Harbinger: The Downfall - Book One (3 page)

The door opened, pulling him from his reverie. Three people entered, and the slave recognized the girl who had been attending him when he woke. She hid behind a tall, willowy woman who wore a sheer shift that showed her curves in the soft light of the candles. A short thick man with a beard streaked with steel gray that went down to his chest followed the women into the room. The man stepped to one side, crossed his arms behind his back in a relaxed military stance, and watched with sharp dark eyes. The tall woman surveyed the scene in the room, her eyes lingering on the broken bowl.

“Elean, clean up the mess, then report to the headmaster to be punished for your carelessness,” she said in a gentle but commanding tone.

“Yes Mistress Sybia,” Elean said, as she darted forward, kneeling to clean up the mess she had made.

“What?” the slave croaked, his voice dry and cracking. “It was an accident, I surprised her. Why would she be punished?” He tried standing to block the woman as she approached the girl who was wiping up the thick cream from the stone floor. The slave fell back groaning and holding his chest from the effort. Blood showed at the edges of his cut. Realizing his nudity, he grabbed the sheet, which had fallen away earlier, and covered himself.

The woman walked around the slab to the opposite side of where the girl was cleaning, and began to inspect the slave. Her hands were cool on his hot skin as she took his shoulders and turned his body, making him lift his feet back onto the stone bed. He cried out, but she ignored his outburst and inspected the tender, puckered flesh with deft, experienced fingers. She circled the slab and went to the table along the wall to retrieve bandages and the other items she would need to bind the wound.

The slave hissed through clenched teeth, then said, “What will happen to her? I told you she didn’t do anything wrong.”

Sybia interrupted him, “Don’t worry about her, she knows her place and her duties. Breaking things is not among them and her punishment will be just. Now, be quiet so I may bind this again and we can begin the real purpose of this visit.”

The slave quieted but continued to glare at the woman for a moment before remembering the silent man. He studied the man, whom he thought to be a guard. The captive grasped the concept that he was not in control of this situation. Minutes later, his wound had been bound, the broken pottery and spilt ointment cleaned up, and the young girl left the room, head bowed.

The tall woman looked pointedly at the short man and nodded, before she turned back to the slave. The man on the slab watched with interest, though he was unsure what it meant. The woman went to the table, put bread on a plate, and poured a cup of water. Sybia held these things towards her patient, who looked at them, and then crossing his arms, stared back at her in defiance.

“Very well,” she said. “I can feed you if you are too weak or stupid to do it yourself. Eating would be wise; you will need your strength if you are ever to leave this room, or this place.”

The slave’s face reddened and his anger slid away. He took the plate and cup from her with shaking hands. “Thank you,” he said.

“You have manners. Good. They will help you here. Eat first, and when you are finished the Master will speak with you.” The woman glided across the floor and left through the open door. The bearded man, who had watched Cite the whole time, followed and shut the door behind them. The slave heard a heavy bar fall into place outside the door.

Seeing no other option, the slave ate. He saw the wisdom and necessity of it, and wasn’t stupid as the stern woman had implied.  It was harder to eat than the he imagined it would be. He sat, wrapped in the sheet, took small bites of the bread, and sipped at the water. As he set the empty plate beside him, the door opened and the stout man came back into the room. The slave’s eyes narrowed and his head tilted as he considered the timing.

“Now lad, allow me to introduce myself,” the short man began, putting his hands behind him once and began to pace the floor at the end of the bed.

“You were outside watching me.” The slave interrupted. “Where exactly am I? Am I being held prisoner or am I now your slave?”

Rogen, unused to interruptions, stopped his pacing for a moment and looked at the youth. Squaring up to face the lad, he said, “I am Rogen the Plague, master of these lands. You are in the Great Desert. Your humble accommodations are courtesy of the Great Desert Empire. As for your other questions, it remains to be seen what your status here is. It seems you have special talents. I guess I do not need to point that out to you, but I may need to point out why it came to my notice.”

“What special talents?” the slave interrupted again. “My dreams? You know about them?” The slave watched the shorter man’s brow furrow.

“What is your name, boy?” Rogan asked. “And tell me the truth, because there is no point in lying.”

“People call me Cite.” The slave said.

“Not your real name though? All right. Why do they call you Cite?”

“Because of my gift of second sight and precognitive dreams. Wait, why am I… you gave me something! Either in the food or the medicine, you are trying to get information out of me…”

Cite trailed off, staring past his host and captor. He felt memories stir, and something he had been trying to recall was on the tip of his tongue, a mental rush made him fall silent as realization washed over him. Rogen’s face had remained as unchanging as stone itself, but Cite knew that the Rokairn had not known about his dreams. Cite felt the image of himself in an arena, and knew the slave lord had been referring to something that happened there. That moment was part of the time that had been lost in the hole in Cite’s memory, and this was the first he knew of it.

Rogen watched this human man, who was not much more than a boy in the Rokairn’s eyes, as the shifting emotions rolled across Cite’s face. A silvery shimmer surrounded the boy. Most would pass it off as a trick of the candlelight and moist eyes, but because of years of training and experience, Rogen knew it was more.

“Your dreams, and more,” Rogen said, watching the young man. “You did things right after you arrived here, in the testing arena. Do you know to what I am referring?”

Cite’s face gave away a lot as he dredged his infallible memory, which had never failed him in his twenty-three years of life. Until now. He looked down at his hands, they fidgeted and twitched in his lap, and Rogen knew the truth. The Rokairn had witnessed something the boy did not even know about himself.

“No, I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Cite ran his hand through his blonde hair, shrugged and sighed. “Before I set out, I had dreamt of horrible things. I had nightmares that came every night for three nights; each one was filled with different horrors. I had gone to the village elders to tell them about the dreams. You see, I am known for my prophetic dreams as well as having a perfect memory. I never forget anything I see. It is seldom a useful gift, but it had brought me some small respect in my village, but alienation also.

“These dreams, I had never seen anything like this in my dreams before. The village elders didn’t seem surprised by my dreams, though they were concerned. Then people began to die, just as my dreams predicted. Mutilated in horrible ways. They told me to travel to the Northwood Community and tell the elders there. They also told me if I did not make it to that destination, I should tell whoever was at the end of the journey about my dreams. I found it odd and suspected that the Elders knew more than they told me, as usual, but I didn’t say anything. I shut down my small shop where I made and sold musical instruments, and then I set out upon my journey.

“Go on, boy,” Rogen said, still at parade rest, “tell me all about it. It will be better once you get this off your chest. And tell you what, I will tell you about me as we go. How about that?”

“How about you tell me a bit more about what this place is, and why I should cooperate?”

“Fair enough, let me get a glass of water and I will begin.”

The Rokairn turned to the sideboard and poured water into clay mug. He drank it down, his back to Cite the whole time. The boy watched, wondering what a Rokairn was doing in the desert instead of being holed up in a mountain somewhere making baubles and trinkets.

“The Great Desert spans more than four hundred thousand square kilometers and is the dwelling of very few things,” Rogen began as he turned back to his prisoner, making Cite jump. “However, in the past decade some beings have come to call it home. Temples have risen from the sand, and the dark magics within has found ways to escape centuries, if not millennia, of imprisonment.

“The Desert Empire had already made its home here for centuries. Few are sure how long. Records were kept, but they are not for the public. The first Rogen the Plague was a human that had been a slave gladiator in the arena of Everyway. He rose in the ranks of the warriors and won his freedom centuries ago. When he left the grand city he had called home, both he and the city were changed. You see, he led a revolt of slaves after he won his freedom and became a legend that has been retold for generations. They even erected a statue of him in Everyway, in spite of him shaking the foundations of the greatest city on the continent, possibly even the known world.

“He left and headed east, crossed the Rolling Mountains, and made his way south to the Rock Crags, just north of the Great Desert. There, he waged war on the slavers. The very men who took him from his family, freedom, and life to make him what he was. He slew them, and freed their slaves. He learned something about people during that time. Humans are not born to be free. Well, not the majority of them. They choose slavery by their very nature. Perhaps not the obvious form that he had been subjected to, but people draw purpose and a reason to live by serving others.

“So, Rogen the Plague, a gladiator and hero who fought long years to gain his freedom, gathered his men and explained the plan. He would help give men their purpose, but still defeat what he hated most, the lack of individual choice. Gathering the slaves who were wandering the desert, lost, he enslaved them again. He took them deep into this very desert, and that was where a legend was born. It is said that he cruelly set them to task. Beating at the sands with their bare hand, they pounded loose sand into rock, their hands becoming raw and bloody, changing the color of the sand to a deep red with their own lifeblood. They formed stones, and set those stones to begin the great fortress that would become the seat of power for the Great Desert Empire.

“Rogen the Plague trained the slaves. He trained some for combat in the arena as well as guarding. He trained others in pleasure. He trained still others in service. He created the ultimate slaves, ones who loved what they did because they were doing what they were born to do, and began his own slave trade. The contracts that went with his slaves were like no other anyone had ever seen. They detailed the slave’s duties, rights, and the right of retribution. If a slave were ever found to be abused, Rogen the Plague would return and take vengeance on any who broke the contract. And he did. I have added certain clauses to the contracts that allow any slave to buy their way out of the contract, guarantee medical attention when warranted, and so on.

“That was centuries ago. A man much shorter than the statue that once stood in Everyway is now called Rogen the Plague.” Rogen smiled and poured himself another mug of water. “I am the sixth to carry the name and the first that is not human. I had reigned for over seventy years but many say I do not look any older than a human of forty years.”

“Why would you ever want to do this? Why would anyone want to be a slaver?” Cite asked.

“To make the world a better place.” Rogen answered.

“How does making people your slave make the world better?”

“I don’t make them my slave, as much as train them to do something they are good at, and allow them to be comfortable with giving responsibility for their day to day life to someone else. It is not any different than a serf farming for a lord, or a soldier serving in an army. It is what people do anyway.  Just make sure they have a decent place to do it by placing them with people who will treat them fairly and appreciate what they have. See, people tend to value things more if they pay for it. If someone does it for free, the master will almost always take it for granted and abuse the relationship. And of course there is the part in the contract of me showing up if they mistreat any of my people.”

“What’s your real name? What about your old family and friends?”

“My real name?” Rogen snorted a laugh. “Rogen is now my real name. Any other name was so long ago, and the man that is not the man I am now. The same for family, I guess. I think about them, and have even assigned slaves to merchants who sell to them – my people would never buy or sell another person - and check up on them that way.”

“How did you get to be Rogen though? And don’t you miss your old life?”

“Oh, I think about my previous life sometimes, but I don’t miss it. This is a life with a greater purpose,” Rogen’s eyes took on a faraway look, “and I get to organize on a massive scale. Not to mention the people I place are still loyal to me, thus giving me constant information from kingdoms across the continent, and contacts and resources in every corner of the land.

“As for how I got this job, I met my predecessor in my business. I made weapons for his training arena. He eventually brought me here under the guise of a weapons master to train his troops. I spent a bit of time fighting myself, and am better at using a sword or axe than making them. Once he began to age, and wanted to retire he took me aside and offered me the job. We sold off our current stock, got new advisors, and he stayed on as an advisor, all the time calling me Rogen the Plague. It is not as uncommon as you may think, and I have even heard of feared pirates doing something similar.”