In hiding

You know all those smoking buildings in Highport? We managed to add to it.

The Temple of Highport is sacked and Highport is in Chaos. We got sidetracked big time, but I honestly think it was for the better. I think we may have put a severe cramp in the Slavelords' lifestyles.

Right now, we are on our way deeper into the mountains. We're tracking these Slavelords to their source. After the information we've gathered at the temple, we're starting to think maybe these Slavelords have something in common with the invaders to the east.

At some point, I think I'm going to have to summarize everything that's happened up to this point. I mean from my sudden appearance outside of Hommlet to the here and now. For now, though, I'll continue from where I left off.

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

We just stared at each other for a while. To be honest, I felt a little disappointed. My first drow and he was albino. I wanted to see what the pitch black skin looked like in real life.

"Drow, huh?" I said. "Did you leave because...?" I gestured at my face.

"Yes," he said. "It happens more often than my people care to admit. My mother did not worship...the Spider Queen. Shar cared little for how drow looked."

I noticed how he didn't say the Spider Queen's name: Lolth.

"What'd other drow think of you worshiping Shar?" Anna asked.

"They didn't," Emril said (I still laugh at the thought of the name). "My family hid within the city."

"The Vault?" Marc asked. "Is that where you lived."

Emril nodded. "That is what surfacers call it, yes. It is one of many."

"A vault?" I asked. "What kind of vault."

"I have heard of it," Audry said. "It is a legendary place."

"It is no legend, lady," Emril said. "I should know."

"Yeah, but what is it?" I asked.

"A city," Emril said. "We drow refer to them as vaults."

"So where is this city?" I asked.

Anna pointed at the ground. "Far, far underground."

"It is what you humans call a cavern," Emril said. "Go far enough beneath the ground and there is a vast network of caves, some large enough to hold entire cities."

"Like the Vault," Marc said. "This is all very interesting, but there are more pressing issues. Such as, where is the girl?"

"Indeed," Saul said. "I assume with these others?"

"Yes," Emril said. "But we must be cautious. They are looking for us."

"Who?" Audry said. "The Slavelords?"

"The temple guards," Emril said. "They want to know where their cargo is going, and I fear it is only a matter of time before they find out."

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

The smell of burning wood was everywhere. There was so much of the city that had been destroyed. If this were a human city it would take years to repair everything, even with the use of magic. This once human city is now under the control of orc tribes. Even with the Slavelords commanding them, it'd be unlikely that the orcs would ever completely rebuild the city.

We followed Emril through the burned out sections of the city. He knew every part of it. We must have dodged five patrols on the way. After two hours of moving from hiding spot to hiding spot, we finally arrived.

The building in question was still largely intact. Some floors had collapsed, but the basic structure was still intact. Every window and door had been bricked up or covered in stone. Some of the stone looked too perfect to have been fashioned by human hands. Given that dwarves probably wouldn't have helped them, it meant that the stone was created by magic.

"How do we get in?" Audry asked.

"There." Emril pointed to a pile of debris. It looked like a pile of trash. Emril reached underneath it and lifted. The "trash" was and elaborately designed sculpture of debris designed to look like a pile of junk, but was really one piece. The six foot diameter sculpture must have weighed a few hundred pounds. Emril lifted one side of it with one hand.

"A counter balance," he said. "Designed by one of us."

"Us," Anna said. "So how many of 'us' are there anyway?"

"You will see," Emril said. Beneath the debris sculpture was a hole. He gestured for us to follow.

I took a quick look around and went down after him. The others followed. The hole had a set of rungs in the side made of various pieces of junk. They creaked as I followed Emril down into darkness.

After some fifteen feet the ladder ended. The only light was that from above. Emril pulled me aside so everyone else could enter safely. "Oh my," I heard Anna say, but not being blessed with heat-sensing vision I couldn't see what she saw.

"You can say that again," Saul said. I wished someone would light a torch or something so I could join in on the sentiment. Finally, a light appeared from one of Marc's continual light pebbles. He held it high. "Oh my is right."

And, yeah, I had to agree.

The subterranean room extended well beyond the fifty foot range of the light. It looked like it might have been a basement storeroom at one point. But that's not what caught my eye. From wall to wall I saw nothing but people. Men, women...they all had two things in common--a set of big eyes and pointed ears.

"Please put out the light," Emril said. "It is unlikely anyone above will see it in broad daylight, but we don't wish to take the chance." The elves parted as Emril approached. "Follow me, please."

Marc put out the light. Everything went into pitch black again. "You know, some of us are blind as a bat right now."

"I'll be your eyes," Anna said. I felt her hand on mine. She put my hand on her shoulder and moved forward. I stayed close behind.

"Bats are not blind, by the way," she said as we moved forward.

"It's just an expression," I said. "And how do you know?"

"I'm more than a pretty face," Anna said.

"Yet another expression," Saul said. I heard a distinct slap on his arm followed by a yelp.

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

We went to a staircase leading down. Out boots clunked loudly on the wooden stairs as they spiraled down, but not for long. Suddenly, the wooden sound was replaced with the sound of hard leather boots on rock. The stairs continued on.

To my credit, I only stumbled once. Anna caught me and mumbled something about being big and clumsy. Yeah, so all of us aren't graceful like gazelles.

A light appeared ahead. As we spiraled down it grew brighter and brighter. I could see the walls around me. The "stairs" were cut into the surrounding rock. The light from ahead came into view. A light of some kind sat in an empty torch scone. It looked like one of Marc's continual light spells.

We moved down for maybe about ten minutes or so, which mean we moved pretty far down.

Finally, the stairs ended. We went through a small opening and into a large cavern. Lighting was sparse, consisting of a combination of torches and magical light. I saw pin points off in the distance. The floor was mostly even, with some stalagmites here and there. Stalactites hung from the ceiling, sometimes connecting with stalagmites on the ground to form columns. The walls were smooth in place, rough in others. It looked like people had smoothed out areas for their own use as opposed to an overall attempt to make the natural cavern more livable. And it looked like this had been done over a long period of time.

When we entered we heard whispering. It sounded like an auditorium just before a play started. As we entered, the whispering quieted down. All around us, all along the walls and surrounding stalagmites and columns, were makeshift camps. People of all races stood and watched us. Mostly they were human, but there were elves, dwarves, and halflings there as well. I even saw a couple of gnomes.

"Escaped slaves," Marc said.

"How many slaves are here?" Audry said.

"Many," Emril said. "This cavern was discovered during the Orc invasion and used as a refuge. When the orcs took the city, it became a refuge for escaped slaves. There was another such cavern, but it was collapsed by orcs when they discovered it." His voice cracked when he said this.

"Dear Gods," Audry said. "There were slaves there?"

Emril merely nodded. I thought of the size of this cavern. If the other was of a similar size then quite a few must of died.

The area felt chilly, but I felt no breeze. Surprisingly, the place didn't smell. I would expect with this many people--it looked like hundreds of them--it would start to smell pretty bad. Considering it didn't, that meant they had a means to dispose of their waste and to wash themselves.

I looked up, trying to make out the ceiling more. From what I could tell, there were sentries stationed at various points. I pointed it out to the others.

"They are too obvious," Saul said. "If the orcs came here they would see."

"Is there another way out?" Audry asked. "Do you have plans to escape if need be?"

Emril merely sighed. "Most of us are laborers or merchants. We don't have any soldiers or warriors among us."

"Hard to enslave someone who can fight back," Saul said.

"Indeed." Emril led us down a set of wooden stairs to a lower section of the cavern. The "stairs" appeared to have been cobbled together from junk, but it seemed stable enough. As we descended I heard a rushing sound, like applause heard at a great distance. At the bottom of the stairs we dodged around a set of stalagmites. Among them were several young men and women tending a garden of mushrooms. They looked at us, startled. They relaxed when they saw Emril.

As we passed the garden, the applause sound grew louder and more distinct. It wasn't applause, I realized, but water.

"An underground river," Marc said. "I assume you have more gardens."

"Certainly," Emril said. "We manage to steal supplies from time to time, but Orcs have...interesting appetites. We also manage to do some hunting and gathering in the wilderness at night." He seemed to beam with pride. "I've been told I'm a very fine cook, at that."

A smiled. Yeah, with a name like that I figured as much.

The roaring water got louder. Off to the side of the main cave was a smaller cave. Inside of it, lit by magical light, was a waterfall. People played in the pool at the base of the waterfall. The magical lighting (which looks vaguely like fluorescent lighting) made it look like an indoor swimming pool. Or a public bath, which explained why no one smelled bad.

"How many exits out of this area?" Saul asked. He almost had to yell to be heard.

"Three," Emril said. "Including the one we came through."

"Are they guarded?" I asked.

"We have people watching," Emril said. "And we have an alarm system consisting of bells."

"Armed guards?" Saul asked.

"We are not warriors," Emril said. "We'd just as likely as stab ourselves in the foot as stab the enemy."

Audry frowned, looking at the numerous people who had gathered around us. "Emril, I am immensely pleased that there is a place to go for escaped slaves." I couldn't hear her sigh over the roaring waterfall, but I could see it in her face. "However, I fear that all of this will come crashing down. It is only a matter of time."

Emril looked at each of us. We all agreed with Audry. As wonderful as this place was, it couldn't last.

"We have little choice," Emril said.

"You have many choices," Marc said. "Why not leave altogether? You said you hunt outside the city. That means you have a way to escape."

"Where would we go?" Emril said. "Who would take us in?"

When he said "we" I think he meant himself. He was an albino drow, but I think he could have passed for an elf easily. I looked at him as he stared at us helplessly.

"You're a good man, Emril," I said, "but you are making excuses. These people came from somewhere and had lives before they were slaves. You said it yourself. They are merchants, laborers, and what not. They could go back home and make a living if they wanted."

"But they stay here," Saul said. "For the love of the Gods, why? You risk capture once more?"

Emril only stared at us. I could see what he wished to say. Kantos echoed it for me.

Their minds are broken.

Thankfully, my sword spoke in my mind instead of out loud. I didn't need to explain him to everyone here (it gets old, frankly--yeah, my sword talks, but not often). But he was right. Slavery broke these people.

"You're so used to being slaves you don't know what else to be, do you?" Anna said. Anna is a girl who is normally full of joy, but right now she looked as if her heart would break. "I see it in their faces," Anna said. "They've abused so much they don't know what to do with themselves any longer."

"What do you know about it," Emril said.

"A lot," Anna said. She stood right in front of Emril, looking him in the eye. "I was a whore in Mitrik. There was a time if you gave me enough gold I would be your toy."

That surprised me. I knew she was a thief for a while, but a prostitute?

"I took some abuse for a while," she said. "I took it because I didn't know what else to do. I had been abused by people for so long I thought it was my lot in life. It was a long time before I realized I could have pulled myself out of it on my own."

We just stared at her. I knew that she worked for the thieves' guild in Greyhawk City for a while, but she never went into details.

"I've been there," she said. "I was free to do what I wanted but I chose to enslave myself, first as a whore and then as a no good thief." She pointed at Emril. "You were made a slave against your will, but now you are free. Yet you stay very close to your former masters, like a child clinging to her mother's apron."

Audry put a hand on Anna's shoulder. "Emril, you have to understand that the longer you stay here the greater the chance you will get caught."

Emril continued to stare at Anna. "It's not like that."

"You can say that if it makes you feel better," Anna said. She nodded toward Audry. "You should listen to her. You will get caught. It's just a matter of time."

We moved away from the waterfall to a deeper part of the cave. Many of the elves we traveled here with had dispersed among the other ex-slaves, no doubt filling them in on the skinny of who and what we were. We were alone now in the cave, but being that it was a cave I'm sure anyone could hear what we were saying.

Finally, Marc broke the silence. "Let's assume everyone actually does decide to leave. How do we get all of these people away from the city without the Highport militia finding out?"

"There are about three hundred slaves here at last count," Emril said. "It is a long way to walk north to civilization. We would have to travel by sea."

"Not necessarily," I said. "For the sake of argument, let's say we shipped these three hundred people out by boat. How many would we need?"

Saul shrugged. "Depended on the ship. Four to eight ships, I would think. That's assuming we could get provisions and a reliable crew. I wouldn't count on the latter in these parts."

"We can't go by ship, then," Anna said. "Not enough horses, so it looks like we're walking."

"Hundreds of people milling around in the forest," Saul said. "You'd spot them easy."

"I could try casting some illusion spells," Marc said. "They'd work in the short term."

"We need something long term," Saul said. "We've got to get these people leagues away before anyone in town notices there's a problem. Leaving at night with illusion spells would help, but patrols would spot such a large crowd from far away."

Marc nodded reluctantly. "Even if we could eliminate said patrols, they would eventually be missed. No doubt wizards would be sent to divine as to a cause and then we would be discovered."

"We need a week's start at least," Anna said. "Two would be better. We need a miracle."

"Or a diversion." Audry rubbed her chin, staring at the ground. "We need more information, but I have an idea."

There was no way Audry was just going to leave these people. Yeah, they should have taken off when they had the chance. I couldn't completely blame them. They were scared and were afraid they'd be captured. They made a bad choice. Regardless, Audry wouldn't leave them there. And to be honest, I didn't want to leave them there either.

So we sat and talked with Emril. He gave us details about how the slaves were processed and where. As we talked, a plan started to form. It was a damn near impossible plan, one that required a set of brass big ones to pull off. I felt like we were the A-Team or something.

The more we talked, the more insane it got. But no matter how crazy our plan sounded, we had to go through with it. We couldn't leave these people to the tender mercies of the Slavelords.

I pitty the fool who stands in our way.