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I made my way through the winding streets of the city quietly; avoiding the few people I came across traveling the dusty road and finally walked out into a wide plaza as the merchants began setting up their stalls.

"And now begins phase one of my plan."

I began browsing through the various goods set out in the stalls while keeping an eye on the gate at the far end of the plaza which was where I presumed wagons would come through from out of the city. At first I paid little real attention to the various odds and ends for sale but as time passed without any wagons I decided to do some actual browsing. I was haggling with one of the stall owners over the price of a relic Kazath had recognized from before the fall, when the first wagon arrived.

The massive gate swung inwards into the plaza and a wagon pulled through, flanked by guards. The first things I noticed were the creatures drawing the wagon, like some crossbreed between a lizard and an ostrich. Then I looked at the contents of the wagon and the bile rose in my throat, the wagon was built like a large cage and trapped inside were creatures of various species and I even saw a human in chains, all were slumped in the middle of the cage, emaciated and filthy. I let Kazath take over the bargaining and focused on the driver of the wagon, as soon as the wagon was fully through they swung shut and a man dressed in what Kazath identified as the Church Guard uniform. The guard spoke briefly with the driver who pulled out what looked basically like a passport. The guard scanned the papers briefly and then waved the wagon through.

I pulled my focus back from the wagon as Kazath finished the deal and picked up the black cube, which I slipped into one of my inner pockets and walked into a shaded area of the plaza where I took an unoccupied bench for myself.

"Get a good deal on your toy?" I asked Kazath.

"It is not a toy," Kazath exclaimed indignantly. "And if that shopkeeper had known what it actually was I would never have gotten my hands on it."

I hefted my purse which felt substantially lighter and gave a slight grin.

"I'm gonna take that as a no then."

"All right, all right, it wasn't cheap anyways."

"Not to worry though, if my plan works, I have a feeling we're going to gain some more funds."

"We're going to do something permanent to a slaver caravan aren't we."

"Yes we are." I grinned viciously, "I think they're long overdue for a lesson."

I began casually walking towards the gate out of the city with mixed feelings, on the one hand the fact that slavery was in use here made my plan a lot easier, but I couldn't help thinking about those pitiful wretches being carted off to who knows where. I sighed philosophically I'd just have to take what I got.

"So what is that cube of yours anyways?"

"It's a container and a key, and it's got something inside of it."

"Couldn't be very large if it fits inside of there."

"Actually it's a dimensional pocket so it can hold quite a lot."

"This is going to take longer to get used to than I thought; I have to get rid of a lot of ingrained learning if I'm going to make it here."

"Don't beat yourself up about it, you're doing pretty well considering. Besides you're probably not going to find many people who do know about these sort of things."

I walked out the gates unchallenged and set off down the road when suddenly I felt a huge wrench in my chest. I gasped and nearly fell to my knees at the pain.

"What...the fuck...was that." I gasped.

"I think...we got too...far away from the current source of our power."

Kazath sounded in even worse shape than I felt.

I continued to stumble along the road until the pain subsided and straightened back up.

"Let's not do that again."

"That's perfectly all right with me."

I looked around at the scenery, for the first time since I had left the city, It looked pretty much like Earth, green grass, blue sky, scenic hills rolled out as far as the eye could see in all directions and the road led into a verdant forest, I felt simultaneously sad and angry, this place was so beautiful and slaves were dragged through, probably every day. Each day the people who the Church decided were non-people were ground a little more into the dirt, and they did it all probably without even knowing what they were doing was in any way wrong. Religion does funny things to people everywhere I supposed. Night began to fall as I entered the forest but I travelled on, I had passed a few farmers hauling carts of food and strange animals towards the city and an empty slave cart, I paused and sniffed the air for a moment and caught the stench I was looking for, the stench I had come to associate with the slavers. It looked like the slavers had stopped for the night and set up camp at the side of the road; I slipped through the deepening darkness and hovered out of sight observing the slavers.

It was the first time I had been able to closely observe the people I had been looking for and I wasn't impressed with what I saw. These slavers were filthy and obviously not too sober as they sat drinking around the fire laughing drunkenly and pushing each other around. The group consisted of six people, two carts and individual tents for each; one cart held slaves and the other I wasn't sure of. There were four slaves visible to me from the firelight though more of them could have been hidden. I waited patiently amidst the trees and shadows as the slavers proceeded to get roaring drunk.

After what seemed like an eternity most of the slavers staggered off to their tents while one of them stumbled over to supposedly keep an eye on the slaves, of course with how much alcohol they had consumed I doubted that it actually served any purpose. I waited for a while longer until the sounds of snoring filled the cool night air before slipping quietly up to the first wagon, the one that I didn't know what contained. To my surprise I heard the slaver who had been sent to keep watch talking drunkenly to the cart I was hiding beside.

"You, you thought you were sho clever..." The drunken slaver slurred, "but you're nothing but a fucking animal." The slaver appeared to grow more and more agitated as he spoke. "You killed Trevor" he sobbed, " but you'll pay for that, you'll pay, cuz we're takin you to Merestille. They'll be sure to give you the collar and then you'll spend the rest of your miserable fucking life doing whatever your master tells you." He paused for a moment swaying drunkenly. "You'll pay."

I had heard enough and slipped up behind the guard drawing my kukri and ramming it upwards into his brain, the slaver stiffened and twitched for a few moments before sinking to the ground pulling my knife with it. I gave the knife a tug but it had lodged firmly in the dead man's skull, I sighed and placed my boot into the man's back and gave a hard pull, the knife finally came loose with a sickening squelching noise. I waited a few moments to regain control of my stomach then wiped the knife clean on the dead slavers clothes.

Now that I knew what the second cart contained I slipped around to the tents of the others and entered the first man's tent, he snored drunkenly as I bent over him, kukri in hand once again and drew a crimson line across his throat.

Once all the slavers were dead I walked over to the fire and sat on one of the stumps that had previously been used by one of the now cooling slavers and looked at my blood drenched hands.

"You did what you had too."

"I know Kazath, and that's the strange part, I don't feel particularly bad for killing those men, they were obstacles," I narrowed my eyes and stared into the fire, "I removed them."

I looked over to where the slaves also slept in their pen.

"I did what needed to be done to save them, and I don't have time for remorse right now." I stood up and walked over to the slave cart I had hid behind and listened to a drunken man spout his last words before I killed him. I shook my head to clear it and wiped my bloody hands on a piece of cloth before walking up the few steps to the heavy wood door and knocking quietly. There was a brief startled silence which I promptly filled.

"Would you perhaps be in need of rescuing? I was just in the neighborhood and thought I'd check."

"You have a clever mouth for the noble rescuer type." A female voice floated out from the narrow bars of the wagon wryly.

"You wound me." I proclaimed dramatically. "Alas it seems I am doomed to be forever misunderstood."

A tinkling laugh burst from the confines of the wagon and brought a smile to my face I walked up to the final step and looked in through the bars, but I couldn't make out my conversational partner, it seemed that she could though.

"You're a human." The statement was made in a rather accusatory manner.

"Is that so?" I put on my best shocked expression and made a big show of looking at my hand. "It seems you're right, that doesn't however make my offer of rescue any less sincere."

"How do I know I can trust you?" The voice asked suspiciously.

"I suppose you could ask the six dead bodies out here but I'm afraid they wouldn't have much to say."

"You're mad." The captive gasped.

"I'm not mad!" I exclaimed indignantly, "Isn't that right Kazath."

"Of course not." Kazath's voice responded dryly in my head.

"You see, Kazath doesn't think I'm crazy." Then I burst out laughing. "Terribly sorry about that, I couldn't resist. Now do you want to get out of there or not."

The voice gave a long sigh. "Can I at least know the name of my rescuer?"

"But of course, my name is Alath." I pulled a key ring from my jacket that I had lifted off one of the dead bodies and inserted the proper key into the lock then opened it gently. Letting the moonlight flood into the wagon onto the form of a pure white fox, her hands shackled to the back of the wagon.

"My name is Shiva."