Phocosoen (platinum)
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Freedom. To do what ya want, when ya want to. He wasn’t some chaos nut that believed in absolute freedom though. That type of freedom was just an excuse for someone to be a jackass or down right evil.
Whoops. He narrowly avoided the two-handed stroke of the krolvin’s axe by sidestepping quickly. For some odd reason he tended to get philosophical in the midst of a fight. It might end up with his death eventually, but it helped keep his nerves in check. Not that anyone would call him craven sneaking onto a krolvin slaver ship, by himself, in Maelstorm Bay, to rescue some kid that had been kidnapped.
He swung his coraesine longsword at the krolvin and as the blade cut into the krolvin’s side a blast of air exploded from the blade to sheer into the side of the krolvin and remove several feet of intestine. The krolvin gaped at him rather stupidly for a moment and then fell down howling in fear and pain, all the while gaping at the rather large hole in his side.
Sometimes he wished he were a rogue of the Wolf Clan. He’d had a chance to work with them in the past and had been awestruck at the silent death they delivered to any unfortunate soul that got in the way. The poor sod that fell under a Wolf Clan blade or arrow might as well have died in their sleep for all the noise they made in the dying. Things always went relatively smooth until the first exchange of blows when it was just him alone. As soon as someone lost a limb or a kidney though, the screaming inevitably brought curious onlookers to see what all the fuss is about. If the onlookers weren’t generally friendly with the one doing the screaming and holding weapons, things could probably be smoothed over, but as it were the newcomers most often wanted to join in the fight and the chorus of noise makers.
The heavy trod of a multitude of feet upon the wood deck announced the arrival of several more krolvin that had become quite curious, as expected, as to why their friend was screaming his bloody head off. Actually, the one doing the screaming had stopped at some point as he lay silently on the deck with the slack jawed expression so common among idiots that think they’re going to live forever because they have a large weapon and an abundance of muscle.
Apish screaming and the loud pounding of fists on chests snapped his attention back to his present predicament of being entirely surrounded by slathering krolvin that wanted to poke holes in him and peel the skin off his body like the skin off a banana and eat him. Come to think of it, he wasn’t sure the krolvin actually ate bananas despite their similarities to apes. Stop it. Not the time to be thinking about nonsense thoughts. This is why he was not cut out to be a Bear Clan Warrior. He thought too much to fit into the mold of the single-minded berserker that seemed to characterize every single Bear Clan member.
He drew his second coraesine sword from his bandolier and readied himself. As he raised the swords in the air before him, the world around him seemed to blur and the krolvin surrounding him looked like they were imitating a sloth with how slowly they moved. As the krolvin were finishing their frenzy and about to assault him; he became a whirlwind of death. Quite literally if you happened to be a spectator you would have simply seen a blur move amongst the krolvin that resulted in explosive showers of gore that seemed to blossom in the air like gnomish fire crackers. The carnage he wrecked was a little at odds with his usually amiable demeanor, but he was a member of the Wind Clan and a line had to be drawn at some point. Slavery was across that line and he had yet to encounter a slaver that agreed to release their prisoners with a please and tip of his hat. On the other hand, they always agreed to his request after they were lying on the ground, groaning pathetically, and trying to cling to their vile existence.
Looking around, the krolvin he had just dispatched were not actually groaning and seemed to be quite dead instead. That suited him just fine as well as he wouldn’t need to watch his back for someone that was trying to be crafty and pretending to be far more injured than they were. It is hard to play dead when you have a large hole in your chest or half your skull is missing. He’d be obligated as a bard to applaud any actor that could accomplish such a feat; Gods know he couldn’t.
He had managed to kill about twenty-four krolvin and that seemed a likely number required to man the ship he was presently on. He made a careful study of the deck and the bodies littered haphazardly across it. Once he was sure nothing was moving, he made his way below deck to where the child was most likely being held. A rather unpleasant odor greeted him as he made his way towards the holding pens in the hold of the ship. A mixture of unwashed flesh, feces, and rotting food seemed to be the common aroma one could always expect in the hold of a slaver’s ship. Death didn’t seem to be a part of this particular perfume so he was holding out hope that the child was still alive.
The child was in a bad state when he found him. The poor lad was emaciated and lacked the strength to move. The child had been beaten badly and what was left of his clothing hung in rags. A sight like this always reaffirmed his resolve when it came to ensuring the freedom of others; regardless of how many bastards needed to be killed to do it. The numerous lives he had taken never kept him awake at night, but the sight of men, women, and children in a wretched existence and denied the freedom to seek out the simple pleasures of a loving family, food, and shelter… those thoughts made him restless at times.
He raised his voice in song to travel back to the nearest inn. The child needed a healer’s attention if his life was to be saved. Phocosoen wasn’t sure about the child’s spirit though. That seemed to always be the hardest thing to recover. Hopefully the parents would be patient and love and time would do what the best healer’s could not.