It was a huge step to consider, and a leap in the measure of trust for a man who sold lives for profit. It was obvious that I was not the only one with those concerns. It would be easy to refuse his offer except that he was right, and we all knew it. It was the easiest and surest way to enter Kaon and would account for our being there if anyone should ask.
Instead of accepting or rejecting his offer, I waited to observe Kendra and Damon’s reactions. Both were looking at me as if with the same reluctance.
Damon finally said, “We’ve played blocks, and I stretched the rules to the point of breaking, but he agreed to play until one of us lost all of our money. It took the most part of a day when he wanted to rejoin his caravan, but he didn’t. He stayed and kept his word.”
I fixed Damon with a stern look. “You are suggesting we risk our lives based on playing a game with a man?”
There is a point where Damon fights back, even with me. I pushed him to that point and beyond. He said, “Your father told me about trust one time. He sat me down and explained that an honest man will not steal even if he knows he will get away with it.”
“What does that mean?” I shouted.
“Just that. The Slave-Master could have called for an end to our game or declared himself the winner or a hundred other things . . . but he didn’t. He played on and lost.”
There are times when Damon is the most frustrating man I know. Instead of answering me directly, he tells me a story. “So, you think we should trust him?”
He spread his arms wide to encompass us all. “Think about it. If he wanted, he could have his warriors capture us and take us to Kaon in chains. It might be easier than trying to convince us to go with him.”
He was right again. Damn. The real problem was that the idea of being chained and helpless offended me in a way that was new since being taken by the bounty hunter in Vin. I was not scared of dark places, or small ones. I’d sailed a storm at night while at sea—and that example didn’t count because I was scared, I suppose, but I’d done it and survived. Not a lot of things scared me, but manacles on my ankles and wrists did.
As if reading my mind, the Slave-Master said, “Under your robes, you could be armed. The chains could have thin, soft pins that you could break open at any time. But strangers are not welcome in Kaon and entering as slaves is the only safe way that comes to my mind.”
I agreed, with reservations, but Damon is a good reader of people and if he trusted the Slave-Master, so would I. That decided, we spent our last night together planning the future and reviewing the recent past. We learned the Slave-Master was a contrast in who he said he was and who he really was.
The man sold humans yet beat a man in Dagger for kicking a dog. He could be considered lacking in morals but kept his word. For every negative, there seemed to be an opposite positive. By the end of the night, my conclusion was that he would kill me without a second thought if he wanted to, but he would fight to the death if someone else wanted to do the same.
That was the man I decided to trust.
Morning came with a clear blue sky that held little heat. The sun would rage later, but travel in the Kondor desert usually meant traveling from long before sunup to midmorning and sleeping the heat of the afternoon away. The Slave-master met with his people and sent half ahead, leaving six of his guards, all of which were Kaon Warriors he trusted fully. They also left a single chain of eight slaves to be sold at the auction houses.
The five of us that would be chained together in a few days were Damon, Kendra, Anna, Flier, and myself. Anna was a problem. None of us wanted her to go with us. Avery was willing to return her to Dire. She refused to go.
We argued long into the night, at times offering her bribes or incentives, and at more than one point I ordered her to leave. Each time, she refused. She said, “Send me with him but expect me back in a day or two. The first time Avery turns his back, I’ll be gone. Hopefully, I can find you, but in the desert traces of your passing will fade quickly and I may die trying to follow you. But it is my choice.”
Avery refused to tie her up. I understood his reluctance, but it didn’t make me like him any more than I had. We would never be close. However, he was not refusing to spite me. He was doing what he believed right.
In private, Kendra had reassured me that the dragon she called ‘hers’ would accompany us and it would remain in touch at all times—and she could direct it to protect us. That relieved some of my fears.
The larger fears centered around the idea that we had little idea of what we were venturing into. While I knew little of Kondor, I knew less of Kaon. Oddly, it was closer to Dire, a neighboring kingdom separated by impassable mountains. Slavery was rampant, while in Dire it hadn’t existed for centuries.
The slaves were primarily used in the mines and other businesses supporting the wealth of metals that chose to emerge from the mountains on the Kaon side, while few metals were present in Dire. A king and royal family had ruled Kaon until a decade ago.
They had disappeared. Not killed or deposed, but literally over the space of one night there was no king, and all royals were gone. An elderly man who was as tough as old leather issued orders. Those who didn’t obey also went missing or were found dead.
They called him “Councilman.” No name was associated with the title, and he had no known past or associates. Nobody had ever seen him before he sat in the king’s throne to conduct daily business.
But there were rumors, the Slave-Master told us as we trudged through the sand in the early morning. “Some said he was a mage. Others said he was a part mage, whatever that meant. Those who speculated too much in Kaon disappeared, and soon nobody spoke their thoughts out loud.”
I said, “So, everyone just does what he says?”
“Or disappears,” the Slave-Master said again as if using the word would convince us. “Not dies but disappears. Never returns. Think of that as we walk. People who oppose the Councilman disappear. Death can be understood, but when people are never seen again, there are questions that eat at the mind to cause intense fear.”
He was right. The citizens, especially the wealthy ones, could accept death as a natural consequence of trying to obtain power. Disappearance, with no trace of a body ever discovered was far more frightening.
The five of us traveled almost as well as the warriors who guarded us, but the slaves chained together moved so slowly that they finally arrived after we built our camp for the night, most of them too tired to eat. Many simply slumped to the ground and slept until the guards woke them with the new day.
They were thin to the point of starvation but wouldn’t eat, and in the same circumstances, I might do the same. On the afternoon of our third day, we entered the mountains that were the border of Kaon. As we made camp that night, two of the Slave-Master’s guards returned from scouting ahead.
One brought news in the form that all was as usual in the central city of Kaon. The other brought a bundle of rags to dress us in as we descended the other side of the mountains. We’d be seen, and that would be reported by the Councilman’s spies. We wanted to blend in as much as possible.
That night, we were chained for the first time.
Despite knowing the locking pins in our manacles were thin and soft copper, easily broken, the feeling was one of desperation and helplessness. I couldn’t help but look at the others who were chained and sleeping. They’d given up.