A Fool’s Errand for the Fool’s Errant

We argued back and forth over our ship name before finally christening it Fool’s Errant. With only crude paints that we made using what we could gather from the island, we crossed out The Raptor, and penned our new ship’s name. After raising the most non-descript sails we could find among the lot, we set sail with fair winds. It was so good to be out

on the open waters again. Everyone’s mood seemed to improve, even the two hobbies, who I found had a generally terrible disposition.

It had been five clear days sailing apart from a few bouts of rain—which were actually welcome after the oppressive heat of the dry rainforest—when the Boneyard came into view.

As we came closer, an alarm sounded and we could see people running about on shore. We were met by a bunch of angry men, weapons drawn. It wasn’t quite the homecoming we were expecting.

“Where’s Bhet?” It didn’t sound like much of a question, but more of a demand to produce the pirate … immediately.

“He’s marooned on an island, about five days that way,” I stated, pointing in the general direction I thought the island to be.

“You’ll forgive me if I don’t believe you. This is Bhet’s boat.” When Gordon Marcum talked, people listened. The man was a legend in the Boneyard.

“Feel free to come aboard and see for yourself.”

Gordon Marcum himself was the first aboard our ship. He and his men combed it from top to bottom, eyeing the hobgoblins as they searched. Of course, Bhet wasn’t aboard. When that became evident, we were treated quite differently.

Gar, Varis, and I were welcomed into any tavern without any openly snide remarks about our ears, and Praxis and the Admiral enjoyed more than their fair share of free rounds of ale.

Varis hit up the local haunts for any information he could find on possible treasure. He heard about a message that had recently washed ashore at the Boneyard. The person who penned the message was well-known, so it had become quite the gossip. Jacquotte Delahaye, a female pirate with some renown, reported a strange storm had caused her ship, the Red Dawn, to wreck on the shores of Dar Shaw. That all sounded rather unfortunate to me.

Dar Shaw’s Plateau had been known to be an inhospitable place since The Great Flood. Visitors were not treated kindly, to say the least. For that reason, every Captain knew to give the plateau a wide berth lest they end up losing their lives and their ships to the natives of Dar Shaw.

Delahaye, I gathered, had ignored the warning. Even so, it wasn’t the story of her wreck that had caused such a stir. It was the mention in her letter of some golden idol that had an aura of power around it.

The prospect of gold was enough to send Varis into a frenzy. Never mind the warning of certain death. He was hell bent on sailing to the plateau, and I was hell bent on making sure that didn’t happen.

After a day or two at the Boneyard, we sat down to discuss our next adventure. Varis, of course, tried to sway us toward the plateau. I suggested the more noble cause of slaver-hunting. I thought for sure that Gar would take up my cause, but he instead sided with Varis! Praxis, at least had sense enough to see that Dar Shaw’s wasn’t a good idea, but I saw the gleam in the Admiral’s eye at the mention of gold. I should have asked the barkeep to dilute his ale and give him a chance to sober up before we talked business.

I hopped up on the bar, accidentally-on-purpose knocking over the Admiral’s drink. He seemed fairly angry with me until I started to clean up the mess it had made of his pants. Old habits die hard, I guess. Praxis was about to order him another drink, so I had to act fast.

It was time for a rousing speech—something that would sway my friends in the right direction.

“I stand … err sit, before you as a freed slave of Xalyon’s Crest. The Great Flood freed many, but there is still work to be done. My friend here,” I gestured to Gar who shook his head. “Come on, Gar, don’t be shy.”

Reluctantly, Gar came to stand beside me. “Gar is an escaped slave of Handa’ksh. The dark elves survived the flood by escaping underground and are still up to their old tricks!”

The little attention I had started to wane. “Don’t you see his ears and the sickly pallor of his skin?”

“No offense, Gar. I like the strange green color of your skin. It reminds me of peas; my favorite vegetable,” I bent to whisper in his ear. Gar tried to sneak away again, and this time I nearly fell off the bar trying to keep him in place.

“The dark elves bred him like this—experimented on him. We must stop them! We must stop the slavers who purchase people like pieces of property.”

There were a few mumbles and not-so-nice comments from the crowd. I gathered that most of them didn’t believe me or simply didn’t care.

“Here. Here,” a large, tough-looking man spoke up from a nearby table, lifting his drink in agreement. He was sitting quite close to a dark-haired, slender woman. I recognized them as Dorn and Keely, two pit fighters that had made a name for themselves in the Boneyard’s fighting pits. The two of them seemed to be the only ones who were still listening. Everyone else had gone back to their own conversations.

Praxis was the first to officially introduce himself to the pair. The rest of us, minus the Admiral, joined them at their table. Keely and Dorn told us their story. They were escaped slaves that fled Xalyon’s Crest five years ago. As was the way with the Boneyard, the population swelled and waned, and they had found themselves in a bit of a dry-spell at the moment. The prospect of helping slaves and lining their pockets with spoils was enough for them to join our little group. That also meant two more votes for slave-ship hunting, which put us in the lead over the search for a probably-cursed, gold statue of Dar Shaw.

Varis decided to put away his dreams of golden idols … for now, and get down to business. He managed to find a man in the back of the tavern with information on known slave ships and how much money they would fetch if commandeered.

I had to go to the little girl’s room, so I let the others sort out the details. When I came back, the plan had shifted course. We were now going to the ports of Na’Dor to find more information on the slavers—curse me and my tiny bladder!

At least Na’Dor was closer to the Boneyard than the remnants of Handa’ksh. Only three days later we were docked at Doveport on the eastern bank of Na’Dor.

Seeing the city of Xalyon’s Crest in the distance made me homesick. The pull toward my home and my family were wearing on me. Still, it somehow felt like treason to set foot on this shore. I shook off those feelings and got head in the game. People were counting on me.

We needed information about slave auctions, slaver routes, and any dealers in the area. I struck up a conversation with a human with shifty eyes at the bar. He told me that the auctions were done in the city, and that Doveport wasn’t a major hub of imports and exports. I was getting some good information, until he asked me why I wanted to know.

I hadn’t thought too much about what I would say if questioned. I just blurted that I was head slave of my Mistress’s household and she wanted to purchase more attendants for her House. That’s when things went sour. I could tell he didn’t believe me. All I could do was get out of there as quickly as possible. I milled around in town, trying to find my friends and join up with them before returning to the ship. That’s when I realized I was being followed! Three elves were trying to blend into the crowd, but I had seen them looking at me one too many times, following me from stall to stall.

This was not good. This was not good at all! I met up with Varis and Praxis, and together we went back to the Fool’s Errant. The elves didn’t follow us onto the docks, and when I turned back find them, they had vanished.

I did my best to commit their faces to memory, even drawing a rough sketch of the two whose faces I remembered well enough to identify. It wasn’t long before the rest of my friends had returned with their disguises in tow. It was getting late, so we decided to leave our questioning for tomorrow.

I didn’t like the thought of sleeping in the hold with the two gobbies. They were almost feral creatures who needed constant praise and petting to lull them into compliance. I knew I’d be the first throat they’d slit if they suddenly changed their mind, and thinking you’re going to die before you wake up is a good way to get no sleep. Thankfully, the Admiral was obliging and offered to share his cabin with me, though I wish I had known he slept in the nude. How inappropriate!

Once under my covers—fully clothed, I might add—it didn’t take long for the gentle sway of the ship to rock me to sleep. The garbled shout from one of the guards on post woke me from a sound sleep. I sprang from my bed and threw the door open to find an elf cloaked in black standing above our dead crewman! We had come under attack!

Praxis and Varis were the first to reach the deck. Gun shots and the clang of metal rang out over the placid water. I managed to push one of the elves overboard, but another one jumped down from the aft deck right in front of me! Dorn came to pull him off me, and my friends soon had the mean elf surrounded. When one elf fell, another one dropped from the sky. They were in the rigging!

The one I had pushed overboard had made his way back onto the deck and was now near death in a pool of bloody water. We couldn’t kill him. We needed to question him. Besides, he was a dark elf! And while Gar had seen too many of them, this was my first. We surrounded the fallen dark elf, and a moment later two more elves dropped down on top of us. Before we could get to him, they slit the dark elf’s throat and either fled or died on the deck.

We were all shaken from the rude awakening. So much so that I knew many of my friends and crew would have a hard time falling back to sleep. Others, I guess, were so used to such violence that they went right back to sleep while more fidgeted in their bunks. When the last one drifted off, I still found myself wide awake.

As I had done countless times with my sisters, I braided my friends’ hair. Careful not to disturb them, I plaited their hair into neat twists befit elven ladies. Revisiting habits from a more peaceful time did much to calm me, even if I was braiding Dorn’s coarse hair rather than my sisters’ soft, fine locks.

Varis slept on his side, leaving me only half his hair to work with. Praxis, thankfully, slept face down—I was able to give him quite the new doo. Dorn slept with Keely tucked into his side, his large arm and shoulder almost completely obscuring her from view. There was no way to get to Keely without climbing into bed with the duo. Surprisingly, Gar’s strange green-toned locks were silky and smelled of cucumbers. Apparently he shampooed and conditioned.

By the time I had braided the last hobgoblin’s hair, I was tuckered out. Rather than going back to the Admiral’s quarters, I decided to take a spare hammock and wait till morning.

By the time I awoke, every hammock was empty and I was the last to emerge on deck. Someone, apparently, had taken care of our mess the night before, disposing of all the bodies. Whoever these elves were, they were careful to leave no signs of their attack.

Praxis had already left the docks for the nearest tavern, and it was only a few hours past dawn. While we waited for him to return, I prepared Keely’s disguise. As a house slave, she was well aware of the mannerisms and that way a mistress would carry herself. With fine clothes, makeup to give the illusion of elven features, and a hat to hide one’s ears, she was ready to go.

Before Keely left, Praxis returned. He hadn’t received much information at the tavern. After openly asking if anyone knew anything about “ninja elves” the bartended pulled him aside for a warning. He told Praxis that he needed to “leave … town.”

We sent Keely off on her own. Well, not entirely. The rest of us milled around town to make sure she wasn’t followed by the three elves that trailed me back to Fool’s Errant. Once she slipped into the inn, all we could do was wait.

As it turned out, Keely did quite well for herself. She had managed to arrange for a selection of slaves to be delivered to the inn in four days’ time.

Dorn didn’t like the idea of waiting around for four days. He hatched a plan and sprang into action. Varis purchased a horse for Gar, who was sent off in search for a runner to Xalyon’s Crest. Keely would be leaving on foot to meet with Gar at inns along the way. I was to try to gather any information I could on the outskirts of town.

I dressed in a slave’s raiment, careful to hide my hair and ears, and asked after a man leaving in a hurry on horseback. Neither the guards nor merchants seemed to know what I was talking about. No one had seen a man fitting that description.

After my fruitless search, I returned to the ship and told my friends what I had found—nothing. Either there wasn’t a runner at all, or we—and everyone on the outskirts of Doveport—happened to miss him.

Our plan to follow the messenger to the slavers’ hub had come unraveled. Now, with Gar and Keely on their own, we decided it would be best to call them back.

I found a practitioner of magick, and requested she send a mental message to Gar for me. A few minutes later, I received a strange half-message back from Gar. I wasn’t sure what it meant, but at least I knew he had received my message.

Gar returned with Keely in tow a few hours after night had fallen. I was relieved to have everyone safe and back together again.

~Zaly

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