his protection?”
“Our homes are here, near the river,” said Pross, who had woken up. He was half-a-foot taller than his sister, but looked very much like her. “We are not for the desert ways like the autarch and his people. Besides, we do not believe as the autarch, and would have to convert to live among them.”
“Convert to what?” asked Kara.
“Their beliefs, of course,” the brother replied, and then looked curious. “How do you not know of these things? Where are you from?”
Kara looked at Felanar, and he responded.
“We are from the eastern lands.”
“Eastern lands?” remarked Jela. “What are you doing here?”
“We were shipwrecked near High Point,” Felanar said. “We are trying to make our way back home across the Plain and then to Elaria.”
“The elf home?” asked Pross. “Why would anyone want to go there?”
“What is wrong with Elaria?” asked Alessa. “What is wrong with elves? You are not the first to speak ill of my people in these lands and I wonder where such attitudes come from.”
When she drew up to within a few feet of the brother and sister, they both drew in their breath simultaneously and stepped back in horror.
“What is wrong?” asked Alessa. “I am not going to harm you in any way.”
Pross looked at Jela, and then cautiously back toward Alessa.
“I mean no disrespect,” he said, “it’s just that I’ve heard such terrible things about elves that it frightened me to see one in the flesh. You won’t harm us, will you? We are simple folk, there’s no reason to harm us.”
Alessa laughed, and her laughter rang out with such clarity, and in such incongruity to their surroundings, that as it echoed through the caves it stirred in the other prisoners a feeling of something lost, an emotion they had thought gone from their lives. It was so foreign to this place that they each walked up to their bars and pressed themselves against it to see the source of this beautiful and happy sound.
“Of course I will not harm you,” Alessa said with a warm smile. “I have no desire to harm any living creature, especially one that does me no harm. You have nothing to fear from me, and it bothers me to think of the stories you may have been told about my people. We are a peaceable race, a people of nurturers, a kindly people. I promise you, in me you have a friend.”
Brother and sister cautiously approached the bars separating the cells, and again took in their breath as Alessa’s eyes came into closer view and the fire within those eyes glowed brighter in the darkness. But then they smiled tentatively, and Pross said, “I thank you for not harming us, elf lady.”
“Please,” said Alessa as she held her right arm through the bars, “take my hand in friendship.”
Pross looked at her outstretched hand for a moment as if wondering if this was a trick, looked at Alessa’s face to confirm the smile that was still there, and tentatively reached for her hand, touching it gingerly as if something hot. Alessa held very still and let the man take his time, until finally he gently grabbed her hand with his. He visibly relaxed in the calmness of her touch, and even smiled back. Jela reached out and took Alessa’s other hand, and smiled too.
“See?” said Alessa, “we are friends.”
Alessa’s head turned suddenly as she listened. She announced that someone was approaching, and soon everyone heard the footsteps. Prisoners in other cells who had pressed up against their bars to see Alessa, now shrank back to the rear of their cells. Jela’s face became panicked and she pressed herself against her brother. He wrapped his arms around his sister and neither said a word.
A group of four saarks marched down the hallway, glancing into each cell as they walked, until they reached Pross and Jela’s cell. They stopped while one unlocked the bars. Jela buried her face in her brother’s chest and began to cry. One of the saarks turned to Felanar and the others and roughly said, “Watch and learn obedience, slaves.” Three of the saarks entered the cell and told brother and sister to assume obedience positions. Quickly Pross and Jela fell to their knees and bowed until their outstretched arms touched the floor and their heads looked straight at the ground.
A saark guard unfastened a thick whip from the belt on his uniform. Kara saw that Jela was quivering as she lay prone, and making whimpering noises. Felanar looked at the whip and remembered his time onboard one of their ships and seeing the hopeless faces of the beaten-down oarsmen. Whipping their prisoners was evidently commonplace to the saarks.
Then he realized this particular whip was different from the ones on board the ship. This one had sharp metal fragments sticking out from the bound leather at regular intervals. Felanar knew he was looking at a special type of whipping, a punishment whipping instead of a motivation whipping, and he understood Jela’s fear of what was about to occur. He winced at what was unfolding before him.
One saark guard stood on top of the prisoner’s hands, a foot on each hand, to immobilize them. A third saark walked behind them and began making practice whips in the air. Jela began to sob piteously. The whipping guard paused after his last air whip, letting its sound slowly die away in the echoing caverns. He shifted his weight, reared back, and let fly a mighty blow against Pross. The sound of it hitting flesh was loud and awful. Pross yelled out at the pain, but did not move. Blood appeared through his shirt. Another crack of the whip and Pross’s body shook at the blow. He began to sob quietly. The guard shifted and brought a blow down on Jela’s back and she howled in pain and fear.
“Halt!”
The saarks wheeled around to see where the command had come from. Felanar was pressed against the bars separating the cells and holding up his right arm in a gesture of command. The saarks looked at each other in wonder. The one with the whip walked over toward Felanar licking his lips.
“Want a taste of this yourself?” he snarled. “This is what happens to slaves who interfere with punishment!” He reared back with the whip and let fly toward Felanar. Seeing it coming, Felanar dodged aside at the last moment and let the whip fly harmlessly next to him. He quickly reached forward and grabbed tightly on to the whip and wrapped it around his hand. In one motion he then yanked the saark guard toward the bars. Being taken by surprise by this, the saark stumbled forward as his fellow guards yelled and stepped toward them. The first guard now had the presence of mind to let go of the whip and stop his momentum toward Felanar. Felanar took the rest of the whip into his cell and stepped back away from the bars.
“That is enough punishment for these two,” he said coldly. “You made your point, you drew blood, they are punished.”
“How dare you!” growled the first saark guard. “For this I will have your head!”
The four saarks rushed out of the cell and over to the one with Felanar. Unlocking the bars, they pressed forward, but Dolen stepped in front of two of them and knocked both to the ground with his powerful forearms. The third guard kept running toward Felanar, but Felanar met him with the whip and the saark fell back with a yelp. The fourth saark rushed forward, and was completely taken by surprise when Kara met him square in the face with her fist, and then a kick to his midsection. Alessa grabbed the keys from his hand as he staggered back from the blow, and as the elf ran out of the cell she yelled, “I have the keys!”
Kara ran out of the cell, and Dolen jumped up from fighting the two saarks and joined her. Felanar whipped the one guard a final time and leaped out of the cell. Alessa quickly locked the bars and the four saark guards were now imprisoned. They roared their displeasure, but could do nothing more. The other prisoners, especially those closest who could see what was happening, were clamoring and cheering. Pross and Jela had looked up when the guards left their cell and had watched in amazement this scene of rebellion unfolding before them. Alessa walked over to their cell to let them out, but at that moment more saark guards came running down the corridor with swords in hand.
“Get back or die, you swine!” yelled the first saark in the group. He swung the sword as if he was going to chop Alessa’s arms off, and she backed away from the cell quickly. The four of them were quickly surrounded by half a dozen saarks, all with swords drawn. They raised their arms in surrender, while another saark grabbed their keys and released the four imprisoned saarks.
“Back you go,” said one of the saarks, and the four prisoners were marched back into their cell.
“Don’t lock it,” said one of the original guards, “I’m going to punish them until they beg for mercy!”
“You won’t,” commanded one of the new guards. “Orders. ‘No harm is to come to the new prisoners. None.’ Strict orders.”
“But this one begged for it,” the first guard roared, pointing at Felanar. “He used my own whip against me!”
“Orders,” insisted the second guard. “Unless you want a taste of the punishment yourself. Do you?”
The first guard glared at the second, but then backed down and said nothing.
“I thought not. March out.”
The first guard started to march but as he did so he looked back at Felanar and said, “I owe you.”
All the saarks marched back down the corridor and soon it was quiet again.
Kara went over to the bars to see how Pross and Jela were doing.
“Are you hurt badly?” she asked.
Jela said nothing but looked in wonder at Felanar.
“You must be hurt, for you are bleeding,” said Alessa. “Come closer and let me look at your wounds. I may be able to help.”
Without taking her eyes off Felanar, Jela approached the bars and let Alessa examine her. Finally Jela spoke.
“You fought for me,” she said in wonder.
Felanar stepped forward and spoke gently.
“I couldn’t bear seeing you both get hurt like that. It was too cruel. This is not punishment. It’s torture.”
“You fought for me,” she repeated, still staring with wide eyes at Felanar.
“Nobody stands up to the saarks,” said Pross, walking toward them with a similar look of surprise. “I have never seen it done, and yet you live despite your disobedience.” He winced as a movement he made caused the wounds on his back to hurt. Alessa gestured him to come over to her, and she examined his wounds too, which were worse. She cupped her hands over the welts and pressed gently, making Pross jump in pain. But he settled down and she kept pressing for a few minutes.
“Thank you,” Jela said, finally able to realize what had just happened. “You spared me from more than one blow. Thank you. Thank you.”
“You are welcome, Jela,” Felanar said. “I wish I could have done more.”
Jela shook her head vigorously.
“You did more than you should. I fear you will get far worse for what you have done.”
“Maybe not,” said Kara. “Did you hear what the guards said about us?”
“Aye,” said Dolen, “not to harm us in any way, he said. And what is the cause of this, I wonder?”
“Just because we are not from around here?” asked Felanar. “Can that be reason enough? It is a mystery to me.”
“One thing that is not a mystery is that it will be very hard to escape this place,” said Kara. “Those new guards came running quickly, and we know nothing of the layout of these caves. Even if the guards hadn’t shown up, would we have known which way to go?”
“One thing at a time,” said Felanar.
Alessa finished with brother and sister, telling them their wounds would heal well, and they both remarked how they felt considerably less pain already. Jela walked over to the bars near Felanar and again thanked him. Felanar reached through the bars with his hands and gently squeezed her hands.
“It was the least I could do for a fellow prisoner,” he said.
She smiled at him and squeezed back. Then he let go and she returned to her brother, repeating softly to herself, “He fought for me.”
There was no sign of saarks for the rest of that day other than the ones bringing food and drink for the prisoners. Twice a day they came, and for the next couple of days that was the only distraction for the prisoners. The food was meat of some sort, unpleasant looking, but not bad tasting. The drink was, as always, grank. Dolen found that he liked the meat and could tolerate the grank, whereas Felanar and Kara tolerated the meat and made themselves drink the grank with great effort. Alessa, in contrast, touched neither until after a few days with no nourishment or liquid she was forced to taste the grank. She did so with a look of aggrieved regret, and long afterward complained of the aftertaste. She did admit that her strength returned after drinking it, and she was less thirsty than she had been. No amount of enticing could convince her to eat the meat however, and the others finally gave up and trusted in the ways of the elves to keep the elf princess healthy.
During these days of quiet, Dolen and Alessa had off-and-on discussions about the relative merits of the dwarf and elf life. Unlike before, these talks were respectful and thoughtful. Their voices were rarely raised, and no anger erupted even when they disagreed on a point, which still frequently happened. While they talked, Felanar and Kara spent the time talking with each other about ways to escape, and in talking with Pross and Jela. No saark came for them, which surprised the young brother and sister who had been punished. Normally punishment was followed by a swift return to work, they told Felanar. This time they were left alone, and this gave them time for their wounds to heal.
Felanar was still wary about giving away too much information about himself or Kara, even to his new friends in the next cell. So the stories of his life he told were all about fishing and growing up in Brindledown. Pross grew to feel a kinship with Felanar (or as he knew him, Fel) when he heard of his village life, for he could see they had enjoyed similar childhood fun and pleasure.
Jela enjoyed hearing of Kara’s home life. Of less interest to Jela was any story about Kara’s attempts to learn archery or the like, even though Kara kept Bren’s part of those events out of her stories. Jela couldn’t understand why a girl would want to learn those things, and Kara realized quickly that Jela led a very simple life and could understand nothing else. What would she think if she knew I was a queen, she wondered. Kara also couldn’t help noticing how often Jela glanced over at Felanar. The young village girl clearly admired Felanar immensely for his standing up on her behalf.
Were it not for being prisoners, those few days would have been pleasant ones for them all. Pross and Jela even began to relax around the elf Alessa.
“Please tell me why you fear my people,” she requested one day.
Pross, who by now no longer feared directly speaking with Alessa, said, “Do you not know? My people tell of stories from the eastern frontier, near the great Arenton as it flows from the sea. The men who live near that river suffer from the elves.”
“Suffer?” asked Alessa.
“Yes,” said Jela, who jumped into the conversation, “I heard these stories too. When the men of that land need help, they say the elves never offer any, and refuse requests for aid.”
“They even attack them, the elves do,” said Pross, his voice lowered.
“This I cannot believe!” protested Alessa. “Elves do not attack without provocation. You must have heard the stories wrong. This cannot be!”
Pross and Jela stopped talking, and looked at each other for guidance. They weren’t so comfortable with Alessa that they could directly contradict her, especially when she grew animated. So they stopped talking. Alessa could not get them to talk about this subject again. She walked back over to Dolen and sat down.
“These stories they tell,” she said to Dolen with exasperation, “they hear the strangest things and believe them!”
“Aye,” said Dolen, “I know this to be true, for we dwarves have had our share of odd tales invented about us. Do you know we are said to never appear above ground during the daylight?”
“What?” cried Alessa. “But that’s absurd! I have not heard these tales and it is obviously false to anyone who knows anything about dwarves.”
“It is never the ones who know of their subject who make such odd claims. The less known, the more outlandish the tale.”
“So it would seem, Dolen, judging by the two in the next cell.”
It wasn’t until the next day that they finally saw another saark, and this one was dressed in a finer uniform than the ones they had seen previously, let alone the plain garb worn by the guards who brought their daily meals. He was accompanied by a guard unit of four, and they stopped outside their cell and stared at the prisoners for a few moments. Then the saark in the fine uniform ordered the cell to be unlocked and he stepped inside. Facing the prisoners, he held up a hand and spoke.
“I am Slakh, clan chief of this mountain tribe.”
No one said anything in response.
“Tell me of yourselves,” he continued. “Where do you come from?”
They stared at each other momentarily, and Slakh continued.
“I see an elf maiden among you, I know where she comes from. A dwarf too, though this is a rare sight in these lands, let alone traveling with an elf. Where do you come from?”
Felanar had been studying Slakh’s features while he spoke. He had the saark’s usual brown scaly skin and squat face with the red-rimmed eyes and fangs for teeth. In contrast to the saarks from the ship that had captured him, however, Slakh’s hair was less oily and straggly, and he spoke with a more sophisticated speech pattern. The fear of the saark appearance was lessened by these details and Felanar noted that saarks do not all appear or act the same.
“We come from the eastern lands,” Felanar said, “and were blown here by the winds while out fishing. We merely want to return to our homes across the water.”
Slakh looked carefully at Felanar as he said that, and then said, “Men, dwarf, and elf do not fish together, and you are a long way from the eastern lands. What do you say if I accuse you of spying?”
“I say it is not so,” replied Felanar calmly, “for it is not so. I had no desire nor inclination to come to these lands, and only the accident of weather has forced me here. I know nothing of these lands, and need know nothing. If you let us go, you may escort us right across the plain to see that we leave your lands in peace.” He ignored what Slakh said about fishing, for he could think of no explanation for that, and hoped Slakh would just move on.
“Fel is a friend of mine,” said Alessa, “and I was visiting him when he invited me to join him on his boat with his sister and dwarf friend.”
Felanar shot her a look, and instantly Alessa regretted having jumped in.
“Hmm…this is not likely,” said Slakh, rubbing his chin, “not likely at all. You may be friends, but spies can be friends too. What do you want? Who do you spy for?”
“We work for no one other than ourselves,” said an annoyed Kara. “We are people of the lake – Lake Brindle, if you know it in this land. If you knew anything about Brindledown, you would know we have no use of spies or spying.”
“I do not know this town you speak of, though I have heard of this lake,” said Slakh, “nor do I know Eastern accents sufficiently to determine the truth or falsehood of your statements, although it seems to me you are too well-spoken to be fisherman. I do know the ways of the West however, and no woman from the southern lands would dare speak without being spoken to. Nor would a woman from the villages nearby be bold enough to look me in the eye. You, woman, are not of this land, I agree. But no matter, you may wish to tell me nothing else but I have heard enough.”
He walked back out of the cell and ordered the guards to lock it again.
“You will be moved from here, but not to your homes, I’m afraid,” he said from outside the cell. “I know little about eastern lands, but there is one in these parts who does, and it would be smart of me to use you as a gift to him. It is always good to make friends with those in power as often as you are able, and I think he would be most interested in eastern spies. I will get much gold for your capture, and much good will from him. You will be moved tomorrow.”
“Moved where?” asked Felanar.
“To the Tri-Cities of Shakaart,” replied Slakh. “I will sell you to the autarch.”