by Jamie Davis
* * *
A snarl from behind her announced the arrival of a vengeful comrade of the unfortunate slaver who’d seen her first.
Cari spun in place, her prescience ability allowing her to duck under the scimitar seeking to decapitate her. Her extended leg swept the feet out from under the surprised slaver, dropping him to the ground.
A plunging dagger in his chest silenced his shout of alarm.
* * *
2,500 experience
* * *
Wrenching her dagger free as her sweeping leg continued around, she tripped two more charging slavers coming from the direction of the beach.
Cari pulled in her extended leg and somersaulted forward, slashing left and then right with her rapier, finishing the two new arrivals.
* * *
2,500 experience
2,500 experience
* * *
Rolling to her feet, Cari moved back into the same purposeful stride that carried her into the village. At this point, the slavers who’d seen her kill four of their crew with such brutal efficiency opted to hold back forming a loose semi-circle in front of her as she reached the beach. It appeared they were happy to have a standoff as long as she wasn’t attacking anyone.
Cari saw the assembled slaves chained at the shore, already being loaded into the boats. A quick scan of the clustered men, women, and children spotted Jaycee immediately. The little blonde-haired girl standing in her child-sized shackles, clutching at the skirts of a woman who placed a protective arm around the girl.
“Stop!” Cari stopped her advance and bellowed at the top of her lungs, using all the powerful command voice she’d developed as the captain of the Vengeance over the last year.
Every face turned to look in her direction. Cari smirked. She had their attention. Now to put the rest of her plan into place.
“Who’s in command here? Come on, show me the motherless son of a dog who belongs to that rat-infested tub out there.”
No one answered her right away. Then the crescent of slavers parted and a big man with a turban of golden fabric stepped forward. He wore a vest of red velvet over his bare, hairy chest. His baggy pants were of fine linen and his pointy-toed boots looked to be made of crocodile skin or perhaps some other reptile.
“I’m the captain of that ship you just maligned. Who the hell are you? I feel like I should know the name of the fool who stands in front of me before I decide whether to kill you or add you to my bounty.”
“I’m Cari Dix.”
The slaver captain’s eyebrows raised in surprise.
“Yes. I’m that Cari Dix.”
The captain looked around the smoldering ruins of the village, looking for some sort of trap or imminent attack that might explain Cari’s bold presence.
“I have to wonder what you think you’re doing. You’ve managed to kill a few of my crew, but you have to know we’d overwhelm you eventually by sheer numbers. You must have something else planned. What is it you want?”
“I’ve come to offer myself in exchange for the slaves you’ve gathered here. You know who I am so I’m sure you know of the price on my head in your homeland.”
“You are correct. Killing a member of the Sultan’s family has a way of gaining you a certain level of notoriety. You are worth a pretty penny, dead or alive.”
“Let the villagers go, and you’ll live to collect the bounty. Otherwise, I’ll kill you first and then finish off the rest of the crew when I’m done.”
“Oh, you think you can kill me as easily as you dispatched a few members of my crew? I’ll make you a counteroffer. I’ve heard you’re a master with that blade of yours. My ship’s champion will challenge you to a fight. If he wins, I take you and the slaves with me. If you win, my crew lets the slaves go, but I still get you and the bounty that goes with taking you alive.”
Cari had wondered if this might be the way the plan worked out. Honestly, she’d also expected him to order his crew to attack her all at once and take her down without giving in to her demands. Her plan would have worked either way, but this was a better option.
She nodded. “I agree to those terms. But how do I know you’ll hold up your end of the bargain?”
“You don’t.” The slaver captain smiled, showing a pair of gold teeth. “But you knew that already, didn’t you?”
Cari smiled but said nothing.
“Otto.” The slaver captain called out. “Take her alive. The Sultan wants to watch her die himself.”
A massive figure stepped forward, a seven-foot-tall orc wearing only a turban, baggy pants, and sandals. He carried a huge falchion, the broad, curved blade nearly four and a half feet long.
He grinned down at Cari as he approached. She decided the time for niceties was over. It was time for action.
Cari rushed directly at the green-skinned brute in front of her, dodging to the side at the last instant in an attempt at getting around him and slashing at the back of his leading knee, severing the hamstring tendons.
That was the plan.
She successfully dodged the descending falchion blade. She didn’t avoid the sweeping backhand blow from the orc’s other hand.
Stars exploded behind Cari’s eyes from the force of the knuckles on the side of her face. It lifted her from her feet, launching her six feet through the air to land on the sand face down and dazed.
* * *
Health damage — health -22
* * *
Sensing a follow-up strike in the midst of clearing her head, all Cari could do was roll several times to the right, away from the gathered slaver crew and into open ground.
She saw the pommel of the orc’s weapon pound into the sand where her head had been moments before. That blow would have surely rendered her unconscious.
It also told her the captain’s champion was following his orders to try and take her alive. That gave her an advantage, or at least it should.
Rolling over once more, Cari used her momentum to roll back to her feet. Her sword and dagger wove an intricate pattern in front of her to fend off the surprisingly quick strikes coming in at her again and again, seeking to get past her guard.
She heard a hissing intake of his breath when one of her ripostes slipped past his blade and she slashed open a gash on his arm.
It didn’t cause significant damage. The wound only appeared to anger him.
The speed of the falchion attacks increased. Cari didn’t know how he could wield the heavy and ungainly weapon with such grace and ease.
She took two slashing hits in rapid succession.
* * *
Health damage — health -8
Health damage — health -12
* * *
The slaver captain yelled over the shouts and jeers from his crew. “You can yield, girl, at any time. You know he has you beat.”
“Never.” Cari gritted her teeth against the pain and redoubled her efforts, pulling out tricks she’d never tried before in an effort to get past the orc’s defenses with a killing blow or at least hit him enough times to power-up her burst of speed.
The desperation of her attempts opened her up to more strikes from the heavy weapon.
* * *
Health damage — health -12
Health damage — health -10
* * *
Pain and blood loss took its toll on her. She was slowing down. It opened her up to a sweeping downward blow from above.
Cari raised her rapier, trying the stop the heavy falchion with her thinner, more delicate blade.
It didn’t work.
Her precious sword snapped in half, leaving her holding a foot and a half of useless steel in one hand.
The orc’s sandaled foot came up and kicked her in the gut, driving the air from her lungs in a coughing whoosh.
Unable to stop herself, Cari fell to her knees.
She was done, and she knew it.
Cari dropped her stub of a sword and her dagger into the sand and raised her hands.
This wasn’t part of the primary plan. She’d counted on her dueling ability to help her fight past anyone she faced one on one.
Cari glanced over her shoulder, praying she didn’t see her small shore party disobeying orders and trying to save her despite the odds.
The tree line was empty and she smiled. Good. They’d followed orders.
Cari caught movement out of the corner of her eye. She looked to the right in time to see the descending pommel of the falchion just before it struck her temple.
* * *
Health damage — health -12
Critical hit -- Unconsciousness
Quest completed — get captured alive by the slavers
10,000 experience
* * *
Everything went black as her eyes rolled back in her head and she slumped over onto the sandy beach.
Chapter 29
Cari awoke on a narrow wooden platform. There was a similar platform a few bare inches above her. Beyond that, she couldn’t make out much of anything else in the gloomy darkness.
Judging from the rocking motion beneath her, she was in the slaver ship’s hold, held just like the other slaves. She glanced from side to side and saw a three long rows of platforms, stacked five high, stretching both left and right from her position along the length of the ship.
Cari rolled to one side, pulling on the chain running from her manacled hands to a ring set in the corner post of her bunk. She craned her neck so could see as far as possible down the rows.
Every one of the slaver’s cargo platforms was full as far as Cari could tell. She struggled in the darkness to spot Janey on one of them, but it was impossible to pick out individuals more than a few bunks away from her own. The strain on her chains also set her head to pounding. She was still sorely injured.
Cari looked over her stats for the first time in a long while, trying to assess what options she had for the rest of her plan to work out.
* * *
Name: Cari Dix
Class: Duelist
Level: 12
* * *
Attributes:
Brawn: 12 - +2 to hit/damage
Wisdom: 10 - +1
Luck: 10 - +1 to all saving throws
Speed: 22 - +7 defense
Charm: 18 - +5 personal reaction
Health: 44/120
* * *
Skills: Two-Weapon Combat, Acrobatic Dodge — 2, Multi-Foe Tactics — 2, Feint — 2, Taunt, Bladesmith — Master, Prescience — 3, Ambidexterity, Seamanship — Master, Navigation — Master, Aimed Cannon Shot — 2
Master Duelist Bonus — Projectile Dodge (50% chance of activation)
Regeneration – 1 hp/second (max 60 seconds) 1/day
Experience: 386,500/600,000
* * *
Cari wished she’d somehow managed to develop some thieving abilities or some way of picking locks. That could have come in handy right now, and she wouldn’t have to try the crazy idea that had seemed so sensible back on shore. She shook her head. No sense whining about what might have been. She just hoped she had enough health points to spare for what the plan called for next.
Shifting to one side so she could peer over the edge of her bunk, Cari looked up and down to see who her neighbors were.
The elderly man directly below her was sleeping. The girl to her right at the same level was awake, though. She looked to be about fourteen, though she could have been older and just small for her age.
“You’re her, the real Dread Raider Cari. I saw you fighting for us. I’m sorry you lost.”
“So am I,” Cari replied. “What’s your name?”
“Trina.”
“How long have we been on the ship?”
“I think it’s been three and a half days.”
“Hmmm,” Cari thought. Three days? She’d lost a lot of the time while unconscious. She was running out of time and needed to enact a significant part of her plan. That blow to her head would have put her in a coma if it had happened back home. Here, with her extra ability to absorb damage, it had just knocked her out, albeit for a long time.
Cari shook her head. “We don’t have much time.”
“Time for what?”
“Time until my crew comes after me. We need to be ready when they get here. That means I have to get out of these shackles.”
“How are you going to do that? Can you pick locks?”
“Sadly, no. I’m afraid this is going to be much more of a brute force approach, something my pig-headed father would probably do.”
“That doesn’t sound like it’s something good.”
“It’s not, Trina, believe me. Plus, it’s gonna hurt like hell. You might want to look away for a few minutes until I’m done. I’m not sure how long this is going to take or even if it will work the way I planned it.”
“Why would I look away? I don’t even know what it is you’re going to do.”
Another voice sounded from the bunk above Trina. “I’m not looking away either, missy,” a bearded man in his fifties said, leaning over as far as his chains would allow so he could see into the narrow space where Cari lay. “After that fight on the beach, I want to see how you’re going to get yourself out of this predicament.”
“Suit yourself.”
Cari didn’t want an audience for this next part. She didn’t want anyone to see her cry and she was pretty sure she was going to.
Twisting around, so her bare feet were planted against the post where the ring was bolted that secured her manacle, Cari leaned back until her arms were stretched to their limit.
“Ooo, she’s gonna use super-strength to pull the bolts free from the frame,” Trina whispered.
“I wish,” Cari muttered.
The old man chimed in. “She’ll never do it. There’s no way.”
“Oh, there’s a way,” Cari said through gritted teeth. She pushed with her legs while she held her arms straight out towards the ring, the chains of the manacles pulled tight, her shoulder muscles tensed to pull against the manacles.
The iron cuffs dug into her skin, and she felt a stab of pain as the one on her right cut through the skin, making her wrist slick with blood.
Cari’s stomach churned as the pain in her protesting wrists started. She resisted the voice at the back of her mind telling her it would never work. There was no stopping now. It was the only way out.
Pushing harder with her feet, increasing the tension further, Cari pulled back against the manacles, her fingers and thumbs angled away from her, pointing straight at the post.
More blood flowed as the other manacle cut into her wrist just below her thumb.
The pain made her groan and she bit down on her lip hard enough to draw blood as she held back the screams.
It was now or never. She’d lose her nerve if she waited any longer.
Cari steeled herself against the pain, bunched up her shoulder muscles and wrenched her right shoulder backward once, twice, and then a third time. She felt a pop followed by a wave of pain shooting up her arm.
Squinting through a haze of tears down at her right hand, she saw the thumb slip out of its joint and collapse the size of her hand. Another tugging pull through the wave of pain broke several bones in her hand, collapsing the end of her arm further.
A fifth tug on the right side and the manacle slipped off her wrist, over her mangled hand and clattered on the wooden platform.
* * *
Health damage — health -20
* * *
Forcing herself to keep going, Cari set to work on her left hand. It took six tugs on this side to break enough of her bones to pull it through the iron cuff. She almost passed out as her hand slipped through the manacle securing her wrist.
* * *
Health damage — health -20
* * *
Cari collapsed back, weeping silently, hugging her bloody and aching hands close to her chest. The pain overwhelmed her for a few seconds and she forgot part two of her plan for a moment. Then Cari remembered and sh
e forced herself to remain conscious as the red “critical health warning” flashed in the corner of her vision.
“Huh,” the old man said. “I didn’t see that coming.”
“Me, either,” Trina replied. “That was the craziest thing I’ve ever seen. Are you alright, Captain Cari?”
“I. Will. Be.” Cari gritted her teeth against the pain as she spoke. It was hard to concentrate and she had to focus on this or it wasn’t going to work.
Taking a deep breath and letting it out slow and steady, Cari opened her ability and skill menu, scrolling through until the regeneration ability was in place.
It took her several tries to get it to highlight and show it was selected. The throbbing pain in her hands and wrists kept distracting her.
Finally, she saw the golden flash that showed the ability was engaged. She mentally clicked yes. A second later, the familiar warmth spread outward from her center, washing away the worst of the pain. Cari watched her thumbs pop back into place and her crumpled hands reform as her health points ticked upward. A minute later, she’d regained the full sixty points the ability enabled.
Her hands still ached, as did her other wounds but, when she flexed her fingers, everything moved and her dislocated thumbs were both back in position. The right side was sorer than the left, but she could live with that for now.
“How did you do that?” Trina asked. “Your wounds healed while I watched.”
“Not all the way. It’s something a friendly troll taught me to do.”
“Bah, there’s no such thing as a friendly troll,” the old man said. “They eat small children for God’s sake.”
“I don’t know about that, but I made friends with this one. What’s your name, old man?”
