Episde 1: the Coffle
It's noon -- not quite two days since the raid.
The orc raiders had pushed the coffle unmercifully for many hours through that night and the next day, then finally allowed everyone to rest several hours after sundown. The unwholesome victory party was repeated by the orcish raiders -- and the latter half of the coffle noticed that their female members were approached by one or another of the raiders, but left alone after a long gaze and a sulpherous curse from the raider in question.
Just after dawn, orc raiders had kicked awake the people in the coffle. A young-looking orc in studded leather had passed up both sides of the coffle, offering a ladle of some foul smelling and no doubt poisonous swill to each of the captives. Most of the villagers from Tavolo Green, frightened and hungry, had taken the swill and a swig of spring water from this captor. None of our heros accepted the ladle, but did accept the proffered water.
Feeling somewhat better, the captives were unsurprised when one of the most fearsome of the orcish brutes dragged the front of the coffle up and shouted in broken Trade Tongue, "UP! You go now!" A leading man in the coffle, the tavern keeper, attempted to say something, and was cuffed viciously across the face. "You MEAT now! MEAT don't talk! MEAT just WALKS!"
The next few hours passed without incident, if you discount the numerous times coffle members were cuffed and spat on by their orc captors. During this inverval, the young priest, Edo, noticed that his moon elf companion, Dain, seemed almost... well... not entirely lucid. The elf mumbled under his breath, perspiring and glancing up at the sun and then around. Several times this resulted in Dain being cuffed and struck about the head and shoulders by one or another of the orc raiders. By noon, Dain's pallid face was covered in bruises, his lips split and torn by the rough handling of the captors. Further up the coffle, Jared was stealing glances around at all of the raiders he could see, while Tethka merely bowed her head and walked. She seemed to have sunk into herself, providing no additional excuse for abuse at the hands of the raiders and seemingly becoming invisible. As to the two elfin females, Erev-ba and Tannon, each walked through the morning with little or no difficulty. More than once each of these winsome elf maidens were eyed, sniffed and then spat at by one or more of the raiders. The two looked at one another quizzically, but never spoke.
Now the coffle is stopped in a meadow some 60 feet wide. One of the orcs, a huge barbarous fellow with a face almost obscured by swirling tattoos shouts out in Trade Tongue, "You rest now!"
Jared whispers to Tethka, "Ye alright, lass?" She merely nods, not meeting his eyes.
Suddenly, there's a commotion at the rear-most point of the coffle. An orcish voice shouts out, but is clipped short and... one of the captives, a middle-aged man with greying blonde hair is sprinting for the tree line. His hands are free, and he charges for the nearest bush. With whoops and yips, five young orc raiders charge after him, easily catching him short of the concealing trees. One raider reaches out and swings the man around, perhaps to cuff him into submission, but is surprised as the fellow whips around with a small knife and gashes his face. The first orc stumbles back, clutching his face, but the other four pile onto the man, forcing him to the ground. Then they beat him. Badly. The group of orcs is joined by another of the older-looking, tattooed orcs who yanks up the man by the scruff of the neck and frog-walks him up to the raid leader. The younger orcs follow, chest-thumping and high-fiving one another. The injured orc still clutches at his face, and blood wells out through his pale fingers.
The orc raid leader shouts something in an almost pleasant tenor voice, and then the remaining orcs force the coffle into a shallow crescent shape. Now all of the members of the coffle can see the fate of the middle aged man. His head hangs to one side, his face distorted with swelling and fresh blood. The orc female, her dreadlocks bobbing around her strangely slim face, turns to the coffle and speaks in unaccented Trade Tongue, "Listen to me, people of the village! Your old lives are over. Before you owned property, you held land and you farmed for yourself. Those days are through. Now you are mine. You are slaves. You are mine to kill, sell or eat as I choose. Before you had a name. Now you are MEAT. To live, you must learn a new way, and now I will teach it to you."
She turns to the man and picks up his head by the forelock.
"This man tried to run away. He denies he is MEAT. When we try to capture him, he harms us." She takes a curved dagger from her belt and suddenly slashes the man across his face, then repeats the process so that he has a huge "X" centered on his nose. His eyes pop open and he screams, with fresh blood running down his face into his eyes and onto his soiled night shirt.
"You don't EVER run. You don't EVER resist. You are MEAT! You don't have to be pretty to be MEAT. You don't have to be pretty to be useful." The man is still screaming, but has begun to curse and spew at the orc female. She listens to him for a moment, then grabs his tongue and spears her dagger down through it, pinning most of it outside his mouth.
"You don't have to have a tongue to be useful. " She nods at the tattooed orc holding the man up, who reaches around and yanks the tongue from the man's mouth. A gout of blood shoots from the man's mouth, cascading onto his chest. The orc female reaches behind her and unlimbers the Great Club slung across her back. It is a beautiful, yet disturbing club, carved into the shape of clouds and distended faces on the striking area. She takes the club in two hands, and, with a speed and power that belie her comparative slightness, smashes both of the man's legs. The long bones of his legs shatter, and the sound of crushing and breaking meat resonates through the meadow.
"You DO need legs, though." She nods at the tattooed orc, who snatches a hand axe from his belt and quickly beheads the man, holding up the head for all to see. Many of the people in the coffle scream and cry, but these cries don't last long. The orcs wade into the coffle, cuffing the kneeling captives into submissive silence.
"Where you are going, they will treat you worse than this. You are MEAT now. You follow directions, you live. Defy us and you die -- slowly. That is all. "
This has been too much. Dain, who before had been somewhat pacified, begins to struggle with his bonds, crying out, "...They are here! They're all around us! They can see us! We must flee! Help me, you fools, they're coming!" Before Edo can do so much as flinch, the other tattooed orc smashes Dain in the face. Dain's nose shatters, and he slumps toward the ground, unconscious. This proves to be somewhat of a problem for Edo, who now must support Dain's weight and that of the coffle hawser. Edo does what he can to get his shoulder under the unconscious moon elf, and is barely able to support them both as the coffle is prodded and poked back into a line. Everyone is quiet for the rest of the day. Dain wakes an hour or two later, and has some difficulty breathing through his mouth. He is wisely quiet for the rest of the afternoon.
