Erastus 20, 4720

“There has got to be a better way to make a living,” Cress glumly thought. He looked behind at the pair he was leading back to Kaer Maga. Their hands were tied, feet hobbled, and they were strung on a line by which Cress kept them moving forward. And they looked utterly dejected.

But their condition was better than when he had found them: hiding beneath the seat of an outhouse in some gods forsaken grubby little town and starving. It only took a few copper coins to encourage one of the locals to tell him where his quarry was hiding. After they climbed out Cress had tied them, but insisted they wash off in the nearby river. They made a pathetic sight, the pair of them. Barely able to stand, much less walk. Cress still winced at the thought of how they eagerly wolfed down the meager scraps he had tossed them.

It was Cress’ first solo recovery. There had been an attack on slave merchants in Kaer Maga some months back that had set free a large number of slaves. Obviously (to the city officials’ point of view) this could not stand. But while the city had hired a team of specialists to go after the perpetrators it was up to each slave owner to hire out whom they could to recover their merchandise. The merchant whom hired him simply handed him a list of names and descriptions, including the location and description of the identifying mark that had been branded onto each of his “assets.”

It was just a job. It was all perfectly legal and profitable. All perfectly above board and respectable. And so why did Cress feel like pig shit whenever he looked at his captives?

“Why am I doing this?” He asked himself.

“Why indeed?” asked an unfamiliar voice. Startled, Cress looked up and saw a woman standing by the side of the road, but he had been so engrossed in his thoughts that he had failed to notice her until he was nearly upon her. And had he asked that question out loud?

“Isn’t the world a miserable enough place for the likes such as these without adding to their suffering?” She asked.

“The world is a hard place for anyone who has to work for a living,” Cress replied shortly. He didn’t feel like being preached to and her comment came a little too close to his feelings on the matter for comfort. “I am just trying to make a living. And besides, I don’t make the laws.” He added without much enthusiasm.

“Tyrants hide behind the laws that they create to benefit themselves.” She replied. “Perhaps you need a little encouragement to fully realize what you already know to be true.”

She gestured to Cress and formally proclaimed, “You shall track down each of individuals on your list and you will help them to make good their escape and establish themselves in a new community.”

Cress felt a wave of compulsion overwhelm him and he knew he must follow her decree or face intolerable consequences. How was he going to accomplish this? And how long would it take? And what would it cost?

He looked at the woman and miserably stammered, “I will do… must do the things that you demand, but know this: you have ruined me.”

The grey clad woman looked upon Cress with compassion and added, “You should consider the time spent on your quest as well spent. In this purse is more than enough to get started on your goal. When you are done you may find yourself in a far better state and be content with your place in this world than had you carried on with your mercenary career.”

She tossed him a heavy leather pouch and vanished, leaving Cress looking over at his two prisoners. “Where the hell can I take them so they can live without worrying about being captured again?” he wondered.

Desnus 16, 4722

“And that leaves just one left,” Cress thought as he looked at the weathered, creased and crumpled parchment in his hands. He was leaving Magnimar and heading east. So anxious was he to find the final person on the list that he had purchased a seat on a carriage heading toward Korvosa: a rare treat.

Looking back at the list he read KM Krafton 4701 M H/O 23323 and next to that was written Snagsby, male, half orc. They had all been half orcs, he thought glumly, and fortunately they had all known one another and with a little encouragement most were willing to tell him what they knew concerning the whereabouts of their comrades in chains. Those that were still alive, that is. He had found three from his list of two dozen already dead, which made them harder to locate and properly identify; the later requiring bribes to have the bodies exhumed so he could check the tattoos on their shoulders.

Cress consulted his journal and leafed back some pages. “Snagsby: last seen heading southeast from K.M. on the night of the escape.” He had already searched a number of towns in that area some months back before confirming that another two escapees were in Magnimar. Consulting a regional map he traced a likely route an escaped slave might have taken had he tried to keep a low profile. His eyes were drawn to a town called Diamond Lake. The map’s previous owner had written annotations for each town and city on the map, and next to Diamond Lake was scrawled, A real shit-hole. “Well that’s just great,” Cress said out loud as the carriage bumped and rocked on down the road.

Sarenith 8, 4722

“If anything the note on the map was overly kind,” Cress mused as he encouraged his horse to head back toward Korvosa. “And apparently I just missed him! At least he’s no longer keeping a low profile and is doing quite well for himself. And with the group he’s joined he should be fairly easy to find even in a large city like Korvosa.” He looked above him and called out, “Flit, you know the drill: keep a lookout for trouble along the road.” A familiar buzzing sound swooped by overhead.