-Rainer

The young minotaur entered the dungeon holding a small pot with water on one hand and a torch on another. His thoughts were in the task at hand, the new slave had not had a gram of food since he’d been brought here, and he’d received water on the third day of magic infusion. The minotaur had heard him complaining and muttering in that odd language of his, but he was sure that after a whole day with neither food nor water and locked up in the tiny cell, the slave would not be in any state to properly fight back.

Not that it really mattered, Rainer had quickly found out the slave didn’t pose a physical threat.

Still, he wouldn’t lower his guard around the slave, Master Cu may have dismissed the odd clothes the now-slave had been wearing, but in Rainer’s eyes they were proof there could be a nasty surprise or two hiding to jump out at any moment. The materials and quality of the clothes were seen as some odd foreign oddity in the Master’s eyes, but to Rainer, they were signs of someone of high status.

Slaves that were once close to nobility in one form or another needed to be broken more thoroughly, for unlike when people with nothing to lose were enslaved, these people had enough false hope that they’d actively seek freedom from the very moment the chains were placed around their necks.

Peeking into the cell, he spotted the slave leaning against the door. There was a definite stench of piss and shit emanating from within. It made sense the Master desired the slave to be clean before he set foot on the house… Rainer mentally told himself he would have the slave clean the cell after lunch was made.

“Wake up.” Rainer kicked the door to startle the slave into wakefulness.

“Fuk ou.” The words came from the other side, weak, raspy, and quickly followed by intense coughing.

He opened the door, and used the chain to drag the poor excuse of a person that was inside away from the filth. Rainer stopped once it was clear the slave wasn’t even walking, and only once the human had raised his gaze at him did he lightly shake the pot to show the water within.

“Wahtu.” The slave muttered in a raspy tone, his eyes drifting from the pot to Rainer, and then narrowing into a sunken-eyed frown. “Fuk ou.”

The minotaur frowned back, having expected the human to have started begging for the drink in his language. Well, he couldn’t be sure if anything he’d said was asking to be able to drink from the pot, but the tone and expression revealed animosity and not submission.

Were it in Rainer’s hands, he would send him back into the cell for another day. But Master Cu had given his orders.

With one hand on the chain that bound the human’s wrists, he used the other to lower the pot. “Drink.”

He didn’t need have given the order, the human barely paid him any mind as he reached the pot and tilted it to drink, coughing and sputtering and coughing some more in his desperation to get as much as possible down his throat. Rainer let him for about a minute and then yanked him away from it by grasping at his hair. The human screamed and struggled but to no avail, the pot was forcefully removed from his grasp.

“That’s enough.” Rainer growled, ignoring the pot and now dragging the human by both chains and hair. The slave began to struggle far harder the moment he thought Rainer was going to take him towards the altar again.

One particular desperate kick managed to hit against the back of his right thigh, sending the minotaur down to his knees in a cry of agony at the impact and loss of balance. Instantly the slave was running towards the stairs that led towards the mansion, ignoring the minotaur entirely.

Unfortunately for him, Rainer had no intention of letting him. He had never let go of the chain, so it took him a single powerful yank to cause the slave to scream and stumble to the floor. “Think you can run away?” Rainer snarled, pulling at the chain to drag the still kicking slave back towards him. “I’ll teach you that’s no longer an option for you.”

The moment the slave was within hand’s reach, Rainer pulled out the short leather club from his belt. That made the human’s eyes open wide. “Uait! Uait!” He raised both hands and ducked his head submissively in an attempt to defuse the incoming violence.

It was for naught, the minotaur paying no mind to his pleas as he raised the non-lethal weapon and began to rain down one hit after the other, aiming for the human’s arms and back mercilessly, chaining one attack after the other until the human had curled into a ball and was focusing on trying to endure as best as he could.

Feeling himself slightly short of breath, Rainer stood up straight, taking a moment to assess whether or not he’d overdone it. The slave was shaking, and the markings of bruises were starting to show, but he was breathing. So that meant he could still function.

The minotaur yanked at the chain to force him back on his feet before pulling him along towards the only other way out of the basement. The human followed with shaking weak legs, barely keeping the pace though his eyes warily stuck on the metal door that lead to the altar.

Inwardly, Rainer knew the proper thing he should do right now was to drag the slave back to the cell and leave him there for another day or two without water, but Master Cu had been insisting and he couldn’t do anything about it.

“Move it, slave, you’ve work to do.” He yanked the chain to force the human to move faster, moving past the door and continuing towards the second set of stairs in the basement. These ones, after opening a heavily locked door, lead towards the stables.

There Rainer saw the female dwarf Master Cu had a penchant for. Her golden hair always managed to draw the minotaur’s attention, it was the lone feature he’d admit to finding pretty on the too-short-and-stocky woman. She stood next to one of the short-horses, brushing it with soft care as she whispered at it.

A wry chuckle escaped the human, followed by a cough and a laugh. “Pohnee?” He said, drawing her attention.

“Shut up.” Rainer backhanded him hard enough to knock him to the ground, then turned to her. “The master wants him clean before he starts working at the kitchen.”

“And why should I be the one cleaning him?” The dwarf half-glared at him, ignoring the groan from the new slave as she flicked a lock of golden hair behind her ear. “He looks half dead, I’d rather not be the one to be next to the corpse when Master calls for him.”

“And I’d rather be the one standing next to the door before he tries running again.” Rainer replied coarsely, using the padlock to lock the chain against one of the metal rings on the stable walls. He didn’t wait for her to refuse or complain as he walked to stand next to the only doorway that lead to the outside. Crossing his arms, he levelled a glare at the slave.

She snorted loudly and shook her head. “Come here Sugar, I’ll go back to brushing you in a bit.” She whispered at the black short-horse mare, pulling her into one of the pens and closing. Her brown eyes shifted towards the minotaur and his standoffish attitude before switching towards the slave. The grimace in her face showed the distaste of the beating… or was it perhaps that she had heard the screams of the previous days?

Rainer knew the others wanted to know what it was that was being done to the human, for fear it may happen to them if they missbehaved, but Master Cu had instructed on remaining tight-lipped about the altar, and as such Rainer had not revealed what happened in the basement.

The new slave stood on shaky legs, looking down at the dwarf with a levelled even gaze that shifted between her and the minotaur at the barn’s door… and the metal door they’d come through that lead to the basement. There was something in the way he glanced at her that seemed off, like someone trying to determine if they had seen you before or not.

She ignored the look, walking over to the well and pulling out a bucket full of water. The dwarvish blonde woman wobbled towards the human and placed the bucket within his reach, adding a cloth rag. “All yours.” She made a vague gesture at him.

“He doesn’t understand Common.” Rainer spoke from the barn entrance as the human seemed to hesitate. “Whatever it is that he speaks, Master hasn’t heard the language before.”

“Oh, fantastic.” She grumbled even as she watched the human raise the bucket to drink some of it in a hurried fashion, drenching himself with the spilt liquid in his rush to drink as much of it as he could.

“Hey! Stop!” Rainer had immediately rushed forward.

Arwen did not fight back nor attempt to use the bucket as a weapon, instead all too focused on gulping down more water before it was yanked from his hands. The gesture was immediately followed by Rainer savagely punching the human and dropping him to the ground. Cries escaped the penned animals and soon the agitation became a cacophony of braying sounds that forced the dwarven woman to attempt calming down rather than pay any attention at the beating that the slave was receiving through Rainer’s kicks.

Once things calmed back down, she dutifully picked the bucket and went to fill it back up, coming back and halting next to the curled up human that was silently groaning as he tenderly held his ribs. Rainer had been holding back, a lot, he’d wanted to break a bone or two for the transgression but Master Cu’s orders refrained him from doing so. The slave was worthless if it couldn’t perform his given task at the best of his ability, and Master Cu would be infuriated if said results were anything less than the best.

“If you keep this up, he won’t survive the day.” The dwarf spoke in a hushed voice as she picked the rag.

“Master is in a hurry to use him, the slave will learn his lesson one way or another.” Though he said this, there was something about his face that clearly showed there was something else troubling his thoughts. “Clean him yourself before he does anything else that’s stupid.”

She nodded and waited for him to return to the barn entrance before letting out a heavy sigh. Turning towards the human, Rainer noticed the odd look the human was giving her had shifted to one of intense focus, brows practically knit together in focus even while he held himself in a ball to reduce the pain.

“Don’t look at me like that, I wasn’t the one who put the chains on you.” She snapped at him reproachfully.

The human didn’t respond, remaining still while watching her very carefully, there was something about that look Rainer did not like, it was too intense.

“Blaire.” The human had whispered her name, and the hairs on the back of Rainer’s neck stood on end.

Instantly he knew why. No one had said the dwarf’s name throughout their interactions. There was no way he should have known it, let alone that it related to the blond haired dwarf. Rainer felt a sense of wrongness in the pit of his stomach.

He should have gone to tell Master Cu about this but paused, what would he say? That the human had, somehow, learnt Blaire’s name? That gave him enough pause to growl, he would have to come to the Master with something more consistent if he wanted to make sure he’d be taken seriously.

Rainer’s eyes narrowed while he continued to watch the human as he was cleaned.

-Arwen

Having gone through the… not very comfortable… act of getting washed through a wet rag, I felt at least marginally cleaner and definitely less stinky. But it was neither of those that had greatly swelled my mood sky high. No, the reason I was feeling far better than everything my body was telling me I should feel, was because I’d found Blaire.

I mean, it had taken me getting a closer look at her after quenching my thirst to have the idea click in my head, but now I was certain. A character I had known quite well. After all, she had been the one of the more active and notorious participants during the slave revolt arc of the story and ended up joining Hero Lucas’ cliqué when he’d gone to investigate the origins of demons.

Blaire, a female dwarf who possessed a hair blessed by the dwarvish Goddesses of sunshine and moonlight, whose attitude as a rebel slave was ruthless and vicious to the point it made any who faced against the roofians under her control to surrender rather than face her wrath. Blaire, a former love slave to a lasciviously opulent merchant of enchanted artifacts, who had decided to run away the day she found out she was pregnant, all too aware the merchant would kill the child the instant it was born.

Sure, I hadn’t given too much detail to this “Opulent merchant” that had owned her in my notes besides the fact that he’d been stinking rich, the son of disgraced dwarven nobility, and cruel enough to have hired thugs to “deal” with Blaire after her escape… no, it didn’t matter, not that much.

What mattered was that I knew Blaire like the back of my hand, the same way I knew everything about all the main characters I’d written. Their little secrets, their flaws, their personality traits. I knew them all because I had poured over them for hours upon hours. My little great obsession, adding as many details as I could think up to ensure they were as ‘real’ as my skill-level allowed me to make them.

It was with this confidence that I knew what was going through Blaire’s head. I knew that right now the actually lesbian female dwarf was passively restraining her disgust and hatred for how her “Master” treated her purely out of the assumption there was no worth in attempting escape and the self-delusion that her life could surely go to worse if she managed to leave. I knew that becoming pregnant would lead to her reevaluating that. And I knew that the thug’s attack that would result in her miscarriage would turn her into someone that would terrorize Frostshield to the bone.

She would, in time, become a fearsome woman who, as her peak achievement, would spark the slave revolution by leading the slaves in Berton to wreck the fortified coastal city from the inside out.

And I was meeting her now, when she was at her most ‘docile’, right before the spark was ignited.

I felt like meeting Napoleon when he was but a little child barely having learnt how to walk.

My thoughts were interrupted as the minotaur came back looking stern and pissed off. It was at this point that I had decided to stop my attempts at antagonizing him. Actually, I even smiled at the guy with a very honest grin. And it not only instantly startled him, it unnerved him.

I loved it. Oh god did I love it, specially the rushed and spoke agitated words exchanged with Blaire heavy with inquisitive tones. And that was because he didn’t know what I knew. He didn’t know I now had a handhold in my situation. I kept from laughing, but the urge was certainly there.

It’s such a shame I didn’t know a freaking word of their language, this was now tearing me from the inside far more than the beating I’d received. I lamented my inability to communicate while he led me back into the dungeon and out through the passageway that led into the house. Or would calling it a manor be more fitting? I shrugged and just followed him as he pulled the chain.

Sure, I was limping, in pain, bruised, in pain, and very much hurting in pain all over. In pain. Oh, and my hands were trembling and slightly numb. But this was the first damn ray of light I’d seen since being locked up and tortured and I was not going to let it go.

“Why thank you.” I told him with a cheery tone once brought into the kitchen area. He looked at me with a hastily forced impassive face and I returned the gaze with a sunny smile that maybe didn’t hide my smugness all too well.

A snarl escaped his lips immediately after and I was struck by a vicious backhand that knocked me on my ass. The impact made everything in my body flare up in pain and I groaned, shaking from the flayed nerves and bruised… everything. Everything god damn hurt. Agh I wanted to scream but by now my throat was too sore for that. I just endured there, curled up taking shaky breaths and trying my best to find a way to reduce the ouch and calm down.

The minotaur stood there, watching as I heaved to calm myself down, and then, slowly, with shaking legs, I stood up. My knees wobble and almost gave out, but I endured, using the table to straighten myself. My eyes met his.

And I wordlessly smiled again, bowing my head at him as I remained still. The lack of rebellion didn’t bother me anymore. He couldn’t get to me. I had found the single most powerful reminder that my freedom was only a matter of when, not if.

He hesitated, taking a slight step back in shock as I raised my head and looked at him in the eyes once more, my lips curled upwards.

The minotaur snarled and said something my ringing ears didn’t quite catch, and then he tied the end of the chains to the kitchen wall near the fireplace before leaving, clearly perturbed.

I’d gotten to him.

That only made my smile widen further.

With him gone, I changed my focus to look around.

It was a big kitchen, the table was larger than my cell by at least twice as much, there were no stoves but rather one large chimney with a fireplace, and there were copper or black pots and pans hanging practically everywhere. Which sort of left me wondering where all the ingredients were. One of the doors was probably a pantry.

I was going to seek escape from this place, now I had little doubt about the fact, I would only have to pay attention and find the opportunity when it came knocking. Maybe I would even manage to convince Blaire to follow along, maybe, but I wasn’t going to consider it likely at least until I’d learnt to talk in Common.

There was also the fact that “The other Author” might have changed something about her that I wasn’t aware of. If she had, then my confidence on being able to anticipate how Blaire would react to a situation was vastly reduced. I sighed heavily. Mr Coauthor had clearly tweaked some things, but just how much? Also, had he decided to send me into the main plot of the story? Towards a parallel universe where it never happened? Or perhaps he chose to send me so far back in time that the main events wouldn’t come for a long while?

Those points were important to determine, the more I knew about “When” exactly in my original narrative I was then the closer my approximations would be to reality. Question was, how would I determine this? I needed information.

And for information… I needed to learn the language.

I grimaced while turning to the next item in my agenda: How to ensure my escape.

Chains aside, it was clear there were two large obstacles to getting out. Cu, and the minotaur. A dark thought crept into my head and I nodded at myself in acknowledgement to it. Right now escape was more important than revenge.

Though there were strong hopes one could help the other.

-Yselda

“You are going to teach him to cook, and you’re going to teach him how to speak common.” Rainer instructed as he lead her towards the kitchen, there was a nervousness about him she had not seen before. “You will only be responsible for cooking the Master’s meals from now on.”

“I see, I am glad.” She nodded at the young minotaur with a slightly relieved smile. “Having some help in the kitchen will do some good to my shoulders.”

“Yselda.” He grasped her hand before she could step further, looking into her eyes with a hint of worry. “If he does anything, anything at all that seems suspicious, tell me right away.”

The woman leaned into his touch. “You worry too much.” She said as she kissed his cheek sweetly. “I will have him cook some gruel, that way the most dangerous thing he’ll have a hold of will be a wooden spoon.”

Rainer nodded and relaxed, but only marginally. “I have to go to the city to make some purchases for Master…”

“If anything happens I know the Master will be in his study, and we both know that from there he’d be able to hear me scream.” She replied with a wink.

Rainer’s cheeks turned a shade pinker and he abruptly avoided her gaze. “Yes, I… know that lesson well.”

“Do not worry about me.” She reiterated, swatting at his shoulder. “He’s chained up and I’m no defenceless maiden.”

“That you are not.” He replied with a short laugh, relaxing slightly at her reassurance.

“Now shoo, go already or we’ll have starved before you get back.”

He nodded. “I will hurry.”

“I know you will.”

She waved at him to go, not turning towards the kitchen until she heard the main door closing. Then, she sighed, taking a moment to recompose herself. With a determined nod, she headed towards the kitchen, ready to meet this new addition to their family. She was certain that though right now the human was rebellious, if shown that life here could be better than out starving in the streets, then he’d would surely become a great asset for Master. Just how she had shown Rainer that being slaves was not dishonourable.

Nodding with enthusiasm, she combed her hair with her fingers, adjusted the simple brown tunic she wore and opened the door.

As soon as she saw the young man she grimaced in sympathetic pain. He had dark rings under his eyes, his face pale, and the hair on his head matted into an oily messy mop. His arms, neck, and shoulders were sporting deepening purple and blue marks of a beating, and his split lip, though no longer bleeding, was slightly swollen. Yselda had also quickly noticed that the human wasn’t thin, which she thought was a good point since otherwise his cheeks would’ve likely been caved in. Actually, after a moment consideration that drew her attention, the young man seemed to have only undergone a handful of days of malnourishment, but otherwise he seemed slightly plump. Or perhaps was it swelling from half of him being black and blue?

Her eyes travelled to the human’s hands as she got closer without him having caught on to her presence while he was distractedly handling one of the pans. It soon became easy to spot the fact that his palms were smooth and unmarred, long slender fingers that had neither calluses of labor nor scars of effort.

At that thought her gut stirred. This was not the malnourished street-rat whose life would be improved by leaps and bounds through their service to Master Cu.

This man had all the signs of having lived a luxurious comfortable life, perhaps he’d been in the service of a noble! Panic fluttered in her gut at the memory of the previous household she’d served in. The happy welcoming smile she’d put up shifted into cautious observation. “Hello.” She greeted, looking at his reactions closely and attempting to heed Rainer’s warning of seeking out odd behaviour.

The human jumped in surprise and dropped the pan, a yelp followed from having moved quickly when he was clearly not in a condition to do so.

He spoke, but just how Rainer had told her, the language was completely alien to her ears. She frowned, not able to recognize it. She had travelled plenty back when she was a young calf all the way even into her adulthood, but for the life of her his words did not appear similar to any of the myriad of languages and dialects she’d stumbled upon.

“I’m sorry, but I don’t understand you.” She spoke softly, gently, bowing her head in an appeasing gesture, glancing at the chains that tied him to the kitchen wall. Judging by how much leeway Rainer had given the human, he could only remain around the fire and little else.

Good, no access to knives or other pointy objects, only the pans and pots.

“My name is Yselda.” She bowed a second time, pointing her palms at herself. “Yselda.” She repeated slowly, and then switched to point the palms at him. Strangely enough, as she did this, she felt slightly self-conscious, her hands were worn and battered, fingers bent where they’d once broken, scars and calluses of hard labour clear to see. But she restrained the impulse to pull them away. “And you are?”

The man appeared to have picked up on her intention, his face lighting up with a genuine smile. “Arwen.” He said, imitating her initial gesture, and then pointing his palms towards her. “Yselda?”

The female minotaur held back from reaching to touch his hands, instead returning the smile and nodding. Good, it seemed at least the weird language was indeed a foreign tongue and not the result from having been hit in the head or somesuch. She was also quite glad at his body-language, the young man did not appear tense or angry, rather, he looked quite relaxed and content.

“We are going to cook.” Yselda continued her explanation, picking up the dropped pan and putting it back in its place. “I will be teaching you.” She knew he wouldn’t understand, but that would only be a matter of time. “This is a pan.” She pointed at the named object. “Pan.”

“Pan.” He repeated with a nod.

“And this is a pot.” She said. “Pot.”

“Pot.” He replied, then pointed at himself with his hands. “This is a Arwen.”

Oh! He was smart. Yselda laughed lightly and shook his head. “I am Yselda.” She declared. “And you are?”

“I am Arwen.” He nodded his head, and stuck his tongue at her after a moment of doubt. “And you are?”

“I am Yselda.” She nodded in response.

There was a pause as Arwen glanced at her, appearing to be considering something. Then he bowed, placing his thumbs against opposite shoulders and spreading his elbows wide. Yselda had to blink as she saw the gesture; it was a traditional from the homeland of the Beast-Kin, Ingelnay, and it was a show of deep respect, one reserved for when greeting an venerable teacher.

“Yselda.” He said and then raised his head with a smile that grew the moment he’d noticed her shock.

How had he come to learn of this gesture? she wondered. The spark of curiosity ignited as she now really wanted to teach him Common quickly. She was starting to have a great deal of questions she wanted to ask him.

-Arwen

It turns out that cooking gruel is about as fun as watching paint dry.

One long wooden spoon. One pot. Milk. Water. Oatmeal. And fire. Then stir. Stir. Stir.

And slowly stir some more.

I knew what I was cooking was probably going to be the best potential meal for me in terms of what food I was going to be permitted to munch on, which was also disheartening in its own way. Doubly so when I could smell and practically taste the meat and cheese Yselda was preparing in one of the pans.

Frankly speaking, I was increasingly willing to burn my fingers just to get the chance to steal a bite from that food. A part of me was pretty sure that I could dip my hand into boiling oil and it would still hurt less than that damn recharge-altar.

Better put those dangerous thoughts away, I definitely did not want to get myself hurt like that.

On the plus side, Yselda had seen the hunger burning in my eyes and gave me an apple with a rather apologetic expression. She’d said something while pointing at the pan that probably meant ‘For the fucking midget that has you chained to the wall’, but my interpretation could be wrong.

Speaking of, Yselda was the best thing to happen since coming to this place besides Blaire. The minotaur woman appeared to be at least a decade older than me, and considering how she’d recognized the Beast-Kin pupil salute, I could take a guess that she was not originally born in human territory. Also, was friendly, sympathetic, and it was very easy to make her laugh which made me feel less like I’d been stuck into a variation of hell.

I repeated the word in human-common, which was pronounced. “Gudure.” In Freedom-Speech.

There appeared to be something fucky with the verbs of Human-Common, I hadn’t quite pinned it down, but I had the impression there were more conjugations than in English… was it perhaps distantly related to Spanish? I didn’t know, but I hoped not.

Because if I had learned one thing from taking Spanish classes, it was this: **Fuck the three thousand Spanish verb tenses and whoever came up with them.**

I shuddered at the potential nightmare I had little option but to walk into.

“Faren.” Yselda spoke as she pointed at the apple seeds, or was it the core?

“Faren.” I said as I plucked the seed and showed it to her to confirm, she nodded. Guess ‘Faren’ meant seed… or specifically apple seed? For now I’ll consider it to apply to seeds in general.

Wait. I frowned slightly as I looked at the apple seed. There was nothing odd about it, mind you, but there was something in the back of my mind, a vague thought, an idea, or rather, a little tidbit of information… what was it…

Oh, right, what wannabe writer didn’t know about amygdalin and it’s good ol friend cyanide?

The frown deepened while I glanced around the kitchen, and then a defeated sigh escaped me. I didn’t have the specific know-how to get a cyanide concentrate from the seeds, but even then, I was sure it needed some items currently definitely unavailable to me. Like pure ethanol.

“Arwen?” Yselda had spoken when it seemed I’d lost my train of thought.

I shook my head, keeping the seed even though I wasn’t too sure whether I’d get to do much with it. “No, it’s nothing.” I said softly, raising my hand in an appeasing gesture before sighing and going back to stirring the pot of gruel.

Man, for an instant there I’d been looking forward to seeing that dwarf bastard writhing on the floor choking on his own puke as his face turned blue.

Maybe another time.

Currently, it seemed my best bet was just hitting the road at the first chance I had… that’ll probably change once I get the opportunity to communicate with Blaire and convince her to help me.

Maybe.

I was hoping that I could manage to escape sooner though, I was certain Cu would forcefully extract my mana as often as he could manage without it risking my health too seriously. But at the same time, I was quite certain that someone could have their mana forced out of them only so many times before consequences started to happen.