RESCUE AT SEA
It was a year or more before we began our passage of the Great Sea en route to Kalimdor. In that time Rappa and I learned the ropes as sailors while our ship, called Crosser, skirted the coast of the Eastern Kingdoms to the southern tip and back. We stopped in numerous trading towns on the mainland, including one large and bustling port named Booty Bay. But my guardian and I were not allowed off the ship. Since we had proven our worth, we were treated more like servants than crewmembers.
However, I found my time aboard Crosser not to be slavish at all. The days were long and the work backbreaking, true, but for a quickly growing tusker it was a wonderful world of ever-changing experiences and backdrops. Once I proved that I could stand on my own two feet, I was given tasks to do, the simplest being to make the captain's bed every day. Then I was given the job of setting the captain's table before mealtimes. Soon I was cleaning the top decks and hauling sails. I used to love to climb up to the crow's nest and spy rocks in the shallows. I would swing among the spars like a jungle monkey. But there was little chance of skiving off, and if I had done so, the captain would have been after me.
I
was the only child on board, so I quickly became "little bruddah"
to all. From the other trolls I learned fighting and swordplay,
as well as how and when to hide from the captain's ire. Our leader
was a beast of a troll, an Amani as I would discover, and he did not
spare the lash on any of the crew when showing his displeasure. But
this was simply a normal part of life at sea — serene one moment
and severe the next. Take the squalls, for example. When they hit us
it was often with only a few minute's warning. They would roll
across the horizon and we would be thrashed about like a gnome
in a boiling cauldron.
Then
there would be day upon day of still winds and idleness. In these
hours I would sit with Rappa or Dagoo, who became like an uncle to
me, and we would whittle or practice knots. The ship also had a
library of scrolls, most of them written by past captains about the
various places and peoples they had encountered. In the evenings
Rappa would teach me to read using them. By this time I was about
eight seasons old and my tusks had grown in, so like the rest of the
crew I began to carve scrimshaw into them: archaic glyphs that I had
learned in the old scrolls, along with elaborate scenes of marine
animals and fish.
From the crew I also learned about the pleasures of the flesh and drinking. During each stopover at a trading town, while the captain was off bartering for goods, the crew would sneak aboard a willing female. It was not long before, cackling deviously, they got hold of me. Virtuous Rappa refused to participate, but he did not stop the others from dragging me down into the hold to watch them "edutain" their guest. Here, they would drink rum and carouse like only trolls can. I do not deny taking part in the proceedings once or twice, but before too long I discovered the dark side of alcohol and its consuming ways. Today I rarely touch the stuff.
As for the women, let us just say that I was not as interested in them at that tender age as I would be later in my life. I began to skip the crude parties and instead stayed with Rappa in our room, which was really a small storage bay separate from the main crew quarters. It is likely we were given this berth because the captain was being cautious upon inviting us aboard. But in hindsight, it was a welcome retreat where Rappa could continue my education in privacy. He told me of blood rites and voodoo, showed me how to write the words of power, and taught me the simplest priestly spells.
Late one night a few weeks after Crosser had finally started its voyage across the Great Sea, as Rappa and I dozed before our nightly watch, the relative quiet of the ship was pierced by a scream. It echoed through the maze of bulwarks and hatches within the vessel's wood guts. I shot upright in my hammock and looked across the small room to where my guardian lay. "What wuz dat noise?" I asked anxiously. Rappa was already awake. He was a deadly protector as well as a faithful mentor.
"Prolleh dat knuckle-head Dagoo drunk agin. I go an' find out," Rappa huffed, hopping to the floor with a dagger in hand. I could hear footsteps in the companionway outside, other troll sailors rushing to the main deck. The sharp sound of steel on steel began to ring in the air, and then pandemonium broke loose. Gunshots and explosions, battle cries and screams. "Pirates! Yah bolt dah door behind me," barked my guardian, turning quickly to go. Looking back over his shoulder, he said reassuringly, "Yah gwanna be safe. Agwe watchin' over yah." And then he was gone. "Wait..." I yelped weakly. It was the last time he ever saw Rappa alive.
* * * * *
As far as I can figure I was a slave aboard the pirate ship for the next five or more years. I will not go into great detail on my captivity because it is not a very interesting or fond story for me to tell. Quite simply, I was the lowest form of life on the boat, below even the pigs the crew sometimes picked up from attacks on other trading vessels. I would collapse into bed at the end of each day in a state of complete exhaustion from all the work I was forced to do. I was routinely ridiculed, beaten, and spat upon. And that was not the worst of it.
I have since heard others say that there is no shame for those in captivity to do whatever is necessary to stay alive. I hope this is true. If not, I will carry much shame with me to Akumea upon my passing from this world. Yet I would not wish for the readers of this journal to think that I seek sympathy, or that I regret my past. No, those are weak sentiments for pink-skins and fools. While some who know my story say that I have led a hard life, to me it is the only life I know and is not hard or soft or otherwise. My past has led me to where I am today. That is all.
The ship that became my prison for half a decade was crewed almost entirely by humans, with the rare dwarf or filthy elf thrown in. I did not take close notice of the pirates other than the few who were my keepers. Through them I learned that the ocean-going brigands called themselves the Southsea Freebooters. While this very name stoked hot feelings of revenge within me, I could do nothing at the time. All my thoughts and actions were exhausted in working hard so that I might continue to live another day; that and questioning the sea god who seemed to have cursed me.
Over the years I had to dwell on my fate, I began to close my spirit-soul to Agwe. I came to believe that He had forsaken me. And so I had forsaken Him. Then one day I noticed a member of the crew that I had not seen before, a troll who had appeared seemingly from nowhere. We had not been ashore recently, and we had not captured any other ships. One day he was just there. I caught him watching me on more than one occasion. I was curious yet unnerved by his presence. The other pirates did not seem to pay him any mind. Never once did I see him acknowledge the least of them, nor them him.
Not many nights after sighting the strange troll, as the usual drinking and roughhousing wore on topsides, I saw a dark figure descend the ladder and entered the brig in the belly of the ship, where I was kept when not working. The noise from above made sleep impossible, and I was almost glad for something to divert my attention. Almost. I grew nervous as I watched the figure whisper to my guard. Maybe the captain had decided that I was growing too strong and that it was time to end my service. I steeled myself for whatever might come as I was called to the front of my cell, for I had vowed never to fall to my captors without a fight.
What happened next took place so quickly that I still question how (and why) it occurred. While I looked out through the cell door a long-bladed knife, oiled so as to give no reflection, slid out from the shadows of the visitor's cloak and deftly cut the guard's throat. Sidestepping as the dying human fell forward into the bars of my cage, I again glanced up just in time to see the same knife's hilt as it struck my forehead. Through a dizzying haze, I recall being hauled from my prison by the scruff of my shirt and covered with a cloak by strong hands. "Yah enslavement is ovah, mah brudda," I heard before succumbing to the warm blanket of unconsciousness.
I awoke to find myself in a foreign setting, a place of firm ground and clean, sweet smells. I tried to sit up and wobbled, my head spinning and my stomach lurching. "That will pass as yah become adjusted tah land agin," said a troll voice from several yards away. "Dis be yah new home." I glanced around through narrowed eyes and saw stilted huts near a beach, trolls walking freely about the village. "Dat be Sen'jin. Yah go der. Grow up strong, proud," commanded the voice. "Yah be Darkspear, an' even if we no from dah same tribe, troll look out fah troll. Dat what Fathah Oshun say." I heard the retreat of footsteps and then nothing save the sound of the waves lapping gently onto the beach.
Tears began to fall down my cheeks as I realized that I was once more a free troll and that Agwe, Father Ocean, had been watching over me all along.
