City of slaves

Highport...you'll not find a more wretched hive of scum that refuse to say a fricking word! Seriously, you'd think in a town full of scumbags at least one or two of them would sing like a bird, once you check their hearing with the rattle of some jink. Our gold's the same as anyone else's.

(That's the cool thing about gold as money. No matter which government stamps it, it's generally accepted, 'cause it's gold. Well, with some exceptions.)

This disturbs me, greatly. If so few people are talking, then that means the Slavelords have a solid grip on the city.

First, let's start from the beginning.

We stormed the gates a few days ago. That means we sneaked in just before dawn and climbed over the wall. There were few guards, and the ones that were there were snoozing (orcs snore like you can't imagine). Highport, it turns out, never fully recovered from battles with orc tribes back in the day. About half the city is composed of burned out husks of buildings. Orcs and humanoids are not exactly known for being industrious, so they haven't made that much of an effort to rebuild the city, and what they have rebuilt would make any 21st century building inspector laugh himself silly. My God, I'm afraid to stand next to any of these bloody things. If one of them tips over, it'll be like dominoes for blocks and blocks.

We found a place to hole up somewhere not to far from the populated areas. It was a basement of what looked like a burned out tavern. From here, we could wander down an alley and out into the street without being too obvious. We had to hide ourselves in an abandoned basement. It seems that many of the ruined parts of the cities are also the homes of escaped slaves. The local militia (orcs led by humans) scour the area looking for escaped slaves, and enslaving anyone who just plain shouldn't be there in the first place. We barely evaded a couple of these patrols.

"We can't stay here too long," Audry said.

"You know," Anna said. "Sometimes the best place to hide is in plain sight."

She grabbed some of our community gold and disappeared into the city as planned. She would return shortly, though we wondered if she would actually buy clothes or steal them. Whatever we bought in this city is probably stolen from elsewhere at any rate.

We waited as patiently as we could. Audry and I played our usual game.

"A new game?" I said.

"By all means," Audry said.

"Can you handle it?"

"Do you think I can't?"

"Evidently you can."

"Fortunately for me." She smiled. "Good game so far?"

"Hey, I'm supposed to do that one."

"I jumped ahead, I'm afraid," Audry said.

I grinned. "Just knife me in the back, why don't you."

"Knifing you would be bad form."

For a second I thought I had her. "Lovely choice, that one."

"My skills are improving," she said.

"Not as much as mine."

"Oh, really?"

"Please, I taught you this game."

She gave a short laugh. "Quiet yourself, that does not mean you are the best at it."

"Really helps though."

"So you think you can win?"

"'Tis only a matter of time." I smiled.

"Unreal," Marc said.

"Very sure of yourself, aren't you?" Audry said, picking up where Marc left off.

I shrugged. "What do you expect?"

"Expect? You're stealing from me now."

That didn't count, but I realized I couldn't come up with anything better so I let it slide. And she took my turn again! "Zoos exist in your world, don't they?"

"You both belong in one," Saul said.

"Exactly," Marc said.

"Why would you say that?" Audry asked.

"Very strange, going backwards," I said.

"Unless you changed the rules."

"That wasn't one of the rules, to my knowledge," I said.

"Saul started it," Audry said.

A voice from above startled me. "Still playing that silly game?"

We looked up. Anna climbed down into the building basement. She carried a large leather sack over her shoulder.

"We already did that one," I said. "The next one is--"

"I know," Anna said. "Look, I got our disguises."

"Ah, good," Marc said. "Perhaps we can get down to business."

------------------

We got dressed. The clothes were actually pretty nice. Say what you will about Anna, she does have a sense of style.

Saul and I both had matching tunics. We were to play the muscle, guards for Marc and Audry who would masquerade as husband and wife. That left Anna. For a while, we thought have having her play a slave. We then decided she would simply play the role of servant, a sort of lady in waiting for Audry. The reason was because most people who own slaves in this town don't take the best care of them. Anna, frankly, just looked too good to be a slave.

Audry looked incredible. She a long flowing dress that made screamed nobility. She wore earings and gobs of jewelry (some of which was left over from previous adventurers). Marc looked like an upper class stud. He did not at all look like a wizard, which was the point.

Anna dressed in the most plain clothes you can think of. "I ran them through some dirt," she said. She rubbed them across a stone in the basement floor, trying to make them look as worn as possible. "May need some time here."

We spent the rest of the day refining our costumes. The next morning, we climbed out of our basement just before dawn and dressed. We wandered in between buildings and easily wandered out into the street. We easily mingled with the early morning crowds.

The town is dirty. Trash littered every corner and swept around our feet. The stench of human waste and filth was inescapable. Guards consisted of mostly orcs with human commanders. The orcs generally left everyone alone, though they would harass slaves from time to time. One group of orcs started to pull a female elf into an alley. The human guard barked orders at them. The orcs growled, but they obeyed, letting the woman go.

"You see that?" I whispered to Saul.

He nodded. "But I don't think they did it for her benefit. Did you see her wrists? She had bindings on. She probably belonged to someone."

"No way to tell if she belonged to someone important or not," I said. "Rape the wrong slave and you tick off the wrong people."

"I hate this place," Anna said. She stayed behind Audry as we walked down the street. "When can we leave?"

"When we get we came after," Audry said. "However long it takes."

Crowds in Highport are a mixture of extremes. Very poor wander around with the very rich. The very rich, being wary of the very poor, have guards. That doesn't stop the very poor from trying to take from the very rich, of course. That's why everyone who can afford them has armed guards.

Usually the guards give the thieves a warning to steer clear. If the thief doesn't take the hint, they get clobbered. In an hour we had maybe ten try the same thing. I'm not a big fan of bottom feeders, but in a place like this you can't help but feel sorry for these people. This place is the 667th layer of the Abyss. You screw who you have to.

Audry started to give someone a coin, but Saul stopped her. I nodded reluctantly. If you give one a coin then they will come from everywhere. This wasn't Mitrik or Greyhawk City. Here, people who aren't bad get weeded out quick. Beggars in these parts might be legit people down on their luck, but they are more likely con artists looking for a sap.

Damn, I can't wait to leave this godforsaken town.

We spent most of the first day wandering town. We threw some money around, buying some frivilous stuff, but we essentially wanted to get a feel for the place. At the end of the day we spent the night in a tavern. The sign had fallen or been stolen long ago. Whatever it had previously been called, it was now just called "the Highport tavern." Good name, as there was no other tavern in town (none that were standing, anyway).

We got the biggest room available, which had an adjoining room for Audry's "servant." Saul and I got our own room, Audry and Marc shared a common room, and Anna got the servant's room. Once it became clear that Saul and I were not about to let anyone hassle our "employers" (Marc and Audry) or fool around with the servant girl (Anna), they generally left us alone.

At night that Anna and Saul went to work. They both went out into the streets, dressed as general low lives and miscreants (something they used to do in Greyhawk City back in the day). You want to know the 411 about the bad side of town, you go to the streets. Unfortunately, Highport is nothing but a bad side. The good side of town somewhere in the burned out part of town were no one goes. Asking about the bad and the ugly of this town is like asking someone if they've memorized the phone book. Still, it's an angle we have to try.

I went into the tavern downstairs and bought drinks for people (getting people drunk is one way to loosen lips). Audry and Marc had to stay in their rooms for appearances sake, though Marc did a little eavesdropping (something called a Wizard's Eye that allows him to see and hear others at a distance).

During the day, Marc and Audry would inquire with the innkeeper and with shop owners around town as to where the best place would be to acquire "servants" (that's a euphemism for slaves).

"Laborers," Marc said. "We have specific needs and need specific people."

Most people just shrugged and asked us to go to the auctions.

We attended auctions all around town, hoping to see anyone we knew from the party (possibly even Dame Gold herself). A lot of slaves go through this town. We wanted to buy them all, but we couldn't afford it. And that itself would look suspicious.

It's a rotten deal if you ask me. You know if you help these people you'll expose yourself to the Slavelords. They will in turn enslave you and re-enslave all the people you just freed. Damn.

This went on for days. Not once did we see anyone we knew at auctions. Not once did anyone get drunk enough in the tavern to spill the beans about slavers and slaves. And not once did anyone in the street talk about the Slavelords.

Basically, we were stuck. This cover of a rich couple looking for cheap labor wasn't going to last long. The longer we did this, the greater the chance someone would recognize us.

Then about five days into our gig, we caught a break.

Anna and Saul were out doing their nightly scouring of the city. No one talked to them that night either (they said this is normal, it can take weeks or longer before you get on the good side of the under side of a city). While on their way back to the tavern, they saw her.

"Who was she?" I asked.

"Escaped slave, I assume," Saul said. "She ran like hell. She didn't have any shoes on and her clothes were torn."

A group of some five orcs lead by a human chased her through the street. Those who didn't get out of their way were tossed aside. One guy was stabbed with a short sword. They wanted this girl bad.

"So we stepped in," Anna said.

They caught her as she turned down an alley. They managed to hide her from the guards and/or slavers chasing her. "Find her!" the human yelled. "Find her or all of you will take her place!"

"I take it they didn't find her," Audry asked.

Saul nodded. "I wonder if we'll see them on the auction tomorrow."

The girl was frantic, not knowing who to trust. Anna made the point that she didn't have to trust them and could always turn herself over to the tender mercies of the orcs chasing her.

The girl, a human of maybe sixteen years, quickly grasped Anna's logic. Saul and Anna took her into the burned out ruins of the city. They stashed her in the basement of the burned out building we holed up in for a little while. They left her some food and told her not to go wandering.

"For her sake, I hope she stays put," Marc said. "We should question her tomorrow."

"We should have done something like this sooner," I said. "The slaves probably go through some central area for processing. Any one of them would probably know who it is."

"I suppose we could have just bought a slave," Saul said. "But then what? We wouldn't have anywhere to put them? And if we let them go it would raise suspicions."

I shrugged. That was a good point.

The next morning we left before the sun came up. We kept to our costumes, keeping our gear in the portable hole that we kept with us at all times (anything not nailed down has a tendency to grow legs and wander away, never to be seen again). We kept large cloaks on to help disguise us to some degree. We made our way into the burned out section of town just as the sun came up. We dodged a couple of patrols and then entered the abandoned building. We watched from within for several minutes to see if we were followed and then we proceeded to the basement.

It was empty.

"Oh boy," Saul said. It was the best anyone could come up with.

More later.