I lived for a time in horrid dreams. I believe this was the wake of Zaqhat the Enchanter's foul spell, for magic has an inertia of its own. Once reality is reshaped, it will conform to its new contours and those caught within it are swept along its empyrean rivers. I was aware that I faced illusion, but that did not mean I could escape its hold. I was left to wander with no way out. I recall an endless subterranean labyrinth of stone and fungus, a land filled with ghouls and rotkin. Symbols, the ones I now recognize as the marks of the Rising Shadow, adorned the wall sketched in blood and filth. I knew now the enemy existed, and even its name, but I did not know how to strike.
I awoke slumped against bars, my body jostling back and forth. Other men in varying states of nudity, filthy and exhausted, sat around me. We were in a caged wagon, rattling over the Red Wastes. The heat was oppressive, my lips were cracked and dried, my head pounding.
I noted that I still wore my boots and loincloth. Diotenah's ring still clung to my finger. I assumed the dryad's seed and the sweetwater goblet was still hidden in the folds of my garment, but I didn't want to check. I longed for water, but there was none to be had, none for the magic cup to purify. I would learn that the slavers never bothered with our meager possessions. So long as we carried no weapons, they had little concern. I was not the only one with a piece of jewelry either, though such baubles caught the attention of other prisoners.
That was when I noted that Ur-Anu was missing. Raw panic hit me. I sat up straight and instantly regretted it, a blade of agony between my eyes. I cast about, hunting for the spear, but saw nothing. The only spears were the ones tipped in bone carried by the caravan's guards. Perhaps it was back at Zaqhat's castle. I had the vague notion that the structure had crumbled around us, but it could have been part of my dreams. I could only hope my weapon was safe.
For those who are familiar with the traditional histories of my life, this event occurred some five years earlier. When I was washing up on the shores of Storm's Rest, they believe I was captured on the waves by Kharsoomian corsairs and taken to Deszu to be sold in the great market. They do not know of the misery of that overland trek across the wastes, north and east from Udath Swamp. Months of travel in the slavers' caravan, subsisting on scraps of bread and drops of water, the misery of my injuries grinding my will. I do not like thinking of his time very much.
The caravan was a series of caged wagons, pulled by uroks. These brutes were Kharsoomian beasts of burden, and occasional meals. They were six legged reptiles, beasts infamous for their oafish natures. They could pull a wagon, go without food for a year, and were reasonably edible, and so they would always have a place in the Red Wastes. It was not until the Red Wastes were no more that the last urok died.
"You are from Chassudor," said a man across from me. He spoke in passable Eomet, a language I had not used in some time. His once pale skin was baked to leather by the punishing sun. His blond hair was wispy, and scars covered his body. He wore little more than sandals and a loincloth.
"I am."
He broke into a gaptoothed grin. "I am Esmian."
"Rhandonian."
He got up, moving over to my side. The other men gave him space, not caring to protest. "What is a Rhandonian doing this far from home?"
"Getting captured by slavers."
He chuckled. "I suppose that is true. I am a freeblade. Or I was a freeblade. My company was serving on the Edda. We were captured."
"I was...a boldisar?"
"Oh, well then. Should fetch a fine price at the market." He stuck his hand out. "Nordegar."
I took it. "Ashuz."
"Strange name for a Rhandonian," he reflected.
"I am a strange Rhandonian."
He laughed and I suppose after that we were friends.
Nordegar was good enough company. I suspect he looked at me as a familiar face. Though the guards kept we prisoners from preying too much on one another, they seemed to tacitly support a pecking order among us. The largest faction were the Kharsoomians, and they were certain to take their turns at the cistern first, the take largest shares of food, and so on.
Recovery from the battle at Zaqhat's took time, as I was not getting any kind of care. Though the slavers wanted us in saleable shape, they were not overly concerned with our comfort. As such, it was the duty of we slaves to stave off predation. We split into groups based on our lands of origin, and I would soon learn that those from Chassudor were rare.
Nordegar had not entirely been alone until my arrival. He had become somewhat friendly with the group from Aucor. Two of them were Heacharids, though thankfully from conquered populations. That fact alone saved them from my wrath. Still, I could not even pretend to friendship with them, speaking only to Nordegar.
I spent the days searching the sky, waiting to glimpse Quiyahui. I knew she would find me. She had done it before, and something linked us. Even then, there was some ineffable link. I believe Ocoxochi had forged it. The will of a demigod is a powerful thing, and even a passing whim can be more solid than steel.
We were attacked only twice, the first by a party of Kharsoomians and the second by a pack of xerxyss. The guards drove both raids off. The xerxyss took their toll, dragging several slavers off into the wastes. The creatures were beautiful in their way, but moved in an uncanny fashion that made them hard to predict and even harder to battle.
"Are they slavers?" I asked Nordegar.
"The bugs? Everyone's a slaver out here. Offends me sensibilities as a freeman of Esmia, but we're far from a godly place, aren't we? Anyrate, the bugs will take whatever they can, same as everyone out here. Work us to death then eat our bones, if the rumors are to be believed."
I looked at the corpse of one of the iridescent purple beings. I felt no loathing for the creature. I could feel only a sense of tragedy and loss for such an unearthly beautiful thing laid low. Watching the slavers then crack the thing apart and throw it into the cooking pot didn't help the situation either. I would like to say that I stood on principle and refused to eat, I could not.
Deszu sat on the biggest bay of Kharsoom's west coast, at the point where every great road converges.. As with most Kharsoomian cities, it was built around a castle that had been constructed before the cataclysm that had transformed this land of abundance into the Red Wastes. Concentric walls in varying states of decay surrounded every stage of settlement. Dezsu was bigger than most Kharsoomian settlements, as it was a center of Kharsoom's only truly thriving industry: slavery.
The great market was not far from the wharf where slave ships from a hundred different lands made port. A collection of slave pens, pits, and jails took up one side of the plaza, while the other was comprised of auction blocks and houses. Cages hung at every avenue into the market, where defiant slaves were starved to death as warnings to others. It was always bustling with people, the smell of sweat and human waste overpowering any stink from the port. For me, having spent so much time in relative solitude, it was overwhelming.
It is here that I believe I should explain the Kharsoomian people. As an ethnic group, they are mostly extinct, with perhaps only a handful still extant. Perhaps the most Kharsoomian blood still upon Thür are the many descendants from my union with the Princess Tanyth. The culture, the people, so distinct and wondrous and horrible, has vanished.
Kharsoomians were a strain of human, and many believe that they were the first of us. These scholars say that all other tribes came from Kharsoomians migrating from this ancestral homeland and spreading over the world. Perhaps this is true. I can only say with some authority that I believe they rose at the end of the 4th Stata, settling the area that would become the Red Wastes.
Their most famous trait was their red skin. Ranging from burgundy to scarlet, they were hues not found in any other human group. Their hair was commonly black, thick and glossy, often tending to the greasy, and generally worn long. Their bodies were entirely hairless below the neck. Some men could grow mustaches and sometimes even small beards, but these were exceptions rather than the rule.
They went about nude, wearing simple sandals on their feet, and leather harnesses about their chests, waists, and backs to carry weapons and equipment. Jewelry was common as well, but this was confined to the aristocracy. Collars were a common adornment as well, for the bulk of the population was held in some form of bondage. They often wore heavy washes of perfume, fighting the punishing climate of their homes.
They were a beautiful people, generally considered to be the loveliest of us all. Their features were noble, their eyes mysterious and sporting hues not seen anywhere else. My bride Tanyth is certainly a legendary beauty and judging by the number of songs devoted to her, this is not merely the opinion of an infatuated bridegroom.
I had encountered Kharsoomians from time to time in my travels. They tended to be rare outside the Red Wastes, for to a Kharsoomian, the world outside their home is a place of unimaginable barbarity. For one such as me, used to the quiet lawless order of Rhandonia, such an opinion seems like madness. Kharsoom is a violent land, but they had convinced themselves that the rest of the world was even worse to justify their insularity.
