Dawn. I awoke with a snap, though I was a lot more groggy than usual. The last few days had been hard ones. Two days ago we had left the Temple of Rashomon having endured a sleepless night consoling and calming most of our crewmen (and the slaver oarsmen that were surrounding me.) They had been infected with nasty little horrors called Dread Iota that had tormented them relentlessly. We then brought in questors of Garman who healed them, killing the horrors. We then left for K’Nteshin, most of us without sleep. We stayed there, but my night was mostly sleepless anyway. I had divided up our crew among two ships, our ship The Dashing Stag, and the ship we captured at the Temple of Rashomon, The Blue Albatross. We were simply stretched too thin. We had Trejack, plus two of his men, the former captain of the Blue Albatross, Jeoffery, and his bodyguard, a curious swordmaster named Arrick, all locked up in our brig. Vridich was administering a sleeping potion to Trejack and his men, to keep them from causing trouble. But Trejack was a slippery bastard and so were his men, so we had to guard them carefully, further taxing our manpower. We also had fifty rescued slaves on board the stag to worry about, feed and keep contained below decks. Some of them we put to use as oarsmen, which helped, but they would be useless in a fight.
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We, The Unchained, had been summoned to the court for Trejak’s hearing. There was a large number of Throalic citizens in the hall when we arrived. As we entered the hall we were announced. I have been use to people calling Stilicho Lord, Stilicho is use to it too. My heart fluttered when I heard my name called to the court as Thane Ardor Zomay Skram. It was the first time I had heard my title announced. Most of us would be giving testimony so we were shown by an usher to a bench near the front. There were two tables in the front of a large desk. Behind the desk on a pedestal there was a throne for the king.
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Following Trejack’s trial he was unceremoniously hoisted up into a crow’s cage, as they called them in Kratas, in the Grand Bazaar of Throal. I was not there to see it, but Dagmar told me about it the following day. The anger in Dagmar’s voice was evident as he, as well as pretty much everyone else in Throal, was unhappy that Trejack received such a light sentence after so obviously committing such horrible crimes. Trejack only received one month in a crow’s cage, actually a pretty stiff punishment by itself, and two months hard labor. However, he deserved nothing more than an ignoble death and the fact that he was able to snake his way out of it, was a testament to the weakness of the Throalic justice system. Had I been King Neden, I would have intervened and ordered his execution outright, laws of the land be damned.
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It was a cold day as we flew our two vessels, The Dashing Stag and The Blue Albatross, on our journey to Throal. There was a slight drizzle as the misting clouds released their moisture upon us. The crewmen were wrapped up in their cloaks, trying to stay dry in spite of the odds. I was on board The Blue Albatross with Dremnin, Kerick and all of our men who had Air Catching abilities. The plan, if we ran into trouble with another ship and could not outrun them, was that I would ram The Blue Albatross into the enemy vessel, leaving the oarsmen to their fate while my men and I jumped. It would then be up to Quinn and Ardor at the helm of the Dashing Stag to maneuver the ship under us so we could make it to her using our Wind Catcher talents, and not plunge to our deaths.
It was a good plan, but I hoped not to use it. I knew the Albatross would sell for big money if we were able to sell it in Throal. But we had to get her there first.
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There we stood in the Tippling T’skrang around a large round table. The bar was quiet and dark and empty. Just a couple of lanterns were burning. As I had been chosen to lead the bonding, I stepped back out of the circle. I took a bowl of salt and walked around the circle. I poured the salt to create a spirit bearer, closing us all in side.
I stepped back in to my place in the circle. We raised our arms and called to the many passions that have touched, protected, and inspired the group, to watch over and witness their bonding. We asked them to cleanse and seal the circle from any horrors or negative effects.
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It was just after dawn at The Temple of Rashomon and I stood with Draiden, Kerick, Hakka, Tekil and Wheeler on the deck of The Dashing Stag watching the sun rise. All of us had just finished karma rituals, and now we were standing together sipping Draiden’s tea in relative quiet as the rest of the crew started to wake. The events of the day before had us in deep thought as we looked out of the sun rising over the ruins of Rashomon’s Temple.
Draiden broke the silence first. I remember his face was grim as he spoke… he seldom held back the feelings in his heart.
“Those horrors were something else.”
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Suulin showed up early one morning with a message sealed with the King’s seal. She said she was told to deliver the message as soon as possible. I opened the note and found that it had been written in the kings own hand. I was being summoned to a manner in one of the underground cities of Throal. I was allowed to bring any of the Unchained to the event. I showed the note to Suulin and said that I would like all of The Unchained. Suulin congratulated me and told me that Urgral was staying at the Tippling T’skrang and she could let him know. I decided that we could just meet at the Dashing stag as it was still in the docks of Throal. I sent Mika to give messages to Dagmar, Stilicho, Dremnin, and Vridich.
We met that night at the Stag.
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Fafnir had found us a scroll in the library on how to bond as a group. We had also talked to the master of the forge at Dagmar’s forge on how to make these group pattern items. The smith had given us a couple of pointers and we had developed a plan.
We were going to rent a small building at the forge that has a small forge in it that was not commonly used. Urgral was in charge of cleaning the forge and the smudging it with a combination of sage and lavender. Being a horror stalker he had a special sense to make sure that there were no negative energies.
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At the end of the second week in Throal S’kram woke up with his face lying in an old musty tomb. Fafnir was relentless in his teachings. S’kram had not been out one night this week. He was beginning to think that he was never going to survive the training or see the sun again. He pushed the book away and sat up. S’kram decided he was going out today.
After cleaning himself and dressing he summoned Mika and headed out. He was going to see Stilicho about Fafnir traveling on the ship. He had already talked to Dagmar, and he was sure that Vridich, Suulin, Urgral, and Dremnin would not mind.
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The day after I had finished my training to sixth circle I went to see my friend Fafnir in the great library. I found him buried behind a pile of books and scrolls. He smiled and came around the desk to greet me. I produced a couple of crocks of his favorite Ale. We sat down to talk and have a drink.
I had come to Fafnir to ask him to train me in the skills of research, evidence analysis, search, and dragon lore. When we first met we had gotten off on the wrong foot. I did not understand Fafnir and his book learned ways. With a little bit of world experience under my belt I had learned the power that could be gained from the knowledge in these books. I would not become some spell caster, but I could learn from the experiences of others. We talked of old stories and Fafnir lost me with his talk of the research in to the Book of Tomorrow he had done.
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