TRAITORS, TRAITORS EVERYWHERE, AND NOT A ONE CAN THINK

ferryferry

Pictures: The new ferry of Tancred’s Landing

Traitors, Traitors everywhere, and not a one can think

By Teal Razor, slave of Captain Siri Emerald Jr, Port Olni Warrior

Distressing as it may be, there are traitors in every city and hamlet. There are free who would sooner spit on the Home Stone than honor it. It fills everyone with disgust to think that this would be possible and if it does not fill one with disgust, then one needs to reexamine his or her priorities.
 
All warriors, companions, Masters, Mistresses, and yes, even slaves need someone who has their back. This person is one you can depend on to sit with you, back to back, and have a 180 degree view of the battle field while you cover the other 180 degrees. Then in the war called life, you are less likely to suffer a sneak attack. They would both have each other’s back, or so one would think.
 
This past week I was the personal witness and recipient to a traitor and his ugly ways. The city of my Master’s Home Stone is a paragon of good taste, beautiful ladies, exquisite slaves, (except for you Tilapia, you bitch) and brave handsome males of all castes. So it is with heavy heart that I must relate a most disgusting act by a warrior to his senior officer. If this act shook me to the core, I could see that it might make a grown man cry. My Master had the unfortunate bad luck to be captured by warriors from Sais. My Master departed Olni to help Turia against an attack from Sais. That Sais is a filthy outpost on the Vosk, a fly ridden, smelly heap of bosk dung, is really secondary to the lying thieving ways of their slaves.
 
But I digress…My Master was tied hand and foot and dragged down the unpaved streets of Sais to their jail which is little more than a pen for verr. Upon this straw covered floor he lay helpless while a couple of slaves from the city made rude comments about his manhood and robbed him of his coin purse. I have sent a scroll to the Initiate in Port Olni asking him, in the name of my Master, to send a blue flame their way. My Master was allowed to give one shout out for help and so a scribe was sent for and a scroll prepared for delivery to the warriors in Port Olni.
 
When the scroll arrived by messenger, a warrior at the gate opened it and wrote across my Master’s plea for help, “NO”. He handed the scroll back to the messenger. When my Master heard of the reply from this traitor to his caste, he was incredulous. He vowed that upon returning to Port Olni, heads were going to roll. I never want to contemplate my Master going to the City of Dust due to neglect from a brother in his caste.
 
Fortunately for my Master and me, a merchant named Hesius was at the gate and watched this whole disgraceful transaction take place. He immediately took off for the docks with his slave and sister who was visiting him at the time. He arrived in Sais a short time later, it being just down the Olni River on the Vosk. It is amazing to me how one small merchant was brave enough to face all the warriors of Sais. He had no weapon but his inventory. Makes me think of my Boss, the Rarius Yuroki, and how he can make cities bow low with just the mention of the delicacies he puts into his warehouses.
 
Well, Master Hesius Grey, cajoled the two dufus warriors who greeted him at the gate, with 2 barrels of mead and 2 of ale. They had demanded 5 slaves at first and it was fortunate that these dipsomaniacal members of their caste let a valuable warrior escape their clutches. If the sainted Ubar of Port Olni had caught wind of his capture, a protracted war with Sais would have been undertaken.
 
After this incident of the capture and release, my Master shrugged off the obscene act by a brother and was off again for escort duty for some ambassador or other from the city. I went to the commons to serve and hear the gossip. I was greeted by a persistent buzz about a warrior who had left Olni, seemingly in the dead of night, and went to Genesian Port to swear allegiance to THEIR Home Stone. This happens so infrequently in Olni, traitors spitting on the Home Stone, that free women were seen to weep while talking about this back-stabbing apostate in the commons.
 
I, on the other hand, love the idea of vengeance. I daydreamed of cutting off the head of this two-timing defector. I saw myself leading a battalion of warriors into Genesian Port, headed by the high magistrate and demanding they turn over this man who spit on the Home Stone. I felt my body shaking with righteous indignation picturing my laughter at his execution.
 
Shortly though, I was yelled at by a scribe to wake up because he wanted a hot drink. And so went my reverie. It is at times like this, I wish I was free and had money in my purse. Then there would be no question about hiring an assassin to push this ex-Olnian into the river chained to some large boulders. If I was the Ubar of a city, a silly thought really, I would deny that pond scum, access to bread, salt, and fire.
 
If I could, I would warn the good citizens of Genesian Port, of the double-crossing deceiver in their midst who most certainly will have no one’s back but his own.

From the NEW VOICE OF GOR v.3 Issue 144

Comments are closed.